Comment by Animats

Over on the entertainment side, video is getting really good. Yes, there's a huge amount of AI slop, but the good stuff is quite good.

- Kono Express. [1] Disney laid off an character animator from the Star Wars factory. The animator decided to see what was possible with the best modern tools. He's using both AI tools and Unreal Engine. There are six episodes now, and each one is a bit better than the last, as he gets a handle on the technology. The first episode looks like generic sci-fi stuff, at good quality but not yet perfect. By episode three, he has this nailed. It keeps getting better. Episode six [2] is a delight. He's now almost up to current Hollywood quality. One person, turning out half an hour of content every few weeks. Who needs Disney any more?

- Asian vertical dramas. 17,000 episodes per day. Apparently 55% of China's AI capacity is cranking these out. Search for "asian drama creation tools". Amusingly, Google and Bing have completely different tool lists. These are all software as a service products, with accounts and token charges. Currently, visuals are quite good, with some notable errors. Complex patterns on clothing don't stay consistent, for example. Continuity errors remain common. Automatically generated audio is currently terrible, at least in the English translations. Plots are so cliche that it's clear people are re-using the same prompts. "Heiress girl returns from countryside" is very popular. Here's a recent drama, about startup working hours.[3] The plot is silly but the visuals are OK.

- There's starting to be a thing for turning out movies based on old SF novels. So far, these seem unauthorized by the original author, but that will change. In time, every good book will have its movie.

The good stuff in this space is getting to be better than the Marvel Overexpanded Universe.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikm5lP0zsi0

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XklUIGp6jH0

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7b9xNEkhlc