I used AI in a video. There was backlash. 

In terms of that first comment hypothesising that the whole book must obviously be AI generated too...the several months I personally spent writing the first draft of The Spider Queen (of which there is still a backup in my files) can put your minds at ease. Austin was an INCREDIBLE client who paid my full proposed rate without a blink and was super supportive and understanding throughout the whole process.

I don't know about anyone else, but I would really enjoy a "here are all of the digital creation tools I use/have used, and what they do" video.

I just found out about this response video, and I want to seriously apologize. Thank you for explaining how the original video was made. You made significant effort to ensure the resources you used were ethical and no one was uncompensated. And it took months of work to have it come out as good as it did, so none of this was by any means a shortcut. You also made good points regarding where the line should be drawn as far as computer assisted tools go, and what counts as transformative media, and it’s much more nuanced than it seemed. It’s worth thinking about. The last jab at you in my comment was really uncalled for, too, and I’m doubly sorry. You are an artist and you care about how your art is made. This whole AI panic has been a nightmare, and there is still real concern, but we can’t get so caught up in the frenzy that we forget there’s good and ethical use cases for it, and we need more information before we jump to conclusions. I hope your book and future projects are a success. Keep up the good work, keep having fun making stuff, and sorry again.

The AI scare has gotten so bad that I got a comment from someone who thought some art from a video of mine was AI generated. Ignoring how the video was released many years before AI tech got good, and the original piece of art was credited in the description to like 2016 lol

one of my favourite artists on pixiv got wrongly accused of using AI, having all of their work tagged AI even if they were made before the advent of AI tools. I get your struggle.

If you could have made made that video in a few hours, I trust you would have made many more.

As an illustrator and graphic designer, the AI images I generated by text prompt can never replace the specific image that I had in my mind. I thought AI can help with ideation, but as it turns out, I still need myself to do the concepts. You still need people to put things together for it to be cohesive and for it to make sense. Totally agree with you Austin!

Milton Friedman went to China where a handful of government bureaucrats showed him a canal-building project. He couldn’t help but notice the lack of heavy machinery. He said to the bureaucrat: “Why are the workers digging with shovels? Where are all the machines?” The bureaucrat replied: “You don’t understand Mr. Friedman, this is a job-creation project!” He said: “Oh, I thought you wanted to build a canal...If it’s jobs you want, why don’t you take away their shovels and give them spoons?”

Huge respect to the way you responded to this. Infortmative, non-combative, and well thought out

Is it just me? I always got the impression that every video you made was some type of an experiment. Be it in the way you tell stories, the kind of media, or the type of stories you are sharing with us. It’s honestly one of the reasons I love your channel. Every video is different and I always found it encouraging, at least to me, to try something new or to think outside the box or to not be afraid to share random facts that I’ve learned with people who probably didn’t care to know, but are all the better for knowing now☺️ Keep doing what you’re doing….. there’s more of us that love your work! 🥰🥰🥰

I do not mind AI being a tool for creative people who have a great passion, not at all. I just would hate to see people lose jobs and go broke because million dollar companies who have the money and resources getting even more greedy. AI could be used for so many good things I just really hope it will be a tool for the artists and not for rich CEO's to get even richer.

21:29 Audio transcriber here, I still have a job! We just spend our time editing AI transcriptions, and writing them when it fails to capture anything. We started that BEFORE ChatGPT!!

I cant believe the Moist Critical jumpscare at the start actually scared me that was so unexpected

I think Most people’s problems with AI is that companies think that they can competently replace people with it rather than use it as a tool to help them.

No place like the internet to take a nuanced, complex issue and boil it down to "thing good" or "thing bad"

Way too many people see in black and white. You just proved that using artificial intelligence to act as an artist isn't automatically a bad thing.

Lately, I've been a "where is this channel even going??..." subscriber, but this video has given me a lot of context. And on top of that, what a great way to open up the reality of all the "industry tools." I'm really excited to keep seeing your work.

In relation to your story about the professor who refused to use digital cameras over film, I'd like to share one that a co-worker once told me. I work in the planning/estimating phase of construction, specifically drywall. One of my co-workers used to work for a contractor back in the early 2000's who refused to use these new-fangled computer programs to plan out projects or do simple takeoff. Instead, they preferred to use physical paper plans on these giant tables, going over them with pencils, rulers, and compasses. By the 2010's, they were bankrupt and out of business. You know why? Because computer programs like OST and AutoCAD allowed other contractors, their competition, to pump out bids and proposals at a quicker rate with the same level of detail. Now these older programs are being replaced too with things like Revit, which is almost like an all-in-one CAD program for use by architects, engineers, estimators, project managers, field workers, etc. We're yet again having to adapt to the most efficient way of doing things, and so long as people adapt then nobody's being put out of a job.

