Google Veo 3.1 Lite: same performance, half the price

2026.04.01

What's up — Carat crew here. 🤗 Google just dropped a new video AI that handles animated text, OpenAI pulled in the biggest funding round in history, and Runway showed off AI characters that talk back. Let's get into it.

🔥 Google Veo 3.1 Lite: same performance, half the price

Google just released Veo 3.1 Lite. It does everything Veo 3.1 Fast does, but at less than half the cost. Text-to-video, image-to-video, same speed, same quality.

It supports 720p and 1080p in both landscape (16:9) and portrait (9:16), with 4, 6, or 8-second clips. It's built for developers who need to generate video at scale without burning through their budget.

On April 7, Google is also cutting the price of Veo 3.1 Fast. They're clearly pushing to make video generation more accessible across the board.

Carat is planning to add Veo 3.1 Lite soon. Same performance at half the cost — if video production costs have been holding you back, stay tuned.

📌 Today's top 3 stories

1️⃣ OpenAI just raised $122B. What's next?

OpenAI closed a $122 billion funding round — the largest in AI history. Amazon, NVIDIA, and SoftBank all came to the table.

Why did this much money pile in? ChatGPT now has over 900 million weekly active users and is growing revenue 4x faster than Alphabet or Meta did at the same stage. For investors, it's a land grab — get in early on the fastest-growing company in the AI space.

OpenAI says the capital will go toward next-gen compute infrastructure and global AI expansion. It's a signal of just how big the bets on AI have gotten.

2️⃣ One photo, one AI character that talks back

Runway unveiled a new AI character feature at their NYC Summit. Drop in a single photo and it becomes a real-time AI character that sees through your camera and actually talks to you.

It's built on GWM-1, their world model tech. No training needed — it handles everything from photorealistic to cartoon styles. The character can even react to what it sees through your camera.

They also announced a $10M fund for AI media startups, backing early-stage companies building in video, media, and simulation.

Once this goes mainstream, imagine spinning up a 24/7 AI brand ambassador from a single headshot. It's still API-only for now, but the first real business use cases are coming fast.

3️⃣ Meta's AI glasses now record your meetings

Meta dropped the Gen 2 Ray-Ban AI glasses. This time they come in prescription versions too, so anyone who wears glasses can use them.

The standout feature: Meeting Intelligence. Wear them into a meeting and they auto-record, then summarize the key points when it's over. Point them at food and they'll break down calories and nutrition.

They also added a desktop mode where the glasses understand what's on your screen and offer help in context. AI that sees what you see, in real time — it's getting real.

🧪 Prompt tip of the day

Cherry blossom portraits — just paste these prompts

Cherry blossom season is here, so we tested and verified two sakura prompts on Carat. Upload a selfie and watch it turn into a magazine-quality blossom shot.

🌸 Cinematic cherry blossom rain

Paste this prompt into Nano Banana 2 along with your photo. It creates a dreamy petal-shower effect.

Transform this photo with cherry blossom petals falling like rain. Layer the petals at three depths — some blurred close to camera, some mid-distance, some far. Add warm spring golden-hour light filtering through the blossoms, cinematic composition, soft pink and warm tones. Keep the face sharp and clear, petals falling around but not covering the face. Canon EOS R5, 85mm f/1.4, ISO 200 look.

Here's what we got on Carat with Nano Banana 2. ⬇️

🌸 Magazine portrait under the blossoms

This one swaps the petal rain for a classic under-the-tree look.

Transform this photo as if taken under a fully bloomed cherry blossom tree. Pink petals drifting in a gentle breeze, warm golden-hour sunlight around 5 PM. Background of pastel pink sakura branches with soft blur, shallow depth of field like an 85mm portrait lens, magazine editorial quality. 4K resolution.

Same method, different vibe. ⬇️

Copy a prompt, drop it into Carat with a selfie, and you're done.

Thanks for reading — see you tomorrow. 😊