AI Zombie Trend Prompts

The zombie trend format is a fifteen-second film with a fixed shape: a survivor cannot raise a gun, the turned one comes closer, arms open instead of a shot, and the embrace hard-cuts from a cold cabin into a golden field. A prompt has to hold all of that in one pass, and hold two faces recognisable while it does.

This page is for people writing those prompts themselves, in a video model that takes images as character references. Our own generator does not have a prompt box — the beat map below is already pinned server-side, so the only decision left in the workbench is which two photographs go in. That is a deliberate product choice, not a missing feature; here is what the prompt is actually doing so you can judge both routes.

What a zombie trend prompt has to carry

Six jobs, and a prompt that misses any one of them produces a different video than the one you came for:

1. Two named identities. Character A is the survivor, Character B is the one who has turned. Every later sentence refers back to those names, which is how a model keeps two people from blending into one.
2. A locked appearance per character. Undead B is described once, in detail, and the living version is explicitly tied back to the reference photo.
3. The beat map, timed. Four shots with second ranges. Without timestamps a model rushes the ending and the match cut lands at the wrong moment.
4. The colour contract. Cold blue-grey for the cabin, warm gold for the field. The emotional turn is carried by the grade, not by the acting.
5. A restraint clause. No gore, no biting, no blood. The format is a romance dressed as horror; and the clause keeps the render inside moderation on the models that have it.
6. Format and length. 9:16 vertical, about fifteen seconds, with scene audio — the aspect ratio and the duration are the two things most often left out and most annoying to re-render for.

The all-in-one prompt

Paste this whole block into a model that accepts two character references, then attach your survivor photo as reference one and the turned photo as reference two.

Create a 15-second cinematic short from two character references.
Vertical 9:16, with scene audio. Photorealistic, soft film grain.

CHARACTER A: @image1 — the survivor, fully human.
CHARACTER B: @image2 — the one who has turned.

Identity lock: preserve Character A's facial identity, hairstyle and body
proportions exactly as in the reference. Preserve Character B's facial
identity, hairstyle and proportions as in the reference, and apply the undead
make-up on top of it: pale grey skin, cloudy pale eyes, dark veins at the
temples, hollow features, dishevelled hair. B must stay unmistakably
recognisable as the person in the reference photo.

SHOT 1 — THE CABIN (0-4s). A dark, abandoned wooden cabin, dim daylight
through old windows, dust in the air, cold blue-grey grade. Tight close-up of
Character A's face, crying, red eyes, trembling lips, shaking hands. A handgun
hangs lowered at A's side. A cannot bring themself to raise it. Cut wide: B
crosses the room toward A with a stiff, unnatural gait — approaching, not
attacking.

SHOT 2 — THE UNDEAD FACE (4-6s). Extreme close-up of B: the make-up above,
shallow depth of field, small facial twitches, uneven breathing. Frightening
but recognisable. No gore, no open wounds, no biting, no blood.

SHOT 3 — THE CHOICE (6-10s). Back to A, still crying, gun still lowered. A
lets the weapon fall from their hands and slowly opens both arms — not in
defence, in recognition. B stops. Something familiar moves behind the cloudy
eyes. B crosses the last few steps and rests their head against A's shoulder.
A closes their eyes and holds them. The camera begins a slow arc around the
two figures.

SHOT 4 — THE MATCH CUT (10-15s). Exactly as B leans in, cut. The cabin becomes
an open wheat field at sunset, warm golden grade, wind. Both characters are
alive and healthy, appearance restored to the reference photos, clean everyday
clothing. The embrace continues without a break across the cut — same arms,
same distance, same direction of movement, now in sunlight. Hold two seconds,
then the film ends.

Tone: grief turning into reunion. This is a love story, not a horror scene.

Read it back, beat by beat

The identity sentence goes second, not last. Models weight earlier clauses more heavily, and face drift is the single most common failure of this format. If the faces soften after the cut, move the identity lock to the top of the prompt and repeat B's restored-appearance line inside shot 4.

"Approaching, not attacking" is load-bearing. Without it the model reads a zombie crossing a room as a chase, and the whole third shot — the choice to lower the gun — has nothing to be a choice about.

The match cut is a movement instruction, not an edit instruction. "The embrace continues without a break across the cut, same arms, same direction of movement" is what makes the transition read as one continuous gesture instead of two clips glued together. If the cut feels abrupt, name the pose on both sides of it.

The restraint clause is also a moderation shield. "Frightening but recognisable, no gore, no open wounds, no blood" keeps the render on the romance side of the line. Describe the undead look as make-up on a known face and you get both a safer submission and a better result.

Swap-in lines for each story

Change only the relationship line under the character block, and the pronouns that follow it. Everything above it is shared.

Partner — B is A's partner, who has tragically turned. Best friend — B is A's best friend, who has tragically turned. Parent — A is the younger survivor. B is A's parent, the elder of the two references, who has tragically turned. Pet — B is A's dog or cat, matching the second reference, an undead animal. With the pet variant, replace the identity lock with the animal's own features — preserve the exact breed, coat, size and facial identity of the animal — and change how B crosses the room to dragging itself closer on a stiff gait.

Keep the pronouns consistent after you swap: a pet is it and its throughout, and mixing they into the animal variant is how you end up with a humanoid figure in fur.

If your model takes no image references

Describe both faces in words instead, one short paragraph each — hair, eyes, build, the one detail that makes the person recognisable to you — and accept that identity will drift across fifteen seconds. That drift is the honest limit of the text-only route: nothing in a written description can carry a specific face the way a reference image does. It is the reason this product submits both photographs as character references rather than as a starting frame.

What goes wrong, and the line that fixes it

Before you upload the two photographs

The prompt can only work with a usable pair. One clear face per photo, A close to the camera, both subjects roughly the same distance from the lens, and no group shots. The order matters: the survivor goes in first, the turned second — that order is what the prompt calls @image1 and @image2. Full guidance in how to make an AI zombie video.

Frequently asked questions

Are these prompts free to use?

Yes. This page is free, the blocks are yours to copy, and there is no attribution requirement. What costs money is the render — either your own credits on whatever model you use, or a one-time credit pack here, with no subscription.

Do I need a specific video model?

Any that accepts two character references and runs to about fifteen seconds. The prompt is written around the mechanism, not a vendor, so the same block moves between services. Reference support is the part worth checking before you spend anything.

Can the zombie be my dog or cat?

Yes — the pet variant above rewrites the identity lock to hold breed and coat instead of a human face. Same structure, same four beats.

Why does your own generator not have a prompt box?

Because the format's quality comes from the storyboard, and a storyboard people edit is a storyboard people break. The beat map on this page is pinned on our side and applied to every film, which is also why renders here come out looking like each other. If you would rather write the prompt yourself, this page is the whole recipe.

Can I use a photo of someone else?

Only with their agreement, and never a public figure or a minor. The generator asks you to declare that before it renders. Guidance on choosing and clearing photos in the privacy guide.

Or skip the prompting

Two photos, one world, a person or a pet as the one who turned, and the fifteen seconds come back with the sound design already on it — open the generator, or see what came out of the last renders in examples.