Will Actors REALLY be Replaced? (VFX Artists Explain)

I'm not scared of AI, I'm scared of what the Greedy Corporations Will try to do with it.

I am of two minds of this...
For big studios I am worried, because they're run by abusive greedy sociopaths who don't care about exploiting people.
But for indie filmmakers these will be amazing tools to bring their vision to life. Much how digital music production tools have eliminated the necessity for having a studio.

"While progress will not slow, our preparation can increase."
Wise words, Jordan.

I was one of the de-aging artists on The irishman. haha yeah we all laughed when we saw that performance of old man bobby.
It was my first time working with AI (this was like 6 years ago. Forever ago tech wise) and it was very crazy. ILM was developing the software faster then I could learn to use it. Every week there was a new update with new nodes to learn. It really was a bonkers mind boggling experience.

The most troublesome thing I have seen AI do for the present is being able to voice match someone based off a short clip and have it say other things. THAT will cause some issues down the line.

I was always surprised that De Niro agreed to use de-aging in The Irishman (he produced it so he would have had a say), because one of his breakthrough roles was playing a younger Marlon Brando in The Godfather Part II. If de-aging was available in 1974, it would have cost De Niro a job and an Oscar and possibly affected his whole career. The de-aging in The Irishman could have cost an actor the same in 2019.

You know it's a epic video when wren is the main character

I think the replacement of actors (and more so, locations) is inevitable. You guys touched on the reasons economically but from a producer's perspective this goes so much deeper. They need to consider so much more than just finance in preparing a production; crew size and safety, catering, insurance, weather, time of day, availability, crowds, etc etc etc. If these issues become reduced or more easily navigated via VFX, that path will most likely be taken. It feels like it's just a matter of quality and cost at this point.

As a HMU in film & tv, our makeup, hair styling, wigs, special effects makeup/prosthetics are all in danger of becoming irrelevant due to filters and AI generating it for us. This is a problem now even before the actors disappear...
Also, just like actors who take background acting jobs as a way to get their foot in the door, crowd rooms (where we style them) are integral for networking and establishing a presence in the film Hair and Makeup industry. Very similar for the costume dept.

It's really cool timing that the day after this video was uploaded, a U.S court in DC ruled that AI generated art can't receive copyright! While we still don't know how this will play out with studio's, it feels like a great direction to go with regulation to prevent over-reliance without condemning the tech's utility.

So my dad always talked about how when CNC machining first started, people didn’t believe it would happen so soon. It’s interesting to draw parallels from this and see how machinists job roles changed.

Background actors don't typically say lines. They're just supposed to be playing a random person in the background or passing by. Now with that out of the way: The first step is that every person alive now, actor or not, should be granted an automatic copyright to their image and voice throughout their lives.
This is just the first step to figuring things out when it comes to the production of CG virtual humans.

When the background actors go away, so too do the makeup artists, costume designers, etc, etc, etc. If you can just scan an actor in costume and makeup and digitally place them into a scene, those key production roles get only one day of work instead of weeks or months. I'd argue that the pay model needs to shift to a "per project" rather than "per day/hour" model, but even that isn't really a good solution because then they just hire one makeup artist for the entire project instead of dozens. There are a LOT of considerations as we move forward.

I think that with the level of personalization that you mentioned at the end of a video for movies and shows we will see the end of a collective zeitgeist created by popular media culture. The radio is dead, cable TV is dead, but now even shows and movies that we all watch at generally the same time are likely to go away. That makes me feel like it will be harder to relate to others. Just feels incredibly personalized but also more lonely.

I DP'd a video shoot for an AI generated avatar company like the one you featured. It was a REALLY weird few days. All of the actors knew exactly what was going on and what the implications were, but there was this pervasive feeling around the whole studio that something didn't feel right about working on the project. For the company that hired us, the voices of the actors were never intended to be used. The voices and images are two separate sources, and my understanding is that the end user can select an avatar and a voice separately and have them generated and synced seamlessly. Each actor had several costumes and read a standard script designed to get a wide range of facial expressions. It's fascinating technology, but what I saw was a very primitive version of what exists now.

