Ghosts, Cameras & AI: How a music video was born from a ghost and curiosity. A behind-the-scenes look at turning a melancholic story into an AI-powered video project.
🎯 Motivation: Creative Curiosity Over Credentials
Golden Star Mall is open from 9 to 9. By day, it’s full of people, sounds, and sales. But after hours, it empties out — and that’s when she appears. This project started with a simple idea: explore what AI can do creatively. As an art hobbyist, I wasn’t aiming to become an art director, just someone experimenting with visuals, sound, and storytelling. The concept? A young woman in blouse, skirt, and white sneakers haunts a mall at night. No horror. Just her quiet presence. Watched by security cameras. Most of the times, she stares right into the lens.
💡 The Concept: A Ghost in Sneakers
The idea was sparked by a visit to the “Ghosts” exhibition at Kunstmuseum Basel, my interest in abandoned places, and a deep love for melancholic dance music. I turned that inspiration into a 15-scene story, using ChatGPT to shape the ghost narrative.
🖼 Visuals: Midjourney and Controlled Randomness
I used Midjourney, guided by a custom GPT I built (“Art Director for Midjourney”), to create the visuals, using always the same portrait as "Omni Reference". I allowed randomness to play a role, which gave the whole thing a haunting, slightly glitchy feel — perfect for the story. The result: 15 scene stills and clips that felt like lost footage from a dream you almost remember.
🎬 Editing: Learning by Doing in Final Cut Pro
With 15 mini-clips ready, I edited them in Final Cut Pro. As a beginner, the learning curve was real, but rewarding. I focused on soft transitions, emotional pacing, and balancing motion with stillness. Final Cut Pro was very helpful, and this was my first time working seriously with video editing.
🎵 Music: From Mood to Soundtrack via AI
Then came the music. The video was silent at first — so I asked ChatGPT to help analyze the mood and generate a music brief. Based on that, I used Udio to create an atmospheric dance track: upbeat, melancholic, with soft vocals. The lyrics were also AI-generated and written to reflect the mood of the ghost story. The track brought everything together emotionally and gave the visuals a rhythm.
📦 Output: A Full Creative Package
From this small project came a surprising number of outputs: the music video (shared across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and my blog), a photo gallery on Flickr, a short ghost story on flurakus.ch, and even some Instagram reels with alternate scenes. This post itself serves as a case study, showing what can happen when creative curiosity meets accessible tools.
🧠 What I Learned: AI as a Creative Companion
What did I learn? That you don’t have to be a filmmaker or sound designer to prototype real creative projects with AI. With just a concept and the willingness to try, you can explore stories in motion, image, and sound — and learn a lot along the way.
➤ Watch. Read. Explore
Curious to try something similar? Or want to talk creative workflows with AI? Let’s connect.