The film industry is going hand in hand with technological and innovative progress that boomed in the past several years. From virtual and augmented reality to the innovative production tools such as 360- degree experiential recording just on a mobile phone, autonomous filming drones, 3D printing filming gear to usage of digital technologies such as deepfake and AI programs to clever editing.
More and more movies both fictional and documentary are being done using these new approaches in order to speed up the production process and to engage more audiences. Yet sometimes some of the approaches are being questioned and criticized, in particular a deep fake technology. Generally, such technology is more controversial in documentary and media/real tv usage since it changes reality that could have legal and ethical consequences than in film usage.
Deepfake uses data (AI, Deep Learning and a Generative Adversarial Network or GAN) to build videos or images that seem real yet that are actually fake, recreating a person’s image. In 2014, researchers for the first time used computers to create realistic-looking faces using “generative adversarial networks,” or GANs. There are currently over 14 thousand Deepfake videos circulating online as of September 2019—almost a 100% increase over a period of one year. Ninety-nine percent of the circulated videos are in the entertainment industry.
As with any new technology, it’s implementation has its own advantages and disadvantages. In film industry many expert point out such benefits in its usage, such as: changing lines of dialogue without the need to do reshoots and thus minimizing production and filming costs; putting lead actors in the footage when filming schedules collide, or replacing actors in previously done movies in order to refresh them or make sequels.
There are opportunities to do movies without the lead actors being on set at all. For this, there would be a need to find someone with the same body type who can also mimic how that person walks and gestures. CGI, VFX ane SFX technologies that were and still are being used to create artificial but believable worlds and settings in the film industry are quite costly and are not available for smaller productions. Deepfakes can substitute the costly VFX technology as a powerful tool for independent storytellers at a fraction of the cost.
Advantage of this technology usage can be dubbing and translation costs for movie distribution. For instance, Scott Mann, founder of the dubbing startup Flawless using the technology, thinks deep fake can put good actors that do not speak the language of the movie on the radar and that such technology would minimize costs. “What you’re constantly doing as a filmmaker is you’re doing the same thing again and again from different angles. From a production point of view, that’s very time consuming and expensive. Rather than having to remake a movie in English and all these different languages, we’ll be able to enjoy the original,” he said. “I think that will have an effect on the international community of filmmaking, and all types of actors that really should be on the world stage but currently aren’t because no one speaks that language.”
AI-Generated synthetic media are being used by independent creators or YouTube. Some great examples of movie deepfake using GANS are YouTube creators like ctrl shift face and shamook and among filmmakers:One Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, where the Peter Cushing hero was recreated; Travis Cloyd from immersive film company Worldwide XR with his aspiration to bring James Dean in a new film he has announced etc.
“It’s getting more and more complicated to understand what’s real and what’s fake” said the Kinovation festival head Illia Svidler. VFX technology is moving with a tremendous speed”. The first in Europe festival of immersive and innovative technologies in filmmaking has just passed in Dnipr, Ukraine; where more than 1000 movies using new innovations were present. Deepfake technology was discussed thoroughly by filmmakers and experts in the industry during the festival discussions.
As a disadvantage there could be usage the technology in documentary movies and entertainment videos faking and manipulating the reality. In 2017, researchers at the University of Washington released a paper describing how they had created a fake video of President Barack Obama. Google’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, has also been the target of a deep fake video that appeared to show him credit a secretive organisation for the success of the social network. There are also legal issues of stealing faces, illegal videos without consent, piracy, fan fiction. Deepfake technology could also endanger jobs for current actors while making it more difficult for emerging actors to gain success, as legendary actors can now be regenerated after their death.
The technology is constantly developing and that makes it harder for humans to detect it without the help of new technologies that created it in the first place, like Artificial Intelligent (AI). Some giant tech companies like Google, Adobe have been aware of Deepfake and done research on it. Google has stated that they are committed to developing AI best practices to mitigate the potential for harm and abuse, acknowledging the potential threats and harms Deepfake might create to individuals or society. Adobe developed an AI-enabled tool that can spot any small alterations of an image. The company also plans to release an authentication tool on their software in 2020 to allow users to attach information to their work such as when and where the images were taken. Dutch start-up company called Deeptrace is also using AI to collect data, and recently published a report raising concerns about the rapid expansion of Deepfake technology.
Despite many concerns, the technology has a potential in the film industry. The main goal is to understand how to fully benefit from the technology without violating anyone’s intellectual property and privacy.
Written by Natalie Gryvnyak