The Yacht Week has launched a new video to promote its summer season made using pioneering AI techniques. Created by Anthony Rubinstein and the team at AR Visual, the ‘Year Of The Sea Myth’ video uses AI to create new workflows that would not have been possible even a few months ago. With much debate currently taking place regarding the impact of AI on the job market in the creative industries, Rubinstein believes the video is a great example of how the new AI technology can be used to enhance creativity and workflow, allowing humans to do their job more efficiently in terms of speed, cost, and creative design. Watch the ‘Year Of The Sea Myth’ video HERE
The video features a number of AI innovations. Firstly, AR Visual used Midjourney, a generative artificial intelligence program and service that generates images from natural language descriptions, called ‘prompts’. The team used Midjourney for character creation, using a range of prompts to deliver multiple iterations of character design until they found the ones they liked. Anthony Rubinstein said,
“It was kind of like having a giant team of concept artists at your service at all hours of the day who respond instantly.”
They dropped the characters into the background shots, added some additional effects and they were done. This is a process that would have taken days if a human designer has been tasked with creating the various designs, also saving a considerable cost within the video production budget.
The next step was to turn the AI 2D images into 3D objects that could be animated. Again, Midjourney was key to creating the characters but AR Visual then used a combination of Photoshop, the free website Monster Mash, and Cinema 4D software to animate the characters including a swimming fish, all in only a couple of hours work. AI also created 2D characters to sit alongside the 3D such as a deep sea diver that rides on the back of a 3D turtle. This new combination of AI and traditional 3D work creates a powerful new tool that has the potential to give even small independent creators the ability to deliver work that would have previously been too time-consuming and expensive to consider.
More innovative use of AI in The Yacht Week’s ‘Year Of The Sea Myth’ video is the use of Stable Diffusion. This is a text-to-image diffusion model capable of generating photo-realistic images given any text input and can produce incredible imagery in seconds. Stable Diffusion is very good at making video sequences and AR Visual utilised this. For example, they fed it an image of two girls on an inflatable flamingo. Using prompts, they got it to quickly generate a video sequence of the flamingo turning into two women wrestling a sea monster.
AI was also used to design the props that feature in the video. A physical board that looks like an ancient map of islands and sea myths was designed using AI before being printed using a 3D printer. Even intricate details such as the compass started with AI, before being laser engraved, cut out, stained by hand, then surrounded by 3D printed tentacles as a feature on the map board.
Lastly, the AR Visual team wanted to put a giant Poseidon on some rocks in the video. They tested Luma AI and Polycam, both apps that allow creators to capture a 3D image of the actor playing Poseidon, and were then able to integrate the 3D model into the footage of the rocks captured by drone.
Despite the positive impact of the latest AI techniques on this project, Anthony Rubinstein was also quick to point out that the project still relied on a talented crew to bring it to life, from character design work to a studio shoot with performance, lighting, and sound, and the many hours of traditional visual FX work.
The AI required the correct human input and inspiration in order to create and assist with workflow as seen in this video. However, Rubinstein remains optimistic about AI, stating,
“For me, and on this project specifically, I can’t help but see it as an incredibly exciting and liberating development that enables me to be far more creative, to supercharge my workflow, and to deliver far better work for a fraction of the cost that I would have been able to before.”
The video is now being used by The Yacht Week to promote their new ‘Year Of The Sea Myth’ theme and is successfully attracting guests to sign up for their 7-day mix of sailing, parties, and exploration in Croatia, Greece, and Turkey this summer.