As a musician, it's very easy for AI to tap into the fear of "what if someone rips me off before I even make a living". But compared to acting or VFX, it's a much more bleak situation, because streaming has already decimated a big part of musicians' incomes. I think actors/writers are smart to unionize and act in advance - we really need that spark of real humans and inspiration, rather than "generating" by formulaicly imitating the past forever, and actors/writers know that. They can hold that need for reality and change over execs' heads. The scariest thought possible is that they could be wrong and audiences wouldn't know the difference.
(on a smaller side note, I've been convinced Corridor gang is all hairstyle variations on the same CG character, so I wasn't surprised by the ending.)

I think that every artist denying the problems that AI bring to the field is either trying to look tough of just not seeing the real extent of this paradigm change. The AI in itself it's so powerful that the need of actors, cg artists, writers or self proclaimed "artists" who work in an industry like entertainment will be in a steep decline, eventually leaving almost everyone outside, especially since this tool enable the studios to make what they think is their role: rip off the people working for them. Ideally this could allow indie studios or even persons get high quality results, but I think that the real outcome will be studios getting bigger and bigger, concentrating all the profits and the attention of the people. The only concern left, since looks obvious that almost all human jobs will be over in this field, is if the AI could eventually produce work not seen as derivative.

As an educator, I’m curious and a bit anxious to see where this goes in terms of delivering instruction. I already use AI to assist in some of the more tedious aspects of my job (lesson plans, learning questions). But as we continue to move towards online learning, I could see digital models easily replacing face to face teachers in the near future for some number of students.

As someone who works in the audio industry with voiceovers, AI generated content has been a huge issue for years but has recently really exploded this year. With VOs having their voices used in perpetuity via AI by companies without their knowledge, there has been huge outcry unsurprisingly. If you are in the industry you can spot an AI voice but it is getting more difficult and to the general public there is no difference and VOs are terrified about what is being done with their voice. It’s scary times.

It makes me sad that people will not get paid for things they love and worked hard to learn.

When people bashed artists for freaking out about generative AI, I knew it was only a matter of time before people understood the gravity of the situation. My concerns were about the entry level positions disappearing much like background work for extras in movies/TV. Hopefully more people will see how this is only the beginning and its impact extends way more than just the Art and Entertainment industry.

The issue ive always had with all this ai stuff is exactly like you said at the end. The knowledge of that just completely devalues everything now. Yes its fascinating that it can be done yes its interesting etc etc etc, but if i was watching a movie 10 years ago, it was still somewhere in the back of your mind that someone had to draw/create a human mind had to come up with the artwork you are seeing on screen, now your first impression is not that, your first impression no matter what you see or hear these days is oh i wonder was this ai. Devalues every type of art out there. Photographers and digital artists were the first ones to get hit with this because of midjourney and all the other ai art generators out there.

I thought the point you brought up about generating a movie from your tv starring you and all your friends was interesting. I feel as though we might see something like this in the near future. And also along those lines, im currently going to school for music production, and the future of AI generated music haunts me... makes me feel worried i could be learning my passion foe nothing 😢

I think there's a flip side as well, the easier and cheaper it becomes to make an indie film the more indie films will be produced, and at higher qualities. Take Ian Hubert's production, it's taken him years to get to the point where he can start realizing his vision. And he's an extremely talented 3d artist (amongst other things.)
Of course, losing extra roles will hurt new talents chances. But being able to make your own film, and not have to spend years like Ian Hubert, or spend lots of your own money like Markiplier, will allow more films like The Last Supper (1995) to be made. And of course, they could have more environments, more action, and so on.
That said, the money saved by using AI for extras *should* be spent on looking for new talents as well, not doing so will basically make hollywood obsolete eventually. Especially if they treat their employees poorly, why go to the big studios if you can build a grass roots studio and basically get to run it in the way you feel is best?

Please make a video about the terrible work conditions of most VFX artists in Hollywood.

Next question. Would we rather keep using familiar famous faces, or would we use new generated faces to become our famous actors?

Another part of the 'uncanny valley' problem is when people are told that it's either cg or has been altered in some way. I used adobe on a group of young children to have all the children posed nicely. (Getting a good photo of a group of kids including toddlers and babies is a bit challenging!). When I showed the photo to people whose approval I needed I told them I had adjusted some of the children to obtain a great overall photo, but I didn't tell them which children. They were like, 'oh, yeh...we can totally tell it's altered'...haha! but when they identified the altered kids...they were 100% wrong! So, there's that...

