Have you heard/seen the movie Watch The Skies? It’s a 2022 Swedish sci-fi film that’s currently being re-released in AMC theatres for a really fascinating and undoubtedly controversial reason: it’s the first film to use AI-dubbing. All of the acting and English voiceover is done by humans, but they use AI to recreate the lips movements of speaking characters, syncing their mouths to the dubbed over audio. It was awkward once I noticed but really impressive given I didn’t notice for the first 20 minutes of the film. More notably, it’s just a fascinating application of AI because it does nothing to displace human artists or their work. But innovation aside, I have to admit that the whole time I just wished I was watching the original Swedish version with subtitles… it was a really cute and wholesome movie.
Overall, my friends have slowly but surely converted me to a subtitle fiend, however my one exception will always be comedy, particularly stand up (subtitles spoil punchlines). And yes, the occasional anime has a killer dubbed version. Sue me.
I hadn't heard about Watch The Skies, but that's a very fascinating application of AI and something I'll definitely check out.
And I agree that the two areas where dubs can make more sense are for works that are mostly comedies, since many jokes don't translate, and for animated works, since the mouth movements are less prominent. We all watched Pokemon in English as kids and were none the wiser, for example.
Have you heard/seen the movie Watch The Skies? It’s a 2022 Swedish sci-fi film that’s currently being re-released in AMC theatres for a really fascinating and undoubtedly controversial reason: it’s the first film to use AI-dubbing. All of the acting and English voiceover is done by humans, but they use AI to recreate the lips movements of speaking characters, syncing their mouths to the dubbed over audio. It was awkward once I noticed but really impressive given I didn’t notice for the first 20 minutes of the film. More notably, it’s just a fascinating application of AI because it does nothing to displace human artists or their work. But innovation aside, I have to admit that the whole time I just wished I was watching the original Swedish version with subtitles… it was a really cute and wholesome movie.
Overall, my friends have slowly but surely converted me to a subtitle fiend, however my one exception will always be comedy, particularly stand up (subtitles spoil punchlines). And yes, the occasional anime has a killer dubbed version. Sue me.
I hadn't heard about Watch The Skies, but that's a very fascinating application of AI and something I'll definitely check out.
And I agree that the two areas where dubs can make more sense are for works that are mostly comedies, since many jokes don't translate, and for animated works, since the mouth movements are less prominent. We all watched Pokemon in English as kids and were none the wiser, for example.