If a worker uses a electric cement mixer to make a house rather than mixing cement with a shovel does that devalue the work they do? Should i pay him less?

I think that you used AI as it should be. As a tool, not as a replacement for the artists themselves. It's pretty amazing what indie creators can now do with the tools that are able to them.

I would like to see more people make a behind the scenes video to show how they use these tools because I’m not sure how this software works and how it meshes with these types of creative works. Thanks for this perspective.

This is one of the best AI discussions I have seen, I honestly hope this video reaches a wide audience, I´m 100% on your side on this one Austin, hope you are doing well.

So glad you took the time to put all of this into a video! It was very informative and professional- I think something is up with my YT notifications. I haven’t watched your videos in a while so I didn’t know anything about Spider Queen until now. After watching this I’ll go ahead and check it out! I’m kinda glad in a way, if it weren’t for this video I wouldn’t have known about Spider Queen at all.

A big part of the copyright issue is there's not a lot of transparency regarding what has been drawn from. I think there's quite a bit of room for us to regulate and ensure some sort of paper trail. This would also make it that much easier for creators to cite their sources.

You presented your case, your evidence, and your examples very very well. I genuinely believe you don't deserve the backlash for the time and effort put into the project

The main thing I got out of this video is the realization that AI, used responsibly, enables smaller creators like yourself to make things they would never have been able to otherwise, and that is something I can certainly get behind.

Your story with the “film-only” professor was a perfect conclusion to this essay!

As a traditional artists for my entire life, I'm absolutely shocked at how hostile that art community is towards non-artists just wanting to see Harry Potter wear Balenciaga. The idea that "If you can't afford to hire someone, and you are too busy working to spend years practicing painting - that You DON'T DESERVE to bring your imagination to life" - Is fundamentally baffling, wrong, and contrary to everything art is supposed to be. A fun way for people to play with their ideas and bring them into reality - Look up the definition of the word "Artist". It simply says "A person who produces paintings or drawings as a profession or hobby." - That's it... There has "never" been a requirement for the types of techniques, tools, and software that you can or cannot use to create art. Which means a person using AI to create images and paintings is "by definition" an artist. The same way someone using Photoshop instead of oil is still also an artist.

I was admittedly one of the people who thought the book was a graphic novel, but that was 100% my own mistake. I just somehow assumed that. Before the "chapter 1 video" was even out Also 33:33 people really saw old material that wasn't as good as today's standards and said "oh it must be AI" that's says a lot

I hate that you can never seem to catch a break. I appreciate your hard work and creativity to provide so much free content, and I know a lot of people would say the same.

I actually put that video in my watch later because I was interested in hearing the first chapter, but assumed it was going to be a still image and narration, so I wanted to put it on during the day like a podcast. I would have watched it right away if I had known it was a full animatic.

I actually don’t mind TTS AI. Some people can’t afford voice actors, or just can’t do the impression of it. And if you’re an indie group or one man army, I’m completely fine with it. Literally anything else, is very different

If I'm being honest, I never thought there was anything hinky going on with the video, but I was just listening to it while getting ready for bed. "AI" has been being used for a while, the outlines for Into the Spiderverse was helped with "AI". In college 10 years ago, there was an "AI" that would sync the camera audio with the sound recorder audio. Logic would use "AI" to remove dead space in audio tracks. If someone wasn't going to get hired to do the thing in the first place I don't see an issue if it's not done this way, as long as it's not done in an exploitative way. Using ai to cut out the artist, that's bad. Using ai to assist the art and the artist, I don't see the problem.

"If you use AI you take work away from real artists" "You should just find people who would do it for free" What the fuck, man

Personally my limit on using AI is part 3: art theft, using image data from non consenting artists. You've explained that the data used are from properly licensed sources, royalty-free data or from your own sources via commission. I think that's still within the ethical range of using AI, and thank you for explaining it to us.

I certainly don't side with the AI bros "git gud or find a new job" mentality when it comes to the threat of AI to human artists but I think you nailed an aspect of AI use that human artists have to be capable of, throwing the baby out with the bath water. If a project requires 10 artists to get the job done on time, you either don't do it and no one gets paid, try to make it work anyway by underpaying and overworking the artists you have, or use AI to supplement your deficiencies. That's not without its issues and there is the risk of ending up with a slippery slope where artists become less and less essential each year until you've got one guy just there to sign off on what the AI produces but at least for now, artists can benefit from the new creative ventures that AI allows us to pursue.