As a VFX Animator working for one of the top VFX studios I can tell you that this strike has affected my contract from being renewed due to surplus animators and not enough work or major delays to shows ramping up with work. So basically, the VFX industry and artists are getting affected by this strike, and people are losing jobs. I have a family to feed but business is business ey..

I think it's possible to develop the technology good enough where you can "cast" any actor in any film (visual likeness and voice) without paying for it. The studios could save a lot of money and the possibilities are endless.

Another great video guys. I wonder what people like Gui thinks about their stunt profession being completely replaced with CG.

It's *really* important that, going forward, peoples' agency with regard to the use of their image is defended to the utmost. We've already seen posthumous use of a person's image, and consensual generated images in the course of a production. However, the idea of a studio of owning rights to the use of a person's image outside of the scope of a given production or worse, in perpetuity, is really chilling.

Greed is a hell of a thing , i hope these writers and actors get their justice because theyve delivered some of the greatest stories on screen

I think that AI-generated content will become prevalent and will be adopted. A few years later, there will be a movement back to the old ways - kind of like modern musicians insisting on recording to tape and releasing on vinyl. Movie hipsters, so to speak. This retro-entertainment movement may include live theater/events becoming more popular, or it may simply be movies where the production company is known for employing real actors. Like many things, there is a move one direction, a counter move another direction, and eventually a split into different simultaneous genres with their own accepted tropes and adherents.

There's definitely many worrying elements of AI. In a way i hope copyright laws will be helpful in this.
Like the case there was with a comic that was created with AI images. It was deemed that although the comic could get copyright, the images themselves couldn't, because they were fully AI generated.

It seems inevitable to me that as digital performance becomes easier to create, genuine live performance and remix culture will come to the fore.
It’s similar to how musicians have reinvented their relationship with their audience as digital audio became lossless and ubiquitous.

I'm starting my animation course last week, now i have the feeling of going extinct towards AI motion capture( still humans had to clean up animation but ....)

You should do a follow up video answering the question "Will VFX Artists be Replaced?". I think VFX artists have just as much reason to be afraid of being replaced by AI as actors and writers, but they don't get as much publicity since they can't go on strike due to a lack of unionization.

Mistakes and faults make things look and feel real. Would be interested to see that the focus of next gen AI.

I've been worried about this since people started remembering that deepfakes were a thing, and started making them better lol. For indie filmmakers, these tools are pretty sweet, but I think maybe there should be some sort of limitation to how AI tools are used. Perhaps by production size, be it by metric of crew, cost or even film duration. Perhaps if the movie is more than 45mins, it MUST contain at least 2 live actors. This can become a problem with people's creative vision, I suppose, but I don't really know another way of regulating it.
Maybe there should be a limit to how many generated people there are? Like maybe, for every crowd of 100 people, there must be 20 actors on set. For every 10 actors on set, you may have 1 generated character, something like that. Any other ideas?

If I were a VFX artist on Benjamin Button I would have immediately just noted back to the studio "I believe you could achieve this same effect with Toby Jones and a basic makeup artist."

Crowds may be replaced by computer crowds, but it still feels different. I was watching The Mask of Zorro the other night and it started with a crowd scene made of hundreds of real people - and there was a feeling to it that just hit me. I was in that crowd, I was hot, I was being jostled, it was dangerous. Someone was going to get trampled to death. None of the armies of thousands in Lord of the Rings gave me that feeling (even when the movie was first released).

11:46 this part was crazy! Felt like a scene in a movie where the protagonists get duped

The second concern is, and something on the union concern list is; you performed in a movie/show/commercial once and now that studio owns your likeness, forever. They can 'cast' you into whatever, forever.

I just rewatched Sync with my boyfriend and I think it’s kinda funny how you guys made a whole TV series based on an Ai singularity over 10 years ago.

insightful. mostly informative & just discussing videos seems like a new corridor for you guys recently and I like it. this was the most deliberate & enjoyable one i've seen so far

Another short-term concern is the replacement of the 'lead.' With studios utilizing bankable franchises and being able to trivially replace faces, they could theoretically hire 'studio actors' (like a studio band) to fill in for Captain America or Spiderman forever. The character can stay unchanging, meaning the humans behind it are replaceable and the pay for acting drops sharply.

Oddly, my favorite parts of AI is the jankness of it all. It hits in a really inhuman/alien way and I find it fascinating.

