Interface News Reporter | Zhang Youfa
"This tool is very immature now. At least in the film industry, there is currently no way to apply it to films projected on the screen."
At the AI theme forum during the Shanghai International Film Festival, Ray Wang Changtian, chairman of the media, talked about the current situation of AI application in the film industry and bluntly poured cold water on it.
In the previous discussion, most of the guests expressed some expectations and enthusiasm for AI technology to transform movies. Yu Dong, chairman of Bona Pictures, even talked about the importance of AI for the accumulation of digital assets, and mentioned that it will soon The release of "Legend" will be "truly the world's first big-screen presentation of a digital film."
Wang Changtian expressed great doubts about the current tool value of AI: "I think Yu Dong may (need) to go back and learn more about it. I think the AI presentation of the "Legend" application is just an upgrade of the original software used. There is no AI It can still be done."
"Legend" official stills Source: Douban
This debate is also a microcosm of the entire Shanghai Film Festival: the topic of AI is almost everywhere, but how much AI can do to the film industry now and in the future. No one can draw a conclusion on the impact.
In past iterations of the Internet, the film industry was one of the content categories least affected by technology. As Li Jie, president of Alibaba Pictures, mentioned at the opening forum, technological innovations in the past 20 years have affected search, information, portals, interaction and social networking, but they have not affected movies.
With the rapid development of AIGC, more and more film practitioners believe that they may not be able to stay out of this technological wave. At the Shanghai Film Festival in 2023, AI has become a prominent science, but at that time, the industry's discussion of AI was still at the stage of blind people trying to figure out the elephant, and the proportion of prospects and confusion was still not small.
On February 16th at the beginning of this year, openai released the Vincent video large model sora, which brought a greater shock to the film industry. According to Wang Jian'er, Party Secretary and Chairman of Shanghai Film Group and Shanghai Film Co., Ltd., after the birth of sora, Shanghai Film Group "spent 14 days in urgent consultations and discussions" and successively laid out the new strategy of "inew" and "ipai". Planet", and a large model of the Chinese animation school and many other projects.
Other film companies are also following the trend of AI. On April 3 this year, the Beijing Artificial Intelligence Research and Application Branch of China Film Co., Ltd. was officially established. On May 27, Bona Pictures stated on the interactive platform that Bona has established an AI studio.
In terms of content presentation, short content has become the first area for film companies to test the waters. Screenwriter Wang Hongwei, secretary-general of the China Film Directors Association and associate professor of the Directing Department of Beijing Film Academy, said that he has begun to see prototypes of young directors' application of artificial intelligence in the creation of some short films.
Guangguang Media also told investors on the interactive platform on March 14 that the company plans to use AI to participate in the production of animated micro-shorts, using Chinese classics as the theme, to produce an AI-animated micro-short that may last a thousand episodes.
During the Shanghai Film Festival, Shanghai Film Group held the "Global AI Movie Marathon Competition" award ceremony. This competition launched in Los Angeles aims to find AI film and television venture capital projects and "ai+" film and television talents. It has opened the classic IP "Nezha Haohai" and He Xi's science fiction IP respectively. Participating teams and individuals can use AI tools to carry out 2 -3-minute concept short film creation.
At Bona's 25th anniversary press conference, the aigc science fiction short series "Sanxingdui: Future Apocalypse" produced by Bona Pictures and co-produced by Douyin was also unveiled. Yu Dong told Jiemian Entertainment in an interview that AI short plays are mainly used to test whether the company's digital human image is suitable for today's market.
In the production process of movies, AI has entered into every link. Director Zhang Mo mentioned that his film "Rescuing the Suspect" used AI to generate English subtitles. "I input the entire script into AI and it took about 20 minutes to generate English subtitles for the entire movie, and the translation was quite accurate. ."
At the release site of Alibaba Pictures' "Chinese-language masterpiece", when director Feng Xiaogang talked about the restoration of the times in the new film "Catch the Spy", he also mentioned that he consulted other practitioners on whether it was possible to use AI technology to achieve it. Restoring the style of the times.
Yu Dong’s emphasis on AI is mainly because its combination with digital human technology may shorten the shooting cycle. “In the past, it might take 90 days to shoot a movie with real people, but with AI digital human beings, it would take 90 days to shoot.” It may only take 20 days and the pay can be significantly reduced. "
Alibaba Pictures pays more attention to the application of AI in shooting, especially virtual shooting, and has invested in 7 virtual shooting studios in China. In Li Jie's view, this will be helpful for science fiction movies and disaster movies. Waiting for the filming of some non-realistic movies.
As for the core content creation aspect, Wang Hongwei also mentioned the auxiliary role of AI in script creation: "We try to use AI to provide visual performance, technology and plot elements for the script. Multiple solutions are difficult to achieve by a single screenwriter or technical expert. "
The industry no longer has a superficial taste of AI as before, and at this Shanghai Film Festival, everyone began to discuss how far "ai + movies" can go. This is a global issue. According to Xinhua News Agency, the British capital London's Prince Charles Cinema announced on June 18 that it would abandon the screening of "The Last Screenwriter" due to public opposition. The film is billed as "the first feature film entirely written by artificial intelligence."