Darn it, Austin, I was watching this video and formulating a response of "how dare you not shoot your RU-vid content on Super 8 and project it on the side of a barn for passing cars" when you brought that point home in the last 30 seconds! Well done.

I was on the fence about the video having AI elements, but you clarifying the effort and time/financial roadblocks you had throughout the production process absolutely convinced me that this was a project of passion and not laziness. Some may still disagree and they’re within their right to do that, but I’m definitely satisfied with your thorough explanation and I’m still eagerly looking forward to your future content. Thank you Austin.

Finally an actually good showcase of how AI in the hands of an artist with an vision can result in a great artwork. And also finally a creative person talking about AI who took the time to learn what it is and which path is the ethical one. The black and white style of narration about AI online and in the news was slowly making me mad, because it was making artists who potentially could benefit from AI, turn their backs at it. That's why I'm so happy that this video exists and educates people.

people calling him exploitative for using AI and then saying that he should ask people to literally work for free is hilarious

As someone who values creativity and is doubtful of AI, I'm glad I waited for your follow-up before making any assumptions. I can't speak for everyone, but my own personal initial concern with the use of AI in the video was that the AI was used to generate the imagery from the start. And you very quickly assuaged those doubts while also opening a nuanced discussion about what computer assisted tools are and what human creativity actually means. My personal opinion of where to draw the line is whether or not the process of creating art is *started* by a human or a computer - e.g., typing in "red-headed anime woman and white-haired anime scientist" into Dall-E vs commissioning art, or typing in "write a script for Spider Queen" vs thinking of the script and writing it yourself. I don't think AI as a tool of enhancement is a problem, I just don't want it to be part of the foundation of a creative work.

I can't believe you would put out an apology video and not put up billboards, you're putting the men who update billboards out of work

I think the one of the biggest problems with the debate about AI is people are blaming AI for the rampant abusive and low wages for artist when really what artists need is something more like a union, you can even see it with the Writers/SAG-AFTRA strike. Writers and actors are not upset with AI they are upset with how the companies want to use Ai as an excuse not to pay them. The technology I am more concerned with is Deep fake tech, as I can see way more plainly malicious ways to use that tech.

What scares me is that for right now it's impossible to make a video like that for 2 hours. For right NOW it may be improving it's truly scary. But props to you for this video

Backer for the movie here. This seems like you've used AI as ethically as possible, while also doing your best to have as much human creativity inserted as possible. I haven't gotten around to watching that chapter 1, so I didn't even realize AI was used, but the clips looked super cute and you can't even tell from those anyway, aside from the voice. But it still seems really well done, and as a Vocaloid fan, I like AI voices when you're unapologetic about the voices being robots.

I have ethical problems with ai but you've 100% done your due diligence in these projects, you licensed everything & put a lot of effort into making the preview. Thank you for sharing your process

This is the conversation that needs to be had, thanks for educating sir

There is a phrase I heard that I think perfectly reflects AI. "AI is doing for art and writing what the calculator did for Math." It's a tool that lowers the barrier of entry. It is personally empowering me to actually be able to express my creativity which I did not have before and would not have been able to do. You can't put the genie back in the bottle.

AI is an increasingly complicated topic, and my understanding of it is also pretty limited. But if there’s an ethical way to use it, I can agree this is it. I am glad you were able to find different ways to tell your stories, and I’m excited to see what you’ll continue to do in the future. I am also very happy to listen to your experience. Thank you!

You're not taking jobs away from people if you couldn't afford to pay them anyway. Anyway, I really liked how informative this video was! It taught me a lot about how you can use AI and how much human is still involved in it. Really hope the video was also intended that way and not just a defence to the misguided/uninformed people that commented on your other video.

It's pretty obvious when you see ai art if it was made by an artist or made by an ai fan

Hey, Austin. Really appreciate you sharing your experiences and educating me on matters like the "Secret Invasion" opening sequence. I'm sorry to you got caught in the crosshairs of this hot button topic. As a freelance video editor and husband of a WGA writer, its hard to avoid the rapidly evolving conversation around AI on a daily basis; which is usually associated with dread. While these Hollywood strikes are more nuanced than just blaming AI, hearing reports of studios bringing AI technicians in house doesn't paint a good picture. All this to say, I don't think that AI is inherently bad (at this time). In fact, I find the current visual style derived by AI videos to be mesmerizing. While the independent creator in me relishes in the prospect of realizing my budget visions with fewer limitations, knowing that Studios are following in suit to ride this trend, possibly at the cost of labor, is a hard pill to swallow. It feels as though we're witnessing a transition in both the democratization of narrative expression, but at the cost of a potential mass exodus from an industry that brought American Cinema to where it is today; for better or worse. If that does happen, what is needed most is a safety net to support everyone caught in the crosshairs, but that's a different discussion.