The background actor thing is a big point in these negotiations I believe. If I'm remembering correctly, part of the studios initial offer was that they wanted the ability to digitize the background actors when they initially perform and have rights to the performance for use in perpetuity without having to pay.

If I'm not mistaken, one of the main reasons for the strike is the salaries/residuals for the time spent on set. If an actor can come in day 1 , get 3D scanned and then sent home, and then another less paid actor does the performance, then it's a huge problem.

Actually, I think this will open up privatization of movie making, much like ESclips did and Unreal Engine is doing. Freddy Wong and Corridor Digital both started by making ESclips shorts and then formed their own companies. And Jimmy W got his break into acting through Freddy and VGHS. It’s really the big corporations that need to be scared, not the actors. The actors and writers should really be learning to use these tools to their advantage and break away from the big studios to create their own content and build their own companies.

I honestly don't think background artists are going to be replaced entirely.
In big budget blockbuster, sure.
But there's still a bunch of director very passionate about what they do, and the artistry of making a movie... I think those directors will keep the extras.
Also, it probably makes acting much easier. Like if you're filming a set in a crowded, quiet café, it probably helps the main actor to physically be in a crowded, quiet café...

Appreciate corridor weighing thoughtfully on this, great points and question raised. Ai is a pill we're being forced to swallow but aren't able to digest.

I loved this perspective, Wren! Thank you for providing nuance to a very important conversation. I think this very much needs to be regulated, and we need to act now. Unfortunately, the legislative process is so far behind the curve. The Supreme Court is just now getting around to debating whether platforms have responsibility in curating content (Gonzalez vs. Google & Twitter vs. Taamneh). Lawmakers are still trying to figure out how the internet actually works. I hope that the results of the WGA & SAG-AFTRA strike lay some sort of foundation for future regulation.

I remember watching the scene in the running man some years ago where they basically just give voice commands to the computer and it dropped the likeness of Arnold into a fight scene for the cameras. I rolled my eyes at the time knowing how difficult it would have been to actually synthesize a human much less make it photo real. I had no idea it would become reality in such a short time. I’m more afraid that I won’t be able to tell what’s real and what isn’t.

I am completely ok with the Art Station and Dall-E and Hollywood strikes that are occurring. This has been scary, and as a private content creator, I am completely with them all. It makes me question of I should even bother making the content, when it could possibly be made for me(not quite free yet).

For limited acting (one person dialog) with a limited range of emotion, I believe we passed the uncanny valley. For multiple actor interactions with a wide range of emotions, we are still not there, but closer, maybe within 2 years.

I foresaw that ending coming and it still blew me away. I love Wren, he's such a great person on this team

Instead of replacing actors, technology is more likely to continue enhancing their performances and expanding the creative boundaries of storytelling.

i wanna see more of you two! the quemistry its amazing to watch! great work guys!

I would feel less unnerved if I thought that the companies wouldn't skirt what ever regulations are put in place, at every chance they got.

I think the problem for many artist is, that AI which genrate pictures, is using there Art to get better so they feel kind of ripped of if people using AI which is kind of working with their art. Instead of hiring a real person to do the job

(10:00) Yep, I am currently a SAG actor, but in my extras days, I definitely remember those overly filled Roman Army scenes that was like a factory when it came to creating makeup for everyone. They had something between 8 or 10 booths with a makeup artist for each in Cohen brother's "Hail Caesar."

Yeah this is a big thing in the industry right now. I’m a 1st AC, not IATSE 600 yet but I have a lot of friends who are union and this is at the forefront for SAG and the WGA

While the final audience is human, we will always seek something done by other humans
I see AI art that looks crazy good, and feel nothing, because i know that no effort gone into it
But some average art from something i like, drawn by an human makes me feel something
We will understand that shortly, and this whole "AI will replace artists" fear will feel dumb

Glad you guys highlighted the very real concerns that the SAG AFTRA strikers have and how the problem isn’t the tools themselves but the corporate economic side of things that could down not just an entire industry but the artistry involved in said work

In the future, having stock AI generated video will be as common as having an audio tape with the Wilhem scream . Studios will have a bunch of people's presets, in clothes presets,and in mood presets.. As Wren says, give it 2 years time and it will be everywhere.

