Kling Omni Director clones camera moves straight from reference video

Anyone who has tried directing an AI video knows the struggle. You want a dramatic cinematic crane shot, but you are stuck typing clunky text prompts like camera zooms in slightly, only to watch the AI wildly drift off into space.

Text was simply never designed to describe camera kinematics. This week, Kuaishou's Kling research team introduced Omni Director, an experimental project that tosses text-based camera steering out the window.

Instead of making you describe camera behavior in words, Omni Director asks for a reference video clip and a target still image. It parses the reference camera's exact trajectory, then uses that behavior to direct the new scene.

From Furiosa crane shots to hard cuts

This goes well beyond standard pan and zoom presets. Omni Director picks up complex, choreographed camera work, including dramatic aerial dives, dizzying dolly zooms, bullet-time rotations, and extreme fisheye distortions.

Even more impressive is how it handles pacing and editing. If your reference clip contains multi-camera sequences, Omni Director carries those cuts straight into the output at the exact same rhythm.

In one demo, a reference clip cuts from a third-person view of a motorcyclist to a first-person helmet cam; Omni Director mapped that exact multi-shot structure onto an eagle flying through the sky. Another sequence borrowed an sweeping crane move straight out of Furiosa.

It is not completely glitch-free yet. Creators at Theoretically Media spotted occasional quirks, like a character's arms accidentally mimicking the propeller blades spinning behind her. But the ability to borrow real cinematography without 3D camera tracking is undeniable.

Why it matters

We think the AI video race is officially shifting from raw visual fidelity to granular directorial control.

Until now, getting specific camera movement meant playing a prompt lottery. By grounding camera paths in real-world video references, Omni Director gives directors and animators a functional tool rather than an unpredictable novelty. If you spot a camera move in a commercial or movie that you like, you can simply lift it.

For storyboard artists, indie filmmakers, and animators, this drastically shrinks pre-visualization costs. Complex drone maneuvers and impossible physical shots can be prototyped in seconds without firing up Blender or Unreal Engine.

Keep in mind that Omni Director is strictly a research preview from Kuaishou's KwaiVGI group right now. While there is a code button on their page, no code or weights have dropped yet. But it provides a clear preview of where video models are heading, and we would expect similar reference-based camera controls to land in production models very soon.