I'm sorry for the backlash you've seen, I know how devastating that can be. Thank you for your content, most of us appreciate all your efforts!

This video really made me self reflect, on how much I’ve actually looked into issues like this before engaging in discussion on it, which hasn’t been a lot. I realized when you said it, I totally was one of those people who just wanted that little sense of moral superiority, and that’s embarrassing to be honest! So, thank you for the well put together video and encouraging self reflection and betterment! Keep making cool stuff.

Without getting into the right or wrong, hopefully this event hasn’t caused you too much stress❤

People often conflate taking shortcuts with being lazy. Yet as far as I know, taking shortcuts is the smart thing to do, whereas the lazy person would just approach the same thing the same way every time. It’s clear you still put work into this, even if you cut a few corners.

"Hire actual artists and voice actors" "Im fucking poor." "Understandable. Have a great day." Loved this video. Theres a ton more involved and much more nuance to creating projects than people realise. And like you pointed out, there's also a LOT more AI being used than people realise.

It's a really complicated topic for sure. As an artist, I get the feeling that Anti-AI groups are more against large companies who believe artists can be replaced entirely with AI, or people who call themselves artists after putting a prompt into a text-based image generator and making no additional adjustments. They don't think about the fact that tools like Grammerly or motion capture are "ai". When I say I'm against AI art, it's against the total replacement of artists, not for it's use as a tool. I personally struggle with people who type a prompt into something like Dalle and call it art. But I can see an argument for using AI for the specific weird, surreal style it produces or training your own on your own art to help with workload. I still feel uncomfortable with it and won't ever use it myself, but I won't pretend like I don't see the benefit of it. Idk, it feels like a slippery slope.

I have always believed that AI can help and reduce stress in work the amount of cool things that can be done with ai and people working together I’m glad that you made this video to show people

Not sure how I got this recommended, but I'm a software engineer with a masters in machine intelligence, and from my perspective we are in the same situation that people where in the beginning of the industrial age. There where a lot of pushback on factories, and people fearing loosing their jobs. People did loose jobs, but the world as a whole became better. But what history teaches us is that you can't stop this kind of progress. And I don't think in 20 years that we would have wanted to. Unless we are in the scenario where ai destroys us all.... but due to human nature, we can't(wont) stop it, so I choose not to think too often on that side of the coin flip.

There is also the idea that if someone says "if your going to use AI then just don't make it", that point contradicts the "your stealing jobs from the artists". If you use AI to make a project, a theoretical artist isn't getting paid. If you don't make the project, a theoretical artist isn't getting paid. Plus, in theory of you don't do a WHOLE project because one part needs Ai to make, now no one else gets paid. So if a movie isn't made because a scene was going to use AI, then all the writers, musicians, actors, etc. Then more artists are losing jobs.

People are confusing art with drawing. There is art in using ai as a tool to convey a message, there is art in using tts to make your characters feel alive. What isn’t art is just writing a basic prompt and posting it online. But that is obviously not the case here and artists should understand that. What Austin has done takes skill, effort and patience. It compliments the story and combining it with literature is a great example of how we can elevate our talents with modern technologies, as artists. I use ai myself and I completely understand your reasoning. It removes a tedious step, it increases our reach for our creative expressions and it enables us to dive deeper into interests we might not have gotten a chance to do otherwise.

People are terrified of something new because they can't reason how progress is achieved. Every new technology goes through this, and it's sad to see it still happening today. Hearing people say that this is "robbing artists" is like hearing people worried about immigrants "stealing jobs." AI-users will use the tool that gives the most efficient results, and this is good for both the artist, the contractor, and the public. Contractors have a tool to insert their own custom art, and artists have a tool to brainstorm ideas and styles they could be looking for. Eventually, the AI tools now will develop in a way to make it easier for artists as well; such as the example about keyframing animation. Twenty years from now, people will have become accustomed to this and use it as part of their everyday work and have forgotten all the faux-outrage they had.

I'm reminded of how TRON (1982) was basically disqualified for the special effects Oscar because "using computers was cheating". New tools are always scary, and big studios need to be held to a high standard to protect creatives, but I am with you here Austin; Tools are tools, artists are artist. And artists need tools that help them as much as possible, while still maintaining their creativity. Photoshop is cheaper and easier than paints and brushes and air compressors and canvases... And that's been the norm for 20 years, but we still use paints etc.

Not sure why people jump to conclusions with such entitlement in their tone when they do not know how much effort goes into making things. Thank you for addressing the concerns in a constructive way and that is why we love and support you.