I feel that for the most people in the industry right now, their idea of what goes into making a film is already forever changing. My fear is that most will not be abe to adopt to it of how dated their education will get and the slender budgets that will throw people off. Budgets are now very tight, I don't know if if it can sustain if it gets tighter.

Honestly I didn't care much about the SAG strike, not being from the USA, but eventually the multiload of notifications about it made me look into it a bit.
I definitely understand the fear, especially the 80% of actors / writers who don't have a steady income. However acting is still considered part of the arts, and I can certainly say that i have met and known struggling artists who were working part time/full time jobs in order to pursue their passions, a passion of which they weren't necessarily ever expecting to hit it big with.
Secondly, AI, or to put it more straightforwardly an automation of work in order to save money, in whatever form that might be; has been around since the industrial age insofar as affecting large percentages of the work-forces. Every year you can find thousands of people losing their jobs or having to change and adapt their positions due to automation of one sort or another, certainly many more than we see in this actor strike, and this is across the board in the entire world.
These two points I think, is perhaps why a lot of regular folks are sort of lost in this strike since most folks are dealing with a similar issue, but realises that you can't really fight it, as it is an eventuality, and so we see up-skilling, or work-task adapting and so on.
Furthermore, what we'll probably see is companies buying and selling background "actor" profiles, which they simply get by paying regular folks off the street for their image use, and these regular folks will most certainly not be a part of an actors guild.
What is curious to me is that not a lot of folks talk about lead-actor salaries that really spiked after 91's Die Hard, and surely studio usage of funds not funneling to the actors. Perhaps if there was a standard contract that x-amount of the budget need to be allocated to non leads, and only a maximum of x-amount of the budget needs to be allocated to the lead, would we see a more fair pair.
Although I do agree that having strong regulations on the usage of image and voice should happen sooner rather than later, and that is in general, not just the acting industry.

Honestly... much like how tools like Midjourney and Stable Diffusion havent stopped artists creating original work, I don't think AI actors will replace humans any time soon. Sure, some will take the dive, and I don't doubt indie films will 100% use this tech. But I'm sure many of the directors will still want real actors to keep it authentic.

Technology really is taking everyone’s jobs. I knew this even when I was young. But I never thought I’d see the day when actors could be replaced by computers.

When we were fearing that AI will automate and replace all of our boring jobs and all we have to turn to is the creative job. It turns out we solved for the creative jobs first since there's more room for error for creativity and hard to validate objectively what's the truth.

Thank your for doing this episode. With all your work with AI I wasn’t wondering when you’d do one and what your take would be.

Wow, you're the first (or only video so far) that I encountered that actually answered 'Yes' to actors getting replaced eventually. I think all the other videos are just not looking far enough ahead, or are just too afraid to predict doom on such a popular occupation.

You should try filming a scene/video where 1 person plays multiples characters, but they are all made very different using deepfakes and ai voice/voice change effect.

Thanks for covering this topic. As someone in the industry and affected by the current strikes, it feels like an incredibly precarious time.
On one hand, it is fascinating to see what can be done with ever-improving technology. The toolset it can provide could be a major boon to all areas of the industry, such as quality of VFX, or safety as you mentioned.
On the other hand, the uncertainty as to what corporations who prioritise profits above anything else (ethics, artisty, etc) is terrifying. If AI is developed to a point where companies can forgo the entire production crew, not only does an section of industry collapse overnight, but their monopoly over media we consume will be unfathomable.

I personally want to watch movies that other people watch too. A film should be an event and not some arbitrary generated piece only I watch, no matter how good it might be. It's random and isolated. When there's no conscious intend and communication behind the picture, I'm not drawn to it. Time becomes more and more valuable and I don't think I'd spend my time watching arbitrary movies when I can watch something precious. People also have comfort movies which they watch over and over again. The idea that everybody constantly wants new stuff is not entirely true. What I've noticed with AIs like Midjourney is: at some point you feel empty if you do nothing but visualize your ideas. It gets monotonous super fast. Using AI as a tool in it's proper place is way more fun.

As much as all this AI stuff is amazing and unbelievable. I am scared where it will lead to. I kind of hope that there will still be people who will make movies using actors, and animate things by hand, or draw things by hand, because that is art. Art connects with people way more than when you generate something automatically or procedurally. Of course we all dropped our jaws when we saw the Orc army for the first time in LOTR, but when you see it for the hundred times its not that amazing anymore. Same thing in games, you can have world that has thousends of planets and solar systems. But what good is it when there is nothing unique about any of it. We all want so we things where people put their soul into it. I really hope that will never go away.