There are more and more films in China. Feature films have also begun to have deep participation in AI. The movie "Legend" produced by Bona Pictures Group and starring Jackie Chan has been scheduled for July 12. In the film, the digital character Jackie Chan plays more than 70% of the film. Yu Dong said, "We are going through a very important stage in the film industry, which is the formation of digital assets. In the future, we can have a richer pattern and form of expressing films." "
It is also a trend for ai to cooperate with movies for short periods of time. Wang Jian'er said that in the next step, Shanghai Film will select potential AI short dramas and AI animation works to incubate long video projects.
Jia Zhangke previously filmed "Feng Liu" Generation", he mentioned in a recent conversation with overseas filmmakers that in the future, AI movies and traditional movies may be like organic vegetables and ordinary vegetables, "the two look very similar, but they will still Differences. "
Official stills of "The Romantic Generation" Source: Douban
Compared with the optimistic attitude of other filmmakers, Wang Changtian obviously has a more cautious attitude towards the combination of AI and movies, "Excessive expectations for AI are unrealistic. It is also unrealistic to panic. "
Wang Changtian's conclusion is also related to Ray's exploration in the past year, "At this time last year, we all happily believed that movies would undergo great changes, and we held the key to the great changes. "
In October last year, Enlight Media stated that the company had integrated AI into some animation production processes. On March 14 this year, it stated on the interactive platform that the company has a team that is researching and guiding the application of AI in various business aspects of the company. Another team is responsible for applying AI to all aspects of animation production.
After a year of comprehensive application, Wang Changtian believes that AI has many problems. In the field of movies, AI is only a tool after all. "It can't come true." Decision-making, I think humans will like it so I want to create a movie. This instruction can only be issued by humans. AI is just a tool used by humans in their works. "
And as a tool, AI is also very immature," at least in the film industry. At present, there is absolutely no way to apply it to movies projected on the screen. If there is, it is just an upgrade of the original software, not an original new tool. "
Li Jie also mentioned that Alibaba Pictures will use AIGC on a large scale in the next three years, but will be very cautious in changing the creative methods of this industry, "because generally speaking, movies are still centered on creativity and creators. Art, it is not art driven by technology and technology, this is its essence. All technology is for us to use, from the tool side to change."
In Wang Changtian's view, the maturity of AI will take time. "We internally believe that it may take two or three years to truly mature. "
When applied to the creative side, there is indeed a lot of doubt about the effect of aigc. Zhang Mo also mentioned that in script creation, the role of AI is much smaller, "So when we see scenes written by AI, we often (think) Somewhat familiar. Moreover, I have to spend an entire night talking to the AI, so I might as well write it myself. "
"Rescue the Suspect" official poster image source: Douban
For filmmakers, the consensus is that whether it is applied to digital people, virtual shooting or other aspects, AI is more like an efficiency-improving tool, which is more obvious in the field of animated films. For example, Wang Changtian admitted that AI can increase the industry’s production efficiency by 30% and reduce production costs by 25%. Animation director Masaharu Kawamori also believes that AI can significantly improve efficiency for highly repetitive tasks, “to ensure that painters are motivated.” It brings out unique design potential.
ai can have autonomy and a certain degree of dominance in the creative stage, which is unimaginable to everyone. But whether AI will subvert creation is not conclusive.
Wang Jianer is communicating with creators In the process, I can truly feel the possibilities brought by the strong randomness of aigc. “When the creator used aigc to generate images, he did not get the desired results. But got a nice new image. We think AIGC is uncontrollable because we think our creativity is particularly important. This is a kind of creation brought about by (ai). It is not a tool to accomplish what I want, but to give me something I did not expect. "
This uncertainty is actually inspiring, and he therefore believes that AI is not just a tool, but a creative partner.
Science fiction writer Wang Jinkang mentioned that Liu Cixin once said at an event that science fiction writers of their generation are relatively lucky. Because he did not use AI to create. Regardless of whether the subsequent writers used AI or not, others suspected that he might have used AI to create. "Of course this is a joke, but the underlying premise of this joke is that Liu Cixin believes that in the long run, AI will definitely be used for creation in the future. will surpass humans. "
This prospect is still too far away. Although there was a lot of discussion about AI at the Shanghai Film Festival, it did not cause ripples on social platforms. Instead, it was Jia Zhangke's remarks about increasing the introduction of overseas films that triggered heated discussions. On different occasions On this occasion, what practitioners are really worried about is that the box office of the Dragon Boat Festival is less than half of last year, young people are indifferent to theaters, and producers are short of funds.
For the film industry, AI needs to go deep into the present before talking about the future. .
