Stock footage
Also called stock media · licensed footage · B-roll
Pre-shot video clips licensed for reuse, used in a faceless video as an alternative or complement to AI-generated visuals.
In more detail
Stock footage is filmed once by someone else and licensed for repeated use, which makes it cheaper per second than commissioning new footage and, for many subjects, cheaper and more convincing than generating an equivalent scene with an image or video model. Most editing tools built for faceless production, script-to-video editors especially, offer a stock library alongside AI-generated and user-uploaded media as one of several source options per scene.
Example
A history documentary can pair archive-style stock footage for establishing shots with AI-generated stills for scenes no real footage exists for, rather than forcing every scene through the same visual source.
Why it matters
Mixing licensed stock footage with generated visuals, instead of relying on either exclusively, is one of the more concrete ways a channel can signal deliberate production rather than a fully generated slideshow, which matters directly for how a platform assesses originality and authenticity.