AI Reel Generator
From topic to short-form video — AI script, HeyGen avatar, then schedule or post to LinkedIn and Instagram without opening five creative tools.
Key takeaways
- Queue topics, and each one becomes a 9:16 talking-head reel — script, avatar, voice, overlays, render.
- Pick a HeyGen avatar and a paired voice, filter voices by language, or let it rotate looks of the same person so every reel differs without changing who's on screen.
- Three promotion levels: no brand mention at all, a soft end-frame link, or saying the brand aloud — softer endings travel further.
- Script and visual prompt sets rotate per reel, layered on standing context you write once.
- Prepaid reel credits, roughly one per 30 seconds of finished video — a separate pool from your monthly AI credits.
- Publish as a LinkedIn video post and/or an Instagram Reel, with optional Slack approval before anything goes live.
Short-form video converts, and producing it weekly is usually the bottleneck: script, film, edit, caption, upload. The Reel Generator collapses that into a queue. You add topics; it writes the script, films a talking-head avatar, adds overlays, saves the file locally, and publishes to LinkedIn and Instagram.
It runs in the same desktop app as your engagement bots, so publishing happens through your own local LinkedIn and Instagram sessions — not a third-party posting API.
How it works
- 1
Add what the reels are about
A title and an optional context line per topic, the same queue model as the Post Generator, with bulk import if you're planning a month at once. Each reel takes the next topic off the queue.
- 2
Cast it
Choose a HeyGen avatar and voice. Manual is the default so the face on your reels is a deliberate choice, not a lottery — but you can turn on look rotation to keep the same person and voice while varying outfit and angle per reel.
- 3
Read the brief
Before generating, you can open the exact brief being sent to the video agent for your first topic, edit it, or reset it to the template. Nothing about the generation is a black box.
- 4
Generate
A script prompt set and a visual prompt set are drawn, the script is written from your standing context and tone, and the video agent renders a 9:16 talking-head clip with overlays. Reel credits are charged by duration.
- 5
Review, then publish
Finished reels land in the Generates tab with their caption and script. Publish straight away, or require approval — via Slack if connected, otherwise they wait in Awaiting approval on your machine.
Casting the avatar and voice
HeyGen groups looks by person, and the app follows that structure so the choice stays intuitive: pick the person first, then the specific look. A few details make this less fiddly than it sounds:
- Each look has a HeyGen paired voice, marked with a star and selected by default — the voice that actually matches that face.
- Filter the voice list by language when you're producing in something other than English.
- Same-gender-only hides voices that don't match the avatar's gender, which removes most of the obviously wrong pairings.
- Random look each time keeps the person and voice fixed and rotates through all their looks, so a week of reels doesn't look like the same clip re-recorded.
How hard each reel sells
The ending is what decides whether a reel gets shared or scrolled past, so promotion level is an explicit setting rather than something buried in a prompt.
| Mode | What the ending does |
|---|---|
| None | No brand mention, no URL, no pitch — ends on the sharpest line in the script |
| Soft (default) | Ends on the insight; your link appears as small on-screen text on the final frame only, never read aloud |
| Direct | Says the brand name aloud once and shows the link on screen |
Softer endings tend to travel further, because the reel reads as a point of view rather than an ad. Direct exists for when you're deliberately running a promotion.
Brand and standing context
Setup holds the things that should be true of every reel, so you're not restating them per topic:
- Standing context: who you sell to, what you do, proof points worth repeating. Added to every script prompt.
- Brand logo: attached to each reel as a resource for the video agent — used as a corner watermark or an end card. Same logo as the Post Generator.
- Brand accent colour: reserved so overlays never paint an entire text box in it, which is what makes AI video captions look cheap.
- Script prompt sets and visual prompt sets: rotated per reel so structure and look vary across the queue.
Reel credits, not surprise bills
Reel rendering runs on prepaid reel credits, priced by finished duration — roughly one credit per 30 seconds — and completely separate from the monthly AI credit pool that powers comments, networking copy, Reddit drafts, and post captions.
Your remaining balance sits in the header of the Reel Generator, and the app shows the credit cost of a reel before you generate it. There's no metered API bill arriving later: if you're out of reel credits, generation stops instead of quietly spending more money.
Publishing and the Generates tab
LinkedIn publishes the reel as a native video post — to your personal feed or your company page, matching your Post Generator setting. Instagram publishes it as a Reel. Same caption and same mp4 to both, and the file stays on your machine either way.
| Control | Range / behaviour |
|---|---|
| Reels per day | 1–10, with a random target inside the range |
| Hours between reels | Configurable minimum and maximum gap |
| Require approval | Slack Approve / Reject when connected; otherwise reels wait in Generates → Awaiting approval |
| Finished reels | Listed with duration, resolution, file size, avatar, caption, and script |
The Generates tab isn't just an archive. You can re-edit a finished reel by leaving a note about what to change, publish it later to either platform, or delete it — and if a render was interrupted, it can be recovered rather than lost.
Setup checklist
- 1Make sure you have reel credits — the balance is shown in the Reel Generator header.
- 2Write standing context in Setup: audience, offer, proof points.
- 3Upload your brand logo and set your brand accent colour.
- 4Choose a promotion mode. Start with Soft.
- 5Pick an avatar and its paired voice, and decide whether to rotate looks.
- 6Queue a topic, open the brief to see exactly what's being sent, and generate one reel before scheduling a day of them.
- 7Turn on Require approval while you're still calibrating, then decide whether to keep it.
Frequently asked questions
HeyGen provides the avatars and voices and renders the talking-head video from the script. SocialKaptan handles everything around it: the topic queue, script generation from your context and prompt sets, overlays and branding, credits, scheduling, approval, and publishing to LinkedIn and Instagram.
No — they're a separate prepaid pool charged by finished duration, roughly one credit per 30 seconds. Your monthly AI credits still cover comments, networking copy, Reddit drafts, and post captions. Both balances are visible in the app.
Yes, when both accounts are connected. LinkedIn gets a native video post (personal feed or company page), Instagram gets a Reel, and both use the same caption and mp4. You can also publish to just one.
At several levels. Standing context and promotion mode apply to everything; script and visual prompt sets rotate per reel; per-topic context steers an individual reel; and before generating you can open the exact brief being sent to the video agent, edit it, or reset it to the template.
Not unless you want it to. Prompt sets rotate, and "Random look each time" keeps the same person and voice while varying their outfit and angle per reel — so the series stays recognisably you without being visually identical.
No. The voice list can be filtered by language, so you can produce reels in whichever language your audience actually uses.
On your own machine, listed in the Generates tab with duration, resolution, file size, avatar, caption, and script. Publishing later, re-editing with a note, or deleting are all done from there.
Interrupted jobs can be recovered from the Generates tab rather than silently lost, so a crash or a closed laptop doesn't cost you the credits you already spent.
Yes — turn on "Require approval before posting". With Slack connected, finished reels go to your channel for Approve / Reject. Without Slack, they wait in Generates → Awaiting approval on your machine.
One to ten, spaced by an hour range you set, with the exact number drawn inside your range. Video is expensive to produce and heavy in a feed, so most people run one or two.