We use cookies on this website. By continuing to use this site without changing your cookie settings, you agree that you are happy to accept our privacy policy and for us to access our cookies on your device.
Transcript/ScriptUSAGM SHARE
((PLAYBOOK SLUG: LogOn AI Film Dubbing
HEADLINE: Artificial Intelligence Helps Make Movies Speak Many Languages
TEASER: Companies seek to replace subtitles and bad dubbing with multi-lingual AI stand-ins
PUBLISHED: 02/08/2022 at 8:20AM
BYLINE: Matt Dibble
DATELINE: San Francisco, California
VIDEOGRAPHER: Matt Dibble
VIDEO EDITOR: Matt Dibble
SCRIPT EDITORS: Michelle Quinn, Mia Bush
VIDEO SOURCE (S): VOA original, The Street Fighter (film), Hercules and The Tyrants of Babylon (film), Flawless, Deepdub, AFP, SKYPE
PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV X RADIO X
TRT: 2:00
VID APPROVED BY: Salem Solomon
TYPE: TVPKG/RADIO
EDITOR NOTES: )))
((INTRO))
[[Technology used to make a deepfake — a synthetic image of a person — may soon be helping foreign language films become more accessible. Matt Dibble has the story.]]
((Mandatory cg: “The Street Fighter”/ Toei Company))
((NARRATOR))
How to make a movie work in another language? For decades there have been only two options: subtitles or dubbing. Many viewers resist watching films with subtitles, which can distract from the action.
((Mandatory cg: “Hercules and the Tyrants of Babylon” / Romana Film))
((NARRATOR))
And dubbing, which replaces a film’s dialogue,
((SOT)) ((Mandatory cg: “Hercules and the Tyrants of Babylon” / Romana Film))
“This is the first time I’ve ever heard the word ‘coward’ applied to the valiant warrior Bomia.”
((Mandatory cg: “Hercules and the Tyrants of Babylon”/ Romana Film))
((NARRATOR))
…usually results in mouths out of sync with the words they are supposedly speaking.
((Mandatory cg: Flawless))
((NARRATOR))
When director Scott Mann
((NARRATOR))
((Mandatory cg: “Heist” / Hannibal Classics-EFO Films))
first saw a foreign language dub of a film he made...
((Scott Mann, Flawless))
“I was kind of appalled and devastated because I saw how different it was.”
((Mandatory cg: Flawless))
((NARRATOR))
This got him thinking that there might be a technological solution.
He co-founded Flawless, a company that uses a kind of visual artificial intelligence to digitally modify the faces in a film to match the new words.
((SOT))((Mandatory cg: “Heist” / Hannibal Classics-EFO Films))
((Scott Mann, Flawless)) ((Interviewed in person))
“The system is taking a very detailed look and an understanding, of how a certain character talks. The system is able to kind of re-time those mouth movements like subtly alter them so they fit the new dialogue.”
((SOT))((Mandatory cg: “A Few Good Men” / Columbia Pictures-Castle Rock Entertainment-David Brown Productions))
“ç’est amusant monsieur?”
((NARRATOR))
Flawless uses voice actors who are fluent speakers of the new language.
((Mandatory cg: Deepdub))
((NARRATOR))
Another company, Deepdub, uses AI to simulate the original actor’s voice in the translation.
((SOT)) ((Mandatory cg: “Every Time I Die” / MiLa Media- Invisible Films-Latent Images-Giant Hunter Media-Ars Veritas Productions))
“It’s not something that happens to me.”
((SOT)) ((Mandatory cg: “Every Time I Die” / MiLa Media- Invisible Films-Latent Images-Giant Hunter Media-Ars Veritas Productions))
[[For Radio Only: Deepdub’s Oz Krakowski spoke to VOA via Skype]]
((Oz Krakowski, Deepdub)) ((COURTESY: SKYPE))
“We need only a sample of 2 to 5 minutes of the actors’ voices in order to create what we call a voice model.”
((NARRATOR))
The new technologies promise to accelerate a growing appetite for content across language borders.
((Mandatory cg: “Forrest Gump” / Paramount Pictures))
((NARRATOR))
But in the process, the line between humans and machines continues to blur.
((Matt Dibble for VOA News, San Francisco))
NewsML Media TopicsArts, Culture, Entertainment and Media
