Acceptable Use of AI? Sweet Video Brings Grandfather’s Photo Memories to Life
While AI is heavily criticized and feared by many people, it is difficult not to be moved and impressed by a video made by Luis Fernández for his grandfather’s 90th birthday.
Set to the music from Cinema Paradiso, the video begins with a recent photo of Juan Manuel standing next to a speed limit sign that reads “90.” Although at the start of the video, the nonagenarian backflips away from the road, highlighting AI’s shortcomings in physics, the video then picks up into a heartwarming tribute to an old man.
Using photographs taken between the 1940s and 1960s, Fernández brought the images to life with a generative AI app to produce a short film in which the images move with subtle gestures.
“My aunt Lola sent me about 300 photos she’d been collecting for months. When I started editing them, I thought about animating some of them, especially the older ones,” Fernández tells Telecinco. “I knew my grandfather would like to see his family in motion again.”
To mark Manuel’s 90th birthday, the family, from Andalusia in Spain, found photos that had been untouched in albums for decades. They include a 1944 portrait of young Juan Manuel with his mother and siblings, scenes of Manuel riding horses and motorcycles in his youth, moments from family life, and photographs from his wedding in 1965.
“The day he saw the video, he was amazed,” Fernández tells Telecinco. “He said it was science fiction.” The family had gathered for the celebration, unaware of the photo animations they were about to be shown.
Fernández emphasizes that the AI does not replace the original images but offers a reinterpretation meant to enhance the tribute. For him, the tool simply provided a new way to connect his grandfather with moments from his past. “It was a tribute to his life and everything he’s built,” he adds.
Fernandez was born on November 20. 1935. He has worked both as a lawyer and a farmer, and even today, at 90 years old, he visits the fields each morning, maintains a light routine, and recently renewed his driver’s license. He is the father of five children, grandfather of eleven, and great-grandfather to a newborn who carries his name.
Many online commentators commented on how Fernández’s video was a “beautiful” use of AI. There has been much debate recently over AI’s role in breathing new life into old photos; Saturday Night Live recently pilloried the technology in a hilarious sketch featuring Glen Powell.
