In the AI era, anything is truly possible. A young Chinese person named Mx-Shall Liu Ziyu, who lives in a county town in Yunnan and whose main profession is a wedding photographer, produced an AI-original short film with a budget of only 3,000 yuan (approximately NT$13,500), spending 10 days working on it alone.Zombie Scavenger》(Zombie Scavenger), which not only garnered over 10 million views on X, but even caught the attention of Hollywood producers who crossed the ocean to reach out and seek collaboration.
Hollywood-level short film 《Zombie Cleaner》（Zombie Scavenger）
If you haven’t seen it yet, let me show you what this stunning AI short film actually looks like. The story follows a robot cowboy riding an ostrich through a post-apocalyptic wasteland, battling hordes of zombies, and falling in love with a mannequin girlfriend. According to The Paper, the film’s narrative and camera work are seamlessly smooth, full of classic Hollywood dark humor.
This is one of the best short films I’ve seen in years.
Very soon, we’ll stop calling it “AI film” and just call it film. pic.twitter.com/6yjU6HcnzN
— PJ Ace (@PJaccetturo) May 10, 2026
One-Person Hollywood: From Wedding Photographer to AI Director
Mx-Shall Liu Ziyu — this name went from unknown to becoming the focus of the global AI creation community in just one week. He normally lives in a county town in Yunnan, where his main work is wedding photography and portrait photography. All his skills — from photography composition to AI creation — were entirely self-taught through watching videos online and browsing blog posts.
This short film titled “Zombie Janitor” was entirely created using Chinese AI video technology. Seedance 2.0 For the production, Liu Ziyu handled the entire process single-handedly, from scripting and storyboarding to AI generation and post-production editing. From concept to finished product took only 10 days, with token costs coming to approximately 3,000 RMB.
Wild Philosophy: The Untextbooked Path to Creative Work
In an interview on the Chinese Xiaohongshu channel “Nanmen Recording Hall – Along” with Liu Ziyu, this creator summarized their secret to success in three characters: “Unorthodox methodsHe emphasized that he has never received any formal film or video training, and that all his cinematography composition and AI tool skills come from watching extensive amounts of online videos and hands-on experimentation in his daily life.
“Don’t overthink it, just start doing it.” This is the creative advice Liu Ziyu offered in an interview. He believes that in the AI era, the creative bottleneck has shifted from technical barriers to personal taste and execution. As technical tools become accessible to everyone, what determines the height of a work is no longer equipment or budget, but the creator’s understanding of rhythm, visuals, and storytelling.
This interview conveys a key proposition: AI is transforming film and TV production from resource-intensive to creativity-intensive. When generative tools can handle the technical execution layer, an individual’s aesthetic sensibility and storytelling instinct become the sole barrier.
Little Lark and Seedance 2.0: Core Tools Breakdown
The core tool Liu Ziyu uses is ByteDance’s AI video generation model. Seedance 2.0and operates through its official app called Xiaoyunshe (Little Lark). Seedance 2.0 is not merely a text-to-video tool; it boasts three core capabilities: directorial thinking (automatic storyboard composition), world knowledge (no need for encyclopedia-style descriptions), and the ability to reference multimodal inputs (image and text mixed control). In short, it doesn’t generate “clips”—it generates “scenes.”
“Xiaolark” is an AI creative assistant service by CapCut that supports effortless video creation, digital avatar narration, AI design, background removal, and more. Users simply input commands, and AI automatically handles scripting, editing, voiceovers, and other processes. Compared to Seedance 2.0’s own service “Jimeng,” it offers significantly lower prices and much faster video generation speed.
The image graphic design portion uses OpenAI’s GPT Image 2 primarily using Nano Banana Pro, FLUX, Midjourney, and other tools:
10-Day Creative Process: Complete Breakdown
According to Sina TechReportHere is the specific workflow Liu Ziyu used to complete this short film in 10 days:
- Days 1-2: Script and Concept Design Using Doubao AI, another ByteDance product, to help optimize the story script and dialogue logic. The story draws inspiration from the post-apocalyptic wasteland aesthetics of WALL-E and Love, Death & Robots. First, establish the three-act structure: World Building → Rising Action → Emotional Resolution.
