Fact Check: Viral video claiming to show opium bird which can kill people is a meme
A creature with partial human-like and partial bird-like features is going viral on the internet as a meme. The thin 20-foot tall humanoid creature, said to be found in the Antartica, has long white flowing yeti and long white beak is being called the opium bird.
Opium bird
A creature with partial human-like and partial bird-like features is going viral on the internet as a meme. The thin 20-foot tall humanoid creature said to be found in the Antarctica, has long white flowing yeti and a long white beak and is being called the opium bird.
This meme has become so popular that some social media users are sharing video of this bird with the narrative that this bird is very dangerous in that it hypnotizes any person who comes near it and kills them. In the video, we can see the bird-like creature moving around in a snow-covered environment.
The video is shared with the caption: “Do you know Opium Bird? It can kill within a second if you move closer.”
Fact check:
The claim is False. The video does not show the real bird which is very dangerous and kills people.
When we searched for the opium bird, we did not find any scientific articles about this bird. This bird does not exist in nature.
When we searched further using the keyframes extracted from the video, we found that the video was shared by an Instagram account structuredmag. The caption states ““Opium bird came to life” by @official_spiritwalker “
When searched the Instagram account of @official_spiritwalker, we found that the video was posted by the handle on November 1, 2023. The video was shared with caption “Opium bird came to life #opiumbird #spiritwalker”
The bio of this Instagram handle states that it belongs to “Brandon Johnson Costume builder, inventor, audio engineer and business owner.”
He shared another video on the making of the Opium bird costume with the caption: “I gave it a shot. 7.5ft tall opium bird home made. #spiritwalker #opiumbird
His YouTube bio also states that he is a costume designer, engineer and puppeteer.
He published the longer video on the YouTube channel also.
When searched more about the opium birds, we found that the video showing the opium birds was first published by a Tiktok user named drevfx. His Instagram and also YouTube accounts mention that he is the ‘creator of the Opium birds’. He is a VFX artist and has created the opium birds using artificial intelligence and CGI.
The YouTube channel shared several bird-like structures with the title “Meme from 2027 I Opium bird meme”
According to an article in thirdeyefacts.com, the VFX artist shared the images with hashtags like #aiart #deepfake on his TikTok handle, which is banned now.
Another article published on medium.com, also states that this creature was created using Artificial intelligence.
Therefore, the viral video does not show a real bird that can hypnotize human beings and kill them. The video shows a costume version of the Opium bird which is a CGI creation and not a real bird. The claim is false.