GUEST · EP 073 SALMA ABOUKAR
Salma Aboukar
Creative director and founder
On Fast Hours July 12, 2026
She Cracked AI Advertising Before Brands Were Ready
ft. Salma Aboukar
Creative director Salma Aboukar tells Fast Hours how she moved from CGI in Blender and 3ds Max to an AI-native ad stack, and how her viral exploding-IKEA-box video, built on Veo 3 and a JSON prompt, convinced brands like Coca-Cola and Panasonic that AI video was ready. She breaks down her current pipeline, including Claude skills, Midjourney, Nano Banana, Z Image Turbo and Qwen LoRAs, and argues original taste, not technical skill, is the real creative moat.
- Salma's viral exploding-IKEA-box ad ran on Veo 3 with a prompt she converted into timestamped JSON so the box, throw pillow and product beats stayed in sync.
- Going viral landed her the Panasonic, Coca-Cola and IKEA-adjacent work, but the deals overlapped so badly she'd already signed elsewhere by the time IKEA called.
- Her hot take: software engineers have no taste, and AI labs chasing 'manufactured taste' would do better hiring a stylist who's never touched AI.
- She never upscales AI video footage; instead she generates in 4K or 1080p and color-corrects in Premiere, since upscalers make skin 'too sharp' and obviously fake.
Salma Aboukar, on the record
“I don't think technical people have any taste whatsoever, like software engineers or like any … I'm sorry, but like they just don't have taste.”
“it came up with this long JSON prompt. And then I threw it in there and honestly came up with such an amazing video.”
“there's just a there's just a sheer volume of AI content. And honestly, like it's really hard to come up with like new ideas and stress test things that hasn't already been done before.”