As someone who’s trying to create a full 30 minute pilot episode for a show and straight up not being able to afford animators or Lengthy AI Motion capture, the pain of being the only animator, modeler, texture artist, rig builder, sound designer, and one of two writers while also barely surviving on ramen noodles in college is more painful than whatever any hate comment can ever be.

Thanks for this. I just found your channel yesterday, on the Springfield Cobra Scare video. Quality content. Then today, I looked at this video. It's refreshing to see content makers who look at the comments and take seriously the questions and critiques of their viewers. You spend time and effort to defend your approach to a project I know nothing about. I don't know if you did it to defend yourself from the accusations or to explore the emerging technologies in the industry, but you treated all of the commenters fairly, despite your urge to not.

I work for a company that does court recordings. Ever since that one lawyer used AI to generate BS legal documents, a few too many judges have been afraid of AI. We now have to be cautious about the ID of us AI to clean the recordings because somehow the two are completely equated thanks to those 2 little letters.

Hey, Austin. Fellow Austin here. You handled this very well. I am currently waiting for a copy of the book and I am so excited to read it when it comes in.

I am so disappointed in this video. It's quite clear that it was shot digitally, rather than on film. This robs film developers of work, and is thus deeply unethical. Further, that means it was almost certainly edited digitally, again, robbing people of the labor of splicing the film (and audio tape) together properly. Austin, how could you??? (Note: I wrote this comment at about the 30:00 minute mark of the video. I almost deleted it at 37:30 when Austin was telling the story about his film school professor. I'm going to leave it because I still think it's funny, and I want to leave some comment for the dreaded algorithm - which to me is as much of an "AI" as anything Austin used.)

I think this is a perfect example of ethical use of ai. All of the work was created using licensed, commissioned, or royalty-free assets (or AI trained on content that companies *claimed* that they owned) and I'm glad you thought through the development of your video and explored the more expensive option of commissioning VAs and artists even if it didn't work out and instead went with a more time-consuming route. I think many people have a different understanding of AI to many artists, though- there isn't a hatred of progress (many 3D artists would eagerly accept AI that did efficient UV mapping for them, for example) but a fear around the use of such products. AI has been trained on certain artists' work in order to replicate their style (including the art of Qinni (@Qinniart) who is now sadly deceased so the replication and 'theft' of her work greatly upset her family and friends). Certain people even went so far as to generate naked images of some female artists who requested they not train the ai on their artwork in order to make them stop protesting. It CAN be a tool (used for good or ill) but if so it is a very different tool from those that have come before and it is important that we respond to this difference adequately as a society. The camera must be positioned, adjusted, and shot by the photographer. The input is the arrangement created by the photographer and it is based on not only the photographer's interests and inspirations but also the environment around them. Many different references go into it until the final result is unrecognisable from anything else because it has become something new- the artist has made mistakes and changes in their attempt to 'copy' a reference and it has become something different and original. AI does not understand, perceive, analyse, make mistakes, and put the images through the filter of human experience so it's a little different from a tool upgrade like pencils to photoshop or paint to a camera. If I wanted to adjust one aspect of my painting, I could go in with a paintbrush and change it and JUST that. AI cannot do this as it doesn't perceive the picture as a whole but as data. One day it may be that good and to be honest, I'll be sad because I won't be able to afford to continue pursuing a career in solving problems via art and telling stories through my creations because why would they ask a human to do it if they can do it with less cost with a button and keys? AI could have fantastic applications in art, but only if companies creating these AI engines wish to pay artists to *contribute* their works so everyone is being compensated fairly (and we slow down progress on it enough that adequate laws can be made to protect artists and everyone who ever put their image on the internet publicly). Artists want to keep existing and keep making things to share with the world.... Ordinary people want to make their creative dreams come to life and cannot afford to pay people a living wage to help them... This clash is unfortunate and part of our problem lies in ordinary people not being paid enough for their work so they can pay people to bring their ideas to life, not just big companies. Big studios turning to AI to make products faster because they already have their artists on unreasonably tight schedules, however? Horrific. But that's a different argument, and not what is happening here. Great video, and best of luck with your book release. I hope you're doing alright after receiving such backlash!

Honestly I didn't even know that video had AI elements, even the voice actor because AI voices just can't sound that good without meticulous tweaking and refining and for that, I commend you.

