Lucasfilm has shown off a short AI film set in the Star Wars universe, but the reaction has been overwhelmingly negative.
In a TED Talk titled ‘Star Wars Changed Visual Effects — AI Is Doing It Again’, Lucasfilm senior vice president of creative innovation Rob Bredow offers up a window into how AI can be used in visual effects – and in a galaxy far, far away (via 404 Media, H/T PC Gamer).
In a section on ‘Artist-Driven Innovation’, Bredow ponders “what happens when you put the latest AI tools in the hands of artists? What does it do to their imagination?”
Far from using ChatGPT to hash out an opening Star Wars crawl, one artist created a short film inside two weeks to “explore what it would feel like if you sent a probe droid out to a brand new Star Wars planet.”
“What would it see? More importantly, if we made a new show – and I’m not announcing a new show – what would it feel like?”
What follows is Star Wars Field Guide, essentially a lukewarm David Attenborough-style documentary, meshing together existing ideas for animals – snails and peacocks, tigers and polar bears – with the odd warped lens usually presented by AI-generated content.
“It’s pretty fun to see artists’ expression leveraging the latest new tools,” Bredow states.
Unfortunately, that isn’t reflected in the general reaction to the video. You only have to have a quick scout of comments to see fans’ displeasure at the proof of concept.
“None of those creatures look like they belong in Star Wars. They are all clearly two earth animals fused together in the most basic way,” one wrote.
Another added, “The ai video was the same slop we’ve been seeing for ages now.”
Others shared their own brutal takedowns. One said, “Dude, it’s not impressive if a 14-year-old can do it on their smartphone.”
“I think he knew it was bad,” another commenter replied underneath the YouTube video.
There’s no indication that Lucasfilm, ILM, or any other Star Wars entity will be using AI in their future work, however.
Next up, following on from the Andor season 2 ending, will likely be Ahsoka season 2 on TV – which is currently filming. Before that, though, we have The Mandalorian & Grogu on the big screen next May.
For more, check out our guide to upcoming Star Wars movies.