AI background actor are here - like you said - it is just a matter of scope.
I think the future for writers will be more to curate the AI, like edit it match certain profiles, even though it probably is easier and cheaper with AI. I think want the human touch - same way people pay extra for barrister coffee instead a regular one.
For actors I think the future is gonna be devided into different camps; one where influencer/celebrities sell their likeness to movies/tv shows like action or comedy and another that makes "classic movies" - this could even be subdivided further like a actual stunts (like jackie chan) and something more similar to modern movies where an actors is doing emotion capture (the performance).
I think AI an important tool for creators, while very expensive now, movies can be shot on an iphone now so I think it is coming for "lower tier" film makers.
The real test is whether the studios will get greedy fuck everything up like they when they jumped on the woke-train were way to late to the streaming party.

I would love you guys to do a video on watermarks for deepfakes. Because I imagine that whithin the next years, governments and global players will increasingly have to deal with AI-generated fake news, either by trolls or by political enemies. If that was the case, we would need to have a reliable mechanism to distinguish real (or, as in this video, generated avatars, but still coming from the official position, e.g. a ministry) from fake Videos and messages.
Is there any such technology imaginable or foreseeable? And how would the 'new internet' look at that point in time?

This just reminds me of when Midjourney and those sort of tools were just starting up. I went to a presentation done by an artist talking about how it could be used to help artists with their work. In the end his main point was this, those who are going to be affected by this new technology need to be in the room when rules and regulations are being made. There is little point trying to stop it from being used and it is best for those who are going to be affected to be the ones helping to guides it's path. Now we are starting to get rules and regulations around the use of people's art for use within these tools and I would not be surprised if similar things started to happen with actors, and writers. Even if it is something as simply as a little tick box that says I do not give permission for my content to be used within AI tools.

There was great fear that the printing press would put scribes out of business, and it did for the most part. But it also made it easier to publish books, so more books were written. The same thing with ebooks. They hurt the reach of paper books, but they also opened the gates for more writers to publish their books. AI/CGI actors might put some actors out of work, but it will open up the world of moving pictures to a vast new group of movie makers. It will be awesome to see a future where a movie producer can hire from a catalog of virtual actors to cast in their movie and then create it all in an AI rendered world. Brining stories to life without all the expenses of transporting, feeding, training, housing, or insuring a large cast of humans, and then all the costs of equipment, locations, and so much more, will ultimately make way for more stories that will entertain and inform us for generations to come.

There are always saturation/desaturation and contrast issues with deepfakes and CG alike. I do illustrations similar to AI generations. You can use a histogram to see that an added element doesn't match what surrounds it by checking the values (look specifically for darkest and brightest values). A lot of effort is put into understanding how light affects the rendered object, but not how light affects the real environment and how that light affects each object in frame as it gets closer or farther away. There are ways to measure light values and make these details more consistent, but it has more to do with understanding photography than a rendering.

I remember being in a play in the 90’s and other actors thinking the exact same thing was happening with cgi then.
Directors like directing people, it’s the studios that throw cost cutting methods in. It’ll be the job of the director to maintain that relationship imo

I amnnot scared but it will be misused. I am actually excited about how the workflow for animated shows and movies might become easier or at least allow more depth in the same timeframe. also video game characters will hopefully be easier to create, texture and rig and possible their versitility will become more vast and fluid. I can see a tonnof potential but yes there needs to be something that funnels users focus from nefarious activity

its mostly a fear of all the big studios using it cause they've been overtaken by Wal Street guys
though for indie artists it's problebly a miracle these tools exist because an indie artist on a budget now has extra help with projects, things like concept art, music, and even voice (as long as its not stealing the likeness of an actual VA) can be huge bonuses for an indie artist getting into the field who may not have that big of a budget
I think of AI is implemented with regulations and with proper care then it'll just become any other normal tool for creators, like how Photography, or Digital art were at first shunned by artists but now it's a normal thing
technology changes and advances, we really shoulda seen this coming, its not new, it's just gotten better, and we really should be placing adleast some regulations on it, but to outright ban the use imo is just a silly request

I think major studios may be running headlong into irrelevance without even realizing it. If the tools become available to make a blockbuster on an indie budget, what's stopping indie studios from taking the same tools and carving up all of the big studio market share for themselves? We're already seeing this effect in the music industry where small artists are carving out sections of the industry using tools that effectively replace much of what labels have traditionally done.

