Spotlight: The Virtual Production of Europa
... The overall goal of Europa, as with ETC’s previous projects, is to experiment with and validate new cinematic techniques while exposing students to a professional environment in preparation for careers in film and television. For this project, the latest technologies to be tested included metadata, artificial intelligence in various forms and a new virtual production stage facility at Sony Pictures Studios, operated by Pixomondo. ...
The production employed cloud-first principles, allowing for global collaboration across different time zones and regions, including the US, Australia, New Zealand, India, Scandinavia, Iceland, and Canada. ...
Sony is one of Europa’s major supporters, providing Stage 7, its state-of-the-art virtual production volume at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City, California. The stage features Sony Crystal LED B-series 1.5mm panels in a classic C-shape with a ceiling and Sony’s proprietary processors. Sony also loaned VENICE 2 cameras with a custom Virtual Production Tool Set to enhance their use in a virtual production environment. Virtual VENICE, Sony’s Camera and Display Plugin for Unreal Engine, is a unique tool that visualizes undesirable moiré artifacts before they can potentially ruin a shot, a key concern in virtual production along with the ability to preview wall content on specific optics and a suite of Color Calibrator tools geared to the VENICE’s sensor. ...
Artificial Intelligence for Virtual Production
Another important area of exploration for Europa is artificial intelligence and how it can enhance virtual production workflows. One of the critical challenges for VP is content creation. To successfully capture in-camera visual effects, the virtual environment displayed on the LED volume must be camera-ready before production commences. This is inverted to the more traditional visual effects workflow, where a significant portion of the frame is captured as a proxy via a greenscreen or other placeholder. Then, the visual effects are completed during a more extended post-production period.
Creating this content can be a bottleneck because virtual production works best with photorealistic backgrounds. Artificial intelligence offers a potentially powerful shortcut by creating custom visuals in minutes rather than weeks or months. Europa used Cuebric, an AI image generator designed for virtual production backgrounds on a test shot, to explore its viability as a tool. Addy Ghani, vice president of virtual production at Disguise, whose show-running software is tightly integrated with Cuebric, says, “Cuebric enables creators to go from concept to the wall within a matter of minutes.” ...
It’s also helpful to distinguish between generative AI tools such as Cuebric and utility AI tools, which are much more commonplace in production workflows. Utility tools help to automatically apply metadata, identify elements within captured footage, maintain color balance and automate quality control. Europa aimed to leverage these existing utility AI while also exploring the more cutting-edge flavors of generative AI. ...
See the full story here: https://virtualproducer.io
The movies went soft on AI. ‘The Matrix’ reminds us why it’s so dangerous
... But this AI doesn’t have a singular form. Instead, every time Simone interfaces with the algorithm she’s hoping to turn off, she has to speak with and through a human proxy: “Mrs. Davis” is constantly made human by those devoted to her, a case not of AI entrapping us, as Drescher ominously warns us, but us entrapping ourselves. ...
See the full story here: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2024-03-31/the-1999-project-ai-and-the-matrix
The White House Puts New Guardrails on Government Use of AI
... The new policy from the White House Office of Management and Budget will guide AI use across the federal government. It requires more transparency as to how the government uses AI and also calls for more development of the technology within federal agencies. The policy sees the administration trying to strike a balance between mitigating risks from deeper use of AI—the extent of which are not known—and using AI tools to solve existential threats like climate change and disease. ...
Countries around the world are moving to regulate AI. The EU voted in December to pass its AI Act, a measure that governs the creation and use of AI technologies, and formally adopted it earlier this month. China, too, is working on comprehensive AI regulation.
See the full story here; https://www.wired.com/story/white-house-new-guardrails-government-use-of-ai/
Marissa Mayer’s startup just rolled out photo sharing and event planning apps, and the internet isn’t sure what to think
... It’s tempting to dismiss the 15-person outfit as out of touch. But Mayer may be onto something with Sunshine, and that’s nostalgia. Throwback tech is all the rage these days. Further, while most Silicon Valley startups focus on the newest new thing, America is getting older, as the U.S. Census Bureau declared last year. Mayer says Sunshine is tackling problems for people “of all ages,” but targeting a slightly older demographic that gravitates toward the familiar would be a smart move. Older Americans now account for a record share of spending. They have the time to socialize and take pictures. Sunshine’s interface is even steeped in the same purple hue that was long associated with Yahoo, which she famously led for five years beginning in 2012. ...
“The core thesis has always been to take the mundane and make it magical.” ...
See the full post here: https://techcrunch.com/2024/03/27/marissa-mayers-startup-just-rolled-out-apps-for-group-photo-sharing-and-event-planning-and-the-internet-isnt-sure-what-to-think/?utm_medium=TCnewsletter&tpcc=TCdailynewsletter
Fetch.ai, Ocean Protocol and SingularityNET Unite to Create Artificial Superintelligence Alliance
SingularityNET (SNET), the world’s first decentralized Artificial Intelligence (AI) network, Fetch.ai, a Web3 platform for the new AI economy, and Ocean Protocol, a decentralized data exchange platform to protect data, today announced the launch of the Artificial Superintelligence Alliance. The creation of the largest open-sourced, decentralized network through a multi-billion token merger is a major step that accelerates the race to Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).
