In the upcoming movie "Legend" to be released in the summer, the youthful Jackie Chan plays the role of a general of the Han Dynasty who fights on the battlefield and completes wonderful action scenes. This "young Jackie Chan" is shaped with the latest AI technology, which makes Jackie Chan himself sigh "Although time no longer allows me to be young, but movies can".
The debut of "Young Jackie Chan" attracted attention. How does AI empower the development of the film and television industry? This is also a hot topic among the guests at the just-concluded Shanghai International Film Festival and Shanghai TV Festival. AI is surging, and technological innovation empowers the optimization and transformation of the film industry, or does it bring uncontrollable industry crises? How to achieve the organic combination of AIGC (generative artificial intelligence) technology and human creativity in film and television creation?
The future is here
AI is widely used in virtual shooting, script analysis, animation drawing, and more
In 2005, the movie "Myth" became a "phenomenal" film of the year. After 19 years, "Legend", which will be released on July 12 this year, will continue the fantasy adventure theme of "Myth" and continue to lead the audience through the past and the present.
"Legend" can be described as Jackie Chan's most, largest, and most amazing return to action scenes in recent years. The film achieves a new breakthrough in technology, in addition to Jackie Chan himself continuing to show his skills in the modern part of the film, in the magnificent ancient war, the producer also used the latest AI technology to reproduce the image of the 27-year-old Jackie Chan to play the role of the Han Dynasty general on the battlefield and complete wonderful action scenes. In addition, with the blessing of AI technology, the magnificent glacier temple will be revealed for the first time, and scenes such as the yellow sand desert and the sea of wind and snow will also be realistically restored in the film.
Talking about the connection between AI technology and artistic creation, Tang Jili, director and screenwriter of "Legend", said: "Technology has brought us unlimited possibilities for exploration, but what has not changed is the name Jackie Chan and the spirit he conveys to every young actor!" ”
At the Shanghai International Film Festival, director Lu Chuan brought his documentary "West Wild". This documentary is the first work launched by the two parties after director Lu Chuan and Lenovo Group announced the joint establishment of an AI imaging laboratory.
At the opening forum of the Shanghai TV Festival, Xie Ying, vice president of Youku, said that a number of new technologies represented by AI are influencing and changing the whole process of film and television production, and also bringing more new scenarios and new possibilities for the development of the industry. She introduced that the recently completed "Qingming Riverside Picture Password" is the first drama series in China to use virtual shooting on a large scale. Among the many dramas currently being filmed by Youku, the proportion of fake dramas has reached 10%, and it is expected to be close to 50% in science fiction dramas in the future.
Recently, the "Wilderness Echo" Tencent Video Drama Film Exhibition held in Shanghai showcased a series of scientific and technological strategies such as virtual shooting, AIGC, and film and television industrialization. In the field of AIGC technology, Tencent Video has created an AIGC content production engine represented by the "script analysis system" and "ZenRender transfer engine". In terms of film and television applications, the script analysis system relies on the capabilities of large language models and multi-expert models to provide content insight and understanding capabilities for creation, improve the efficiency of script reading and evaluation, and optimize content quality. In animation production, the ZenRender repainting engine can assist creators to quickly achieve stylized video redrawing, reducing repetitive and mechanical work, while maintaining consistent picture quality, realizing the "two-way rush" of technological innovation and artistic creation.
Embrace the future
An actor who is "not old", and the art of no longer regrets
At the 26th Shanghai International Film Festival "When IP Meets AI to Open New Horizons of Light and Shadow" forum, Yu Dong, founder, chairman and general manager of Bona Films, emphasized that AI technology is not the future, the future is already here, and AI is profoundly changing the pattern of the film and television industry.
For example, in the film "Legend", AI technology not only realizes the special effects production that was difficult to complete in the past, but also allows actors to complete more shooting tasks in a limited time through digital human technology, which greatly reduces production costs - "For example, in the past, an actor may need to shoot for 9 days in a row, but now with the assistance of AI technology, they only need 2 days to complete most of the shooting, which can greatly reduce the salary." ”
It is reported that Bona Film has set up its own AI studio this year, accumulating assets from digital images first. In Yu Dong's view, digital humans are important digital assets. "In Legend, we have the digital assets of the young Jackie Chan, which is equivalent to having an actor who will never grow old. Such technological breakthroughs have made filmmaking more flexible and have also made significant changes to the way actors work. ”
In addition, the application of AI technology makes it possible for movies to be modified before release, including scenes, characters, etc., which greatly improves the efficiency and quality of film production. "In the past, we used to say that movies are the art of regret, but the emergence of AI technology has made movies no longer the art of regret." Yu Dong said.