The biggest ethical concern, as always, is the sourcing of training data. The only reason systems like Midjourney are able to produce halfway decent results is because of how much training data they have, and most of that training data was likely acquired without the knowledge or consent of the original artist.

When you mentioned "Just coming home and having your tv create a show with you in it" my first thoughts were of Video Games. Actually the movie "Ready Player 1". I LOVE rpg games (final Fantasy, Skyrim, etc) and if the technology continues. We might actually be moving to a real version of "Ready Player 1" future. Sadly both good, and that bad.

There is an amazing show in Netflix called Maniac (which is a remake of a show from Norway) the glimpses it gives you at the futuristic setting it has outside of the lab most of it happens in, you see things like people selling their likeness for cheap to ad companies with no royalies whatsoever to be used alongside their voices for ads. I can't imagine how terrible hollywood and the whole film industry will treat actors, and pretty much everyone involved in the making of movies from now on when the tech gets good enough for the consumer's liking.

it's definitely an important conversation to have, I think we can probably anticipate pretty well where this will go just by looking at how we've evolved in the past, but what I'm not sure of is what it will look like as we adapt to all of this technology. I was thinking of a future with all this stuff the other day and thinking, if/when we improve and pair XR technology with this you could essentially 'edit' the world around you....don't like how a person looks? Just apply a filter on them with your AI-powered lenses...want to talk with a deceased family member? Have an AI-generated model of them sit next to you on the couch.

If we can simply generated films, it would open possibilities to amateurs to create movies on a scale which was not thinkable. Me and my sister made some movies about 15 years ago. We had plenty of ideas which at that time were not doable with our skills and budget. But if you could generate the movie with something like midjourney, it would open the possibility to actually make the movie we always wanted.
(In the meantime she wrote a couple of books, which are just wating to be turned into a film/series)

Exactly the strikes are about creating a precedent. Definitely scary stuff. But after playing with most of these AI tools it’s really scary good to a certain point, and then it’s unusable and you need to train an entirely different model. I have no idea where things are going and I’ve been following this stuff since 2015 and google deep dream

I just completed my animation and VFX degree course this year. I created my showreel as a rigging artist and was eager to get employed...Then the strike happened...Now I am not sure when I will get employed. In my city there are a lot of layoffs in our industry and when hiring will resume, noone knows.

I am an actor myself and I find this very scary. Okay, I am a stage actor, making enough money to get along, and as long as there will be some form of theatre and other art forms that include live acting, I will be able to get gigs, but if I was a movie actor without the chance of ever "hitting it big", I would probably be shitting my pants right now.

This reminds me so much of the excellent film The Congress (2013), where Robin Wright has to give up the rights for her face, body and acting when she is digitized - absolutely prescient, and a visually stunning film on top. You should totally watch it!

I think eventually the studios will see how much this strike is affecting their overall status change from "Beloved Film Studios" to "Horrible Bosses" or even worse, "Horrible Bosses 2". I loved those movies btw.

I feel like there will continue to be more of a union with video games and movie effects. A tech developed for background characters in a diner in a video game may be worked on with a studio to be used for both. Video game AI breakthroughs could also help the movie industry.

I think it will be determined by what audiences are willing to accept. I think the industry will be split. You will have movies that are crazy and full CG. But you will also have movies with more realism. Even today, I think there is a massive demand for more realism in movies. In general, its very sad. The most fun thing about movies is working with others.

I would like to recommend checking Neal Stephenson's book The Diamond Age, which I think is quite relevant to this conversation and curren developments. In that sci-fi book actors have some implants that read the impulses in the muscles of their bodies and do acting gigs from their own home real time on digital avatars. Instead of dots on the face, the implants capture directly what their muscles are doing under the skin providing a perfectly accurate capture of the performance. Given what is explained in the video about face animation it looks like an interesting next step in the technology. If you know anything about this author you know he has an uncanny forseeing ability for new technologies and the impact they'll have in the world. In the same book he also predicted 3D printing, nanotech, and AI applications on personalized content just to name a few.

Sorry, but you guys are so amazing. I Love evry Episode/video with so much detail and love to the topic. Keep it going!