Animation student here. I haven't watched the Spider queen video yet, because I started doing so and IMMEDIATELY realized the production value that it had. A 50 minute video is very long and takes a lot of time to produce. I believe that AI is a powerful tool when used correctly and this video shows that Austin did precisely that imho

wow man i can’t believe you didn’t spend several years or thousands of dollars to become/hire a competent animator, voice actor, and artist just to make a promo video… really feeling betrayed rn…

Several great points. And I appreciate how you presented a lot of them as questions and not conclusions. AI fascinates me as much as it terrifies me. And I think that’s because it is both extremely useful and extremely dangerous. What I take from this video is the question you posed repeatedly: where do we draw the line? And that is the conversation we should be having. I think it is inevitable that a lot of jobs will disappear as a result of this (as they have as a result of previous technical revolutions). Hopefully we’ll eventually understand this enough to be able to have a proper definition of it’s right and it’s wrong use. Until then, we need people like you to experiment with it

this is one of the most nuanced takes on AI ive seen. I dont like companies using AI to threaten the livelyhoods of workers or like scan people and use ai to just make them background characters without payment or royalties or how studios want to use AI to churn out works and just pay writers (badly) to just touch it up. Im a writer and i love writing but even I use ai to help me with outlining and grammar, im not a native english speaker so these things help. I do use AI as inspiration for character designs which i often then turn into character references using like picrew character creators (think like those dressup games but made by artists) and then hire artists for a final piece which i use for inspiration in my work. Currently all images and text generated with AI dont have copyright and i think thats a fair thing as AI lacks sentience to be given copyright. Theres definitely bad use of AI but like AI is also used to help coral reef reconstruction and detecting wildfires, like theres such a wide spectrum of using ai and sure people can be lazy with it but the mountains of games on steam that are just unity assets slapped together into a game and sold for 20$ proves there will always be people who just want the lazy way out. I think AI can be a good tool but i can also see the concern but i dont think we should paint everything with the same brush.

But one question remains. Is Austin HIMSELF an AI performance? *squints with suspicion* Say something only Austin will say.

I get both sides. Artists, especially in the gig market, are some of the moist exploited workers of the modern age, even though the urge to create is one of the rawest and most beautiful impulses we as humans have. And there is a lot to unpack here. Something that was always seen as human is now approached by machines. Something to intertwined with life made by something that never was alive. It's icky, it's uncanny, it came out of nowhere and now it's here. This is can put myself over. But second is the exploitation. Artists struggle to afford their rent. I'm in the artist community and e-begging is super common, simply because they can barely sustain their lifestyle without emergencies so any emergency could start a debt spiral. Massive companies who can easily afford to hire artists fire artists (especially writers) and replace them with AI to save a buck. It's all about money to them, while to artists it's about having the means to survive. Capitalism pits the worker against the machine while the machien should be a tool for the worker. AI is the enemy, and it can only be the enemy as long as artists need to earn money to survive. In your case, you couldn't have made this if it wasn't for AI. You simply didn't have the budget. You aren't those who 'should have hired artists' simply because you can't. And I don't think it's fair that you then 'don't deserve to get your project made'. If everybody was able to survive without the need to earn money, AI wouldn't be a problem. Intellectual property wouldn't be so strongly defended as it only really exists to secure the pockets of the creator of something. I could see you upload an AI version, only to get some messages from artists who'd love to redo some AI art for something you can give in return rather than money. Over time it turns into a fully human project. You saw this in the past with Vocaloid too. It's just how humans work. And if you're not yet convinced over the evils of AI + caplitalism, look at the hollywood strikes. What caused it is some of the biggest evil I've ever seen towards art. But where does that leave you? Unable to do your project? Able to do your project but knowing your means are hated by those you wish you could afford to hire for the project? I'm sorry, I have no answer for this. You're between a rock and a hard place

This really feels like that one time Corridor made an Anime-like short movie using AI and the entire internet went absolutely crazy, because AI=bad and uncreating. The fact that the video wouldn’t have been possible without the help of AI got completely ignored.

From what I've seen, the more a person is against AI, the less they know about it.

This was an interesting video. I think, if properly used as Austin did, ai will be a tool to help artists and people in all fields to assist with their jobs. My concern is when big companies will try to use ai to supplant or replace their workers to make a greater profit.

One of the Main things I've learned in life? 'You can't make everyone happy'. Keep on keeping on Austin, The majority of us have your back!🙌🏻❤

As a Comp Sci degree who took a class on AI, coded the strongest video game AI of my graduating class, AND MAKES ART (not as a career, but as a hobby - primarily traditional pencil sketches), I think you hit the nail on the head in acknowledging that intent is very important when discussing the use of AI. Using AI can be unethical when using training data gathered without permission or attempting to replace human effort in an attempt to make a low cost _(cough cough low quality)_ product to sell, but it's clear that video was not attempting either. Between you, your cowriter, and all the evidence you showed of the editing process, + attempts at casting, while AI was used to assist the creative process, you already had the story, knew what you wanted to make, and spent a lot of time and effort to make sure it was RIGHT - and since you're NOT a company with the money to spend on hiring an animator at a fair price to make the whole thing for you... Telling someone who is clearly an artist with a passion for their art, who created something not for the sake of cranking out an easy paycheck, but for the sake of creating what was in their head for fun, that if they can't do it themselves or hire someone, it would be better for them to NOT bring their idea to life at all? I don't agree.

