Monday, February 19, 2024

Imperfect

It is very strange to want computers to make very imperfect outputs and, unlike text, cleaning up video after the fact isn't even really feasible.
This is a problem that dramatically limits how much one can rely on generative AI, and it's one that compounds severely with the complexity of what you're asking it to do. Words can be copy-pasted and edited, and citations can be checked. Images, however, are much tougher to edit, and videos are an entirely different beast, especially if you're generating lifelike humans or animals. While Sora is interesting and potentially quite scary to filmmakers, it's important to consider some practical questions, like "how can someone actually make something useful out of this?" and "how do I get this model to do the same thing every time without fail?" While an error in a 30-second-long clip might be something you might miss, once you see one of these strange visual hallucinations it's impossible to ignore them. The assumption is that audiences are stupid, and ignorant, and "just won't care," and I firmly disagree — I think regular people will find this stuff deeply offensive.
Not an expert on video/image editing, but I suspect editing out the 6th finger is a lot more work than it's worth. And, sure, these things will always get better, but some things need to be better than pretty good to be useful.