🎬 The New AI Workflow: Generate with Veo, Shape with Runway

Filmmakers are combining two AI tools to create and edit video.
They’re using Google Veo to generate high-quality, cinematic scenes from a text prompt,
then bringing those videos into Runway to edit, customize, and publish.

This is becoming a practical new AI workflow.

What the Companies Are Saying

Veo is built to generate cinematic video from a simple text prompt, with higher consistency and realism across frames.

It’s designed to understand visual storytelling-scene composition, camera movement, and lighting.

As Google explains:

“Veo understands camera movements, visual effects, and cinematic language, enabling creators to generate shots that look and feel like real films.”
- Google DeepMind blog, May 14, 2025

Runway positions itself as the platform where creators go to shape and personalise AI video output.

It focuses on giving users control over what happens after the video is generated.

As Runway puts it:

“We’re building creative tools that empower people to tell their stories with AI-not just generate them.”
- Runway Product Announcement, April 2025

What That Means (In Human Words)

You can generate high-quality video with Google Veo, but you can’t edit it.
If you want to trim, add text, or change anything-you’ll need to bring it into Runway.
That’s the current setup: one tool to generate, one tool to edit.

Let’s Connect the Dots

You’re confused? We’re not surprised.

If both tools let you make video from a prompt, why would you use-or even pay for-both?

The answer is: it really depends on what you are doing this for.

Are you just experimenting? Working with clients? Trying to go viral? Pitching a film idea?

It comes down to your goal, your job, and the quality of video you need to produce or create.

Here’s a simple breakdown to help decide:

📊 Quality Comparison: Veo vs Runway (Gen-2)

Bottom Line

Google Veo

• Access: Limited preview through Google Labs and Vertex AI

• Editing: Not supported

• Cost: Currently not public-likely tied to Google Cloud usage

• Link: https://deepmind.google/technologies/veo

Runway (Gen-2)

• Access: Public and available via web at runwayml.com

• Editing: Full timeline, masking, audio, effects

• Cost: Free tier available, paid plans start at ~$12/month

• Link: https://runwayml.com

Current Workflow:

1. Generate with Veo (if you have access)

2. Download video

3. Import into Runway for editing

4. Export and publish anywhere

Frozen Light Team Perspective

Let’s just say it:
Our world won’t run on one tool or one AI that does it all.

It all comes down to knowing what you need and which tool gives you the best result.

Sounds simple, right?

Well-maybe now. But as AI evolves, it’s only going to get messier.
More models. More vendors. More overlap.
And it’ll be up to us, the users, to make sense of it.

This Veo–Runway setup? From the outside, it’s giving “guys, get a room.”
But from the inside, it’s classic strategy:
“If you can’t beat them-join them.”
And in this case, they both kind of did.

Google releases a text-to-video model with no editing, no interface, no feedback loop.
You generate the video and hope it’s what you meant.
No way to fix a mistake. No chance to adjust.

Look-I barely trust myself to send a text message to a friend without reading it three times.
Now I’m supposed to be fine sending one off to an AI that turns it into a film?
Yeah… no.

But here’s the real play:
Google needs data.
Real usage, real human hands on the model.
This is how they think they’ll get their hands on that human user data-
to know what works, what doesn’t, and how to improve their algorithm.

Meanwhile, Runway’s not stopping anyone.
They’re staying close-"keep your competitor closer" energy.
Let creators bring in Veo clips and do what they can’t do in Veo:
Make it human. Make it theirs.

And who wins?

We do.
But only if we understand what we’re doing and what we need.

Because in the AI world, tools don’t win.
Users who know how to use tools win.