An AI-generated image depicting an actor on a film set [Created with ChatGPT]
An AI-generated image depicting an actor on a film set [Created with ChatGPT]

"I hate to say it, but we're done." — Rhett Reese, screenwriter of the "Deadpool" film series.

Netflix pays lead actors as much as 500 million won ($324,000) per episode. Skyrocketing fees for top-billed talent have long been cited as a primary driver of rising production costs.

That calculus may soon change. The latest version of Seedance, the AI video model from ByteDance that sparked what the industry has called a global "AI video revolution," is set for a full commercial launch in July.

The industry is watching closely to see whether AI will upend film and drama series production — long considered a domain requiring human expertise. The emergence of an AI video model capable of replacing on-screen talent is also drawing fresh scrutiny to actor pay trends.

According to IT industry sources and foreign media, ByteDance's latest AI video model, Seedance 2.5, will officially launch in July. It is the follow-up to Seedance 2.0, which rattled the industry so deeply that observers dubbed its arrival a "Seedance shock" — comparable in impact to the "DeepSeek shock" that preceded it. ByteDance is the Chinese parent company of the social media platform TikTok.

The most notable upgrade in Seedance 2.5 is a significant increase in video length. A single prompt can now generate up to 30 seconds of footage. The model produces natural scene transitions and variable pacing within a single clip, with no need to stitch separate segments together.

Video quality has also improved. The model supports native 4K output, enabling sharper rendering of product textures and fine detail — a development the industry expects to make commercial advertisement and marketing content production considerably easier. ByteDance also updated the existing Seedance 2.0 model to support native 4K resolution alongside the Seedance 2.5 announcement.

ByteDance's AI video model Seedance has emerged as a major talking point in the global video market. [Yonhap]
ByteDance's AI video model Seedance has emerged as a major talking point in the global video market. [Yonhap]

Seedance 2.5 also accepts up to 50 types of multimodal reference materials — more than four times the 12 supported by its predecessor — enabling more precise video generation and editing. The more reference materials a user provides, the finer the control over the final output.

The model is currently in an enterprise beta phase. ByteDance plans to launch Seedance 2.5 officially in China in early July, though a global release schedule has not been announced.

In addition, ByteDance unveiled an AI copyright commercialization platform designed to address intellectual property concerns that have become a flashpoint in the AI video industry. Users can upload officially licensed film IP to the platform and earn revenue through a profit-sharing structure, supporting the lawful use of AI-generated content.

Meanwhile, Seedance 2.0 was drawn into a copyright controversy shortly after its release earlier this year, when videos depicting well-known Hollywood actors moving with striking realism began circulating online. Major US entertainment companies — including Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount and Netflix — raised intellectual property infringement concerns at the time, which delayed the model's global rollout.


chami@heraldcorp.com