The Alliance is the brainchild of three leading minds in decentralized AI. Dr. Ben Goertzel, renowned as the “Father of AGI”, founded SNET as a blockchain-based marketplace and framework for AI services. DeepMind founding investor Humayun Sheikh built Fetch.ai as a decentralized multi-agent platform to deploy and commercialize AI applications. Trent McConaghy, the architect of the AI-based software that most chip designers use to drive Moore’s Law, formed Ocean Protocol to provide a platform for data exchange and the seamless trade of tokenized data assets.
See the full story here: https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-wire-news-releases-pmn/fetch-ai-ocean-protocol-and-singularitynet-unite-to-create-artificial-superintelligence-alliance
New method generates AI images 30x faster
| The Rundown: Researchers at MIT just introduced a new method called ‘Distribution Matching Distillation’ — enabling faster AI image generation while maintaining the quality of the original model. |
| The details: |
| DMD distills the knowledge of a multi-step model (like Stable Diffusion) into a faster model that generates images in a single step.The method utilizes two diffusion models as guides to train the new, fast model, ensuring stability and consistency. In tests, DMD generated images 30 times faster than Stable Diffusion while maintaining or surpassing the quality level of outputs. |
| Why it matters: By dramatically reducing the computational cost and time required for high-quality image generation, DMD could unlock new possibilities for tools like real-time visual editing, design tools, drug discovery, and 3D modeling applications. |
See the full story here: https://news.mit.edu/2024/ai-generates-high-quality-images-30-times-faster-single-step-0321?utm_source=www.therundown.ai&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=apple-s-ai-master-plan
Book – AI in Museums
"AI in Museums" is a free downloadable collection of papers on the topic.
‘Music off the Wall’: The Music Center unveils its first AR art exhibit
... Presented by The Music Center, “Music off the Wall: An EyeJack Experience” by Campbell’s art and technology company, Eyejack, transforms the Jerry Moss Plaza and Plaza Gallery into an AR adventure. The 16 digital artworks with accompanying music come to life through smartphone lenses in this free exhibit, which will be on view until Saturday, May 4. ...
“Music off the Wall” will be the first in a series of local artist residencies at the Jerry Moss Plaza. Each artist or group will take over the plaza for several months with free reign; the only requirement is to “animate” the space with participatory and digital elements, explained Kamal Sinclair, senior manager of The Music Center’s Digital Innovative Initiative. ...
The digital artworks were previously exhibited in EyeJack’s Prosthetic Reality V.1 and V.2. collection, the world’s first NFT art book. In 2022, more than 60 artists, animators and sound designers from around the world converged to showcase the unprecedented book. As the exhibit’s name suggests, the selected works from the project each have a musical element. ...
“Music Off the Wall”
WHEN: Noon to 11 p.m. Tuesday to Sunday,
through Saturday, May 4
WHERE: Jerry Moss Plaza and Plaza Gallery at The Music Center, 135 N. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles
COST: Free
See the full story here: http://www.ladowntownnews.com/arts_and_entertainment/music-off-the-wall-the-music-center-unveils-its-first-ar-art-exhibit/article_5173807e-e8a4-11ee-988e-07e98bc2576f.html
Ex-Google Gemini guy heads Samsung’s AGI venture, eyes OpenAI and Meta collaborations
... Samsung is reportedly reassessing various aspects of chip architecture to significantly reduce the power consumption required to run LLMs. The company's targets for enhancement include memory design, lightweight model optimization, high-speed interconnects, and advanced packaging.
Additionally, Samsung plans to introduce new chip designs from the AGI Computing Lab through rapid iterations. These designs aim to provide sufficient performance for continuously growing models while helping to save power consumption and costs. ...
See the full story here: https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20240325PD210/agi-google-ai-device-solutions-division-east-asia-ic-design-distribution-it+ce-meta-openai-samsung-server-ipc-cloud-computing-iot-software-big-data-south-korea.html
OpenAI Promoting AI Text-to-Video Model Sora to Entertainment Industry
OpenAI is reportedly working to promote the integration of its unreleased artificial intelligence (AI) text-to-video model, Sora, into film production.
The company is scheduling meetings with Hollywood studios, media executives and talent agencies in Los Angeles to foster partnerships, Bloomberg reported Friday (March 22).
The meetings are part of a broader outreach initiative by OpenAI, according to the report. In February, the startup’s chief operating officer, Brad Lightcap, held introductory talks in Hollywood to demonstrate Sora’s capabilities. ...
See the full story here: https://www.pymnts.com/artificial-intelligence-2/2024/openai-promoting-ai-text-to-video-model-sora-to-entertainment-industry/
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