Lazy = bad is a lazy and bad argument. I don't care that my meals take less than 30 minutes to make as long as they taste good. I'm not sure why we should want art to be hard to make. Why does that make it better?

regardless of ai usage in the video, i personally had no problems with said video. it really was well made and entertaining, and, again, even now just finding out that ai was used in the video at all, which initially surprised me, i personally have no problems with the video, including the decisions to use ai wherever austin did decide to use ai in the video.

Definitely think the mass hate is unwarranted here, and you've definitely taken the most ethical approach in all this. One thing that's definitely poisoned the discourse here is the amount of cases of artists who have had their work "trained on" by AI without their permission, and then the sheer volume of people who are revelling in the displeasure of these artists. If my entire livelihood, my entire historic creative output was fed into a black box and sold to people without my permission, and then these people are taking PLEASURE in my discomfort? Actively mocking on social media? Talking aboot how they're gonna "replace me"? Nah. I think thats been a major reason why so much discourse has been toxic. The tech isn't the problem, but there have been so many people not even trying to work with artists here that I'm not surprised so many people just have this viceral reaction. You've definitely got the right approach though!

29:59 the diffusion model learns what "appleness" is, then when generating denoises the noise until it has something that looks very apple-ly

It's interesting because the same argument for something like this is the most common argument why the idea of "production losses of pirated content" is often considered to be vastly overblown. It's true that pirating DOES extract SOME revenue, but all data show that the VAST MAJORITY of people who are pirating it "would not have watched the content if they couldn't pirate it," meaning that there is something approximating a "net-zero loss" because they wouldn't have GAINED anything if they hadn't watched it and by watching it, they may not be getting money, but they ARE getting mindshare, attention, and cultural elevation. Similarly, at least in this specific case here, if you didn't have access to the AI tools and resources, that video just wouldn't have been made. Or it would be substantially less. So the ARTISTS are seeing the same "Net-zero loss." The video couldn't have been made if it was with them, so they would never have seen the revenue from that project without them, anyway. It makes sense to be critical when there is an "either/or" opportunity (that is, the project CAN afford a writer but uses AI instead, such that it can EITHER use AI OR Humans, but chooses AI,) but it doesn't make sense to level that critique when there's an exclusivity paradox (that is, no one is LOSING anything because the AI is the ONLY reason the project is feasible to begin with.)

18:55 LMAO I've literally seen people nearly canceled for running art contests before, let alone using it for what is effectively an ad.

i think this ai controversy is apart of a larger issue where people put too much emphasis on quality being the core of art when its always been soul at the core of it. to me, as long as you start a piece of art with good intentioned passion then its already good; quality is just there to refine it

I mean you've used Ai in a way that's meant to be used. As a tool to create not a handful of those Wes Anderson ai generation trailers. Your project has soul which Ai can never duplicate

Your ending regarding your professor is exactly what I was thinking of this whole video. When cameras were first invented, painters were upset because they too felt photography wasn't "real art" or would put them out of a job, but who the heck wants to hold still for hours at a time to have a portrait of themselves painted? (I very briefly actually did this myself, before succumbing to how uncomfortable I was with what the artist was asking me to do and to hold that pose for so long, so I quit. But a picture could've been taken and a drawing made from that...if I'd allowed it). Hearing that your professor died with only an ASSISTANT role to his name (not even as a leading position!) is just...oof. Makes me think of the obstinate guy who made The Thief and the Cobbler. It took fans after his death to finish the project because he obsessed over it too much and refused to adapt to technology that could've made it faster. His story is not one that makes me feel impressed or proud of him, it's just frustrating and sad with the squandered potential and how he could've mixed his skills with the emerging technology of the time. Also, I'm sorry you paid for classes from that professor, but if you tilt your head, you can find a silver lining. It wasn't a wasted education. He taught you to not be like him and thus, you've created more already in your lifetime than he ever did. I really appreciated this nuanced conversation into AI, especially as I've not yet seen the original video, but I'm happy to go into it with this background context.