- Day 3-4: Storyboard Generation and Visual Control Use Jimeng AI’s intelligent multi-frame mode to generate storyboard drafts, locking in the composition and camera direction for each scene. Prompt writing for Seedance 2.0 is a key step: it’s not about writing long prompts, but rather getting four things right—structure, anchoring, pacing, and transitions.
- Days 5-7: Core Video Generation Batch video generation through the Seedance 2.0 model in Lark. Here, Liu Ziyu also paired it with “Wanxiang 2.2” (deployed locally via ComfyUI) for finer control over visual details. Seedance 2.0’s “Character Reference” feature ensures the robot protagonist maintains consistent appearance across every shot—a pain point that has been most criticized in AI videos previously.
- Day 8-9: Sound Effects and Voice Acting Use CapCut’s AI voiceover feature to generate dialogue and narration. What sets Seedance 2.0 apart is that the videos it generates come with native audio (ambient sounds, combat effects, etc.), so post-production only needs enhancement rather than starting from scratch.
- Day 10: Post-Production Editing and Export Using “Jianying Pro” for final editing, color grading, subtitle addition, and export. The entire film’s token cost (AI computing fees) was approximately 3,000 RMB.
The biggest takeaway from this workflow is that it replicates the complete stages of traditional filmmaking—scripting, storyboarding, shooting, and post-production—but replaces the execution tools at each stage with AI. The creator’s role shifts from “equipment operator” to “director and decision-maker,” deciding the story direction, aesthetic style, and editing rhythm, while having AI handle the specific visual generation.
Friends who are interested can check out the full interview – I personally find it quite informative.
3000 Yuan vs Hollywood: The Cost Bombshell
The most striking number in this case is undoubtedly the cost comparison. A Token fee of 3,000 RMB (approximately NT$13,500) resulted in 10 million views in a single day, going viral overseas, and Hollywood producers reaching out proactively. Compared to traditional Hollywood production budgets often running into hundreds of millions of dollars, this cost disparity sparked widespread discussion.
Moreover, multiple media outlets reported that after seeing this short film, Hollywood’s AI creative community was asking around trying to find out “who this Chinese director is.” In fact, the CEO of an American film company even went public on social media searching for Liu Ziyu, hoping to work with him.
Many critics compare Scavenger of the Dead to the Netflix animated series Love, Death & Robots. It’s not just the similar post-apocalyptic wasteland visual style—both represent a “creator-driven” production model. As the era arrives where ordinary enthusiasts can become feature film directors, the traditional film and TV industry division of labor—screenwriter, director, cinematography, VFX, post-production—may face a complete restructuring. AI tools allow one person to take on the roles that once required an entire team, and while the quality gap still exists, the rapid lowering of barriers is an irreversible trend.
Users on the X platform also engaged in heated discussions, with some praising “Indeed, once the technical bottleneck is broken, what truly matters is individual thought and aesthetics.” Others reminded that “given that one of the major advantages of AI video is easier script modification, you can quickly adjust when inspiration strikes,” demonstrating that this indeed opens up a new creative model.
Conclusion
The story of Liu Ziyu and “Zombie Cleaner” is not just an inspirational case of an ordinary person going viral, but also a signal of the times: AI is lowering the barrier to entry for video creation, shrinking it from million-dollar budgets and professional teams down to a smartphone, a Douyin account, and a creator willing to try. When Hollywood starts paying attention to a wedding photographer in a Yunnan county town, the rules of the film industry may be being rewritten.
Worth noting is that this won’t be an isolated case. As AI tools like Seedance 2.0 and Xiaoyunci continue to evolve, we’ll likely see more creative examples of “one person, one army” in the future—and this is precisely one of the most exciting possibilities of the AI era. Those who want to learn how to use these tools can check out the tutorial video we made.
Source: KOCPC Chinese