Senior director Huang Jianxin also maintains an open and optimistic attitude towards the development of AI technology. He believes that AI technology can not only help films complete special effects production, scene design, character creation and other work more efficiently and accurately, but also help filmmakers better understand market demand. Wang Jian'er, chairman of Shanghai Film Group, also believes that in the AIGC era, only by entering the game can we break the game, and only by accelerating the layout can we win the opportunity.
At the premiere of "Nishino", Lu Chuan introduced that from "749 Bureau" to "Nishino", he and his team are using AI to assist creation. In Lu Chuan's view, AI can help young creators cross the technical threshold, accelerate the visual presentation of creativity, and optimize the entire workflow of film creation.
Xie Ying, vice president of Youku, introduced: "In "The Case of Tang Di Gong", we used AI to digitally reproduce the magnificent scene of Chang'an City; In "Under the Alien", the hyper-realistic digital human Lili created a precedent for digital people to participate in TV series. In Xie Ying's view, whether it can improve quality and efficiency and apply it to practical work on a large scale is an important criterion for measuring "application-level" new technologies. "Virtual shooting is undoubtedly one of the typical examples, and by optimizing the AI algorithm, we have reduced the on-site commissioning time of virtual shooting from 2 hours to 20 minutes. The rapid construction and switching of multiple scenes has also increased the shooting efficiency of virtual shooting sessions by more than 35%, and more creators are willing to try virtual shooting. ”
"We need to embrace new technology, and new technology brings a lot of opportunities, and we can present the story to the audience in a better way." The chairman of the jury of the Magnolia Award for Animation at the 29th Shanghai TV Festival and French animation producer Frédéric Pierche said.
Be cautious
AIGC should be "well utilized" and "well governed"
The widespread use of AI may lead to a large amount of homogeneous content
However, Wang Changtian, chairman of Guangguang Media, remains cautious about AI. He believes that the current state of AI should not be exaggerated. At least in the field of film, AI is a production tool after all, and now this tool is still extremely immature, and it may take two or three years to really reach the effect of the big screen.
In addition, Wang Changtian is also worried that the widespread use of AI will bring a lot of homogeneous content. "The light of AI can never hide the light of humanity." In his view, at present, AI still presents the function of search and integration, and the unique creative ability cannot be done, and it is always inseparable from human creativity.
Director Zhang Mo also mentioned that AI is indeed technically efficient, for example, his work "Save the Suspect" uses AI to make English subtitles, which greatly improves efficiency and saves the cost of finding someone to translate, communication and other costs. But when it comes to script creation, AI is always almost meaningless, "When we see scenes written by AI, we often have some déjà vu. Also, I have to spend a night talking to the AI, so I might as well write it myself. ”
"The annual meeting can't be stopped! Director Dong Runnian was even more blunt at another forum, and the current AI is more like an existence with extremely rich knowledge and logic, but only the average IQ and creativity of human beings.
At the beginning of this year, the Wensheng video tool Sora made a shocking debut, but at the jury meeting of the 26th Shanghai International Film Festival, the chairman of the jury of the animation unit and the French animation director Benjamin René poured "cold water", "I personally don't want to see a movie made entirely of AI, because I feel that there is no soul in it, no real emotions." Hungarian animation director and screenwriter Reka Buch agrees with Benjamin that AI can be used as a tool, but it is not the subject of artistic creation. "AI sometimes makes us lose our direction and the process of making art."
AI is a partner, "understand it, master it, and embrace it as early as possible"
"We need to think about what AI can do, and even more importantly, what AI can't do." Japanese animation film director Masaharu Kawamori believes that film creators should think more and broaden the boundaries of AI applications in the film field. At the sci-fi movie forum, he said: "We don't need to look for a correct answer from AI, we need to think about what AI can make interesting and interesting things."
Chen Liaoyu, associate professor of the School of Animation of Beijing Film Academy and chief director of "Chinese Strange Tan", said: "Our aesthetic concepts were formed before the advent of AI technology, and the images seen by humans in the future may be related to AI, and the aesthetic concepts will be updated and iterated accordingly, and the fit between creators and AI will become higher and higher." "AI is actually a tool and a partner, whether we accept it or not, it will intervene in our lives, so we need to understand it, master it, and embrace it as soon as possible." ”
At the "AIGC Use and Governance Dialogue" forum, the guests believed that AIGC should be "well used" and "well governed". According to reports, in the face of the risks and challenges of AIGC, the State Administration of Radio and Television will take a series of measures to deal with it. Through cooperation, regulation and education to guide and manage the application of AIGC, to achieve the organic combination of AIGC technology and human creativity.
(Source: Guangzhou Daily Author: Mo Siqige Huang An)