Tilly Norwood is a ‘talking, waving, bona fide person’ who can even cry – despite being entirely a product of AI software
A Brit production company has built the world’s first Hollybot – an AI movie star to rival ‘Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman’. Particle6 Productions is confident Tilly Norwood will become the original robot film goddess.
Norwood is described as a ‘talking, waving, bona fide person’ who can even cry – despite being entirely a product of AI software.
Movie chiefs have used tech tools throughout the production process – from character generation and avatar animation to creating digital twins and generating custom footage – to create an artificial intelligence actress.
The move allows the company to reduce production costs by 90% while maintaining high creative output.
Tilly has already built up a social media following, posting: “Can’t believe it…my first ever role is live!
“I star in AI Commissioner, a new comedy sketch that playfully explores the future of TV development produced by the brilliant team at @particle6productions.
“I may be AI, but I’m feeling very real emotions right now. I am so excited for what’s coming next!”
Particle 6 founder Eline van de Velden, an actor-turned-producer with a Master’s degree in physics from London’s Imperial College, told Broadcast International magazine: “We want Tilly to be the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman.
“That’s the aim of what we’re doing. People are realising that their creativity doesn’t need to be boxed in by a budget.
“There are no constraints creatively and that’s why AI can really be a positive. It’s just about changing peoples’ viewpoints.
“Now with characters you can just take them from photographs. It’s all just constantly evolving.
“In a normal shoot you’d likely have the script almost perfect and then you film it but once it’s done you can’t really change anything about it.
“With AI once you’ve got the footage you can still change the script so you can refine it in a different way and refine it more even within the edit.
“As a comedy person with ambitions to do more in this space for me it was extremely creatively fulfilling.”
Talent agencies are queuing up to sign up Tilly.
Talks are underway that could see her feature in movies and a raft of other projects most of which are covered by non-disclosure agreements.
In a few years van der Velden predicted the entertainment industry will have ‘AI talent’ alongside ‘real’ stars – and it could be impossible to tell the difference.
“Real talents will probably have an AI digital twin of themselves so they won’t have scheduling conflicts in the same way they do now,” she said.
“If they need to do retakes and they’re already moved on to the next shoot that will be no problem. That is definitely the future.
“I feel like there’s an equal emotional connection between AI-generated content and real content.
“AI speeds everything up. So instead of me taking three months to get a comedy script I would do it in a month. Instead of me taking three days to film the comedy I can do it in a day.
“It cuts down the timeline for everything. But there are still all those human touchpoints and human creative checks at every stage along the way.
“AI doesn’t have an intrinsic desire to create anything so unless it’s coming from us it’s not going to do anything.
“And that’s why I’m not scared. It can’t take my creative desire away from me.”
Former Sony and A+E Networks exec Tom Davidson, Particle 6’s chief commercial officer, said: “We’re seeing the change in some of the bigger broadcasters and studios going from, ‘Oh, I don’t think AI is for us’, or, ‘we’re not ready and we’re scared’, to saying, ‘oh my gosh, we have got to get on board now’.
“Literally in the last three months I’ve seen a huge change with the bigger groups from saying this will happen at one point in the future to we have got to get on this now.
“I’m hearing a lot of producers being asked for the same quality but with 25% less budget but how can you do it?
“That’s very, very difficult – but AI can play a huge role in supporting that.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