Personally I just watched The Spider Queen promo today. Learning that the voice for Shannon Kane was a text-to-speech program was a bit shocking. I could tell that it was on the lower end budget wise but the story being told had me at the edge of my seat not the visuals. The visuals were helpful for setting the scene and did their job well enough. The only aspect of the AI work on that videos production was a particular pain point for me was the ‘VA’ for Shannon, but that does make me question why the other AI works didn’t bother me. Obviously in an Ideal world hiring a ‘Proper’ artist for all the things would be the play but art is expensive. Though that said, the ‘AI VA’ did out preform other human workers that could have used the project to build experience and their resume to build themselves up along with your project. All this to say I don’t blame you for using AI or AI assisted tools, only that there are other things that I consider. Regardless with my personal gripes with AI and its use here, the story being told did grab my attention and I do intend on picking up a copy. The work you put into getting multiple takes from the text-to-speech to sound right sounds somewhat similar to the work a voice director does working with voice actors. Just food for thought, regardless have a pleasant day. Sincerely -The Void

I used to make Gacha videos, Gacha being a series of bobblehead anime custom character creators made by Lunime (alot like the Nintendo Mii Maker). You could save your character, put them in a scene with many backgrounds and props to choose from, and give them text dialogue in speech bubbles. This essentially made it relatively easy to make stopmotion story videos. And I once got a comment telling me to make actual animation. Bro, Gacha videos still took me time to make. On top of making the characters, setting the scene, typing in the dialogue, and taking the many, many screenshots, the video editing process involved manually inputting every single one of those screenshots on the timeline. Then there was searching the RU-vid Audio Library for music and sound. I later began writing actual scripts and story plans on word documents. Not everything that is easier is lazy in my opinion.

As a creative professional myself I am more against large corporations substituting human staff with AI or using it as leverage to pay their human staff lower salaries. I don't have any problem when small Indy creators use AI to speed up development of their content/products. AI basically leveled the playing field so to speak. My only concern with this is that in the long run the market will be flooded with content/products/art from both Indy developers and large corporations. The market will be oversaturated, so prices will go down. Good for consumers but not so good for people trying to make a living of their creative endeavors.

I legit had no idea that video was made using AI. I was actually looking for who did the voice in the video and was so confused as to why I couldn’t find it. Makes sense now 😂 You did such an awesome job on that video! I know it took a lot of investment but would absolutely love to see an episodic version of the book that way. Also I hope you use the same voices for the audible!! Your doing awesome Austin!

My dude, I'm so sorry you got all that backlash. I loved the storybook animation of Chapter 1, and really appreciated the multimedia approach to telling your stories. I did not clock that the main voice was AI! Maybe it's because I've had to rely on text-to-speech technologies for around 25 years now, so I know how frustrating and unreliable it is as a tool! It does not surprise me in the least how much work you had to put in to get a good quality reading. Thank you for taking the time to go through all the knee-jerk responses. My friend watching this with me said "This is the most polite F*** you video I've ever seen"! Sending you the love - soooo excited for the Spider Queen audio-book! x

32:08 Projecting an image onto a caves and tracing over it I think of as cheating. It is not wrong or unethical. That said I have a painting I did that way. The first thing I tell people that see it is that I traced it. It was an art project and that was the assignment and anyway I am no where near skilled enough to have done it free hand. That doesn't mean I didn't work at making it though.

Haven’t tuned in for a while, but really interested in this conversation and really enjoyed the way you broke this down. Between you and Corridor Digital, I think your showing one of if not the most ethical approach to use AI in animation and video production. It’s definitely murky waters, but I really respect the efforts you’ve taken to find answers to hard questions through the process. I do wonder if you might start seeing “image data sets” for sale by different artists. Want to use my style? Pay the artist to license it for your production, or permanently. Lot of questions to answer still!

So far one of the more convincing and grounded videos on the subject I've seen. For context I'm coming from this as a tv animator and my main concerns are point 3, art theft. Most of the anxieties I've seen in my spheres are labour concerns, not being able to make a living because they can downsize a crew of 40 down to just 10. With how little recognition, pay, and care animation gets as it's just a shit deal to be replaced because we did our job well enough that an algorithm can be brought in to cut costs. So a primary worry and concern is big conglomerates and less so independent. I still don't really like it even on smaller scales but I get it, it's tough. But that's kinda where I imagine leaning on colleagues, collaborating rather than "work for exposure"(ew). Collaborating, finding those compromises and lil nuggets of magic you weren't expecting. It's just cool to see something come together as a team, and as a lonely animator on the internet having a team to work along side and experience the act of creation wins out on making faster content. Ig that's where I'm at and want, this stupid, dreamy platonic ideal of community working together, instead of as a thousand islands shouting into a vacuum. Good vid Austin, take care