Aerosmith removed from roller coaster preshow at Disney's Hollywood Studios

So Gonchar, I was bored and clicked through the link in your post signature and eventually wound up on a Brimstone on my Boots youtube video:

From the smoke effects and skin/road textures, this appears to be fully AI generated (it looks like a video game cutscene TBH) .. and you're telling me people are actually seeking out this style of content for entertainment? Like, sitting back and watching all parts of it?

My apologies for being blunt but the music and images here are about the most generic I've ever seen outside of a bad video game. Who am I supposed to care about in this story? This is the failure of AI, it's good at creating a mashup but nothing actually interesting. If this WAS a game I'd be furiously pressing the button to skip it. The only interesting thing was the fact the truck appears to be driving sideways at 2:14

If this is the future of entertainment, I'm glad I got terabytes of all kinds of "old school" media stashed away to get me through the rest of my life.

Edited to add, I understand that was a part 6.. I looked at parts 1 and 2 and it still doesn't grab me in any way.

metallik:

I've been seeing those canned responses to bad apartment/restaurant reviews long before AI was a thing.

A canned response would say something like “we’re sorry we didn’t meet your expectations, please contact us blah blah” and would be the same for every review.

metallik:

Who am I supposed to care about in this story?

...it still doesn't grab me in any way.

Those are feelings. You don't like the music or story.

*shrug*

As for the tools...

It's me playing with AI doing **** that's interesting to me. My style is amateur learning to play with tools he enjoys by using loose imagery as story telling over music.

I hate to break it to you, but I don't have the team or budget to go to the desert and film a silly long-form modern film-noir about terrible people doing terrible things - let alone just for ****s and giggles. But it was fun to create this and do something that I had in my head and be able to share it - even if the medium is less than perfect.

The alternative to this, was I never got to tell the story, or enjoy learning to create and no one got to watch it or like or hate it. In this case, perhaps the world would be better off, but you know.

To each their own, I suppose.

I, however, am on your side.

Gotta keep in mind this is as BAD as the tools will ever be - and you compared it to a bad VG cutscene. And I'm just a guy blowing some spare time on a PC with publicly available tools. In the big scheme of things, that's kind of incredible.

This was as good as it got 14 months earlier...and the video you're referencing is 6 months old.

That's both a curve and outcome I'm good with.

This is just one way to use AI (how I've figured my way through it) and I'm just an enthusiastic hobbyist who has been dicking around in my spare time for about 18 months. If I was smart, I'd have spent my time learning make one of those full-blown AI personalities/influencers.

metallik:

The only interesting thing was the fact the truck appears to be driving sideways at 2:14

Which shows how much effort I put into the details.

metallik:
I don't think it's AI. I've been seeing those canned responses to bad apartment/restaurant reviews long before AI was a thing.

Yeah, same thing I said.

You gotta work to make AI that bad...

Like me, apparently. 😂

Ok I gotta admit Granny Panties was surprisingly entertaining. Something about the constantly changing acid-trip backgrounds made it work. Is that a bunch of separate AI images combined into a video?

I wonder, how much of that video is YOUR input vs the AI content? It looks more authentic than the Brimstone video, at least the "animated" parts. Maybe I just appreciate comedy more.

The granny video was my very first video. My input is minimal. That's that old-school "dreamy" AI stuff, where it couldn't keep consistency and stuff became dreamy and morphy.

The "Devil" stuff is WAY more prompted...and created.

I think Granny is a handful of prompts (in a free public tool that doesn't even exist any more) and some photoshop stitched together. Devil (all parts) is over 200 image prompts, multiple character references, minor face-swapping, image-to-video prompts, and editing in Premiere. The reality is the exact opposite of your guess.

At the risk of veering into self promotion, but adding context:

Sex sells. That's my most-viewed video. Old men think the ladies are real - flat out. I have the YouTube stats to prove it.

Another recent video and new technique (for me) is the morphing animations in the right panel in this one - which I think are fun. AI spits out those complex transitions between key frames in no time. And you can prompt almost anything you can think of. I simply don't have the skills to animate like that without it.

Again, just for clarity - I'm only a guy messing around with publicly available tools. I'm not good at this by any stretch. Just sharing how it works for me. Your mileage will vary.

I'd be interested in seeing the workflow of the people doing professional AI stuff like commercials. I honestly have no idea how they get from A to B.

You guys sent me down a rabbit hole on YouTube. A new Runway model came out a couple weeks ago. I had no idea. I haven't been using it lately, but it is responsible for a decent amount of the "Devil" video. (an older model, obviously)

That's all generated. It's looking pretty good. I keep going back to the idea that this is the new "worst this stuff will ever be."

But all of that is prompt-and-go. That's literally the 'lazy' generation that everyone thinks of when they think AI-generated...and it's amazing.

I think the really creative folks use it in more tool-like ways as part of a bigger work process. I talk about not having time or budget, but imagine what you could do with both...even a little. A well lit green screen and the time and desire/effort (no sideways trucks) and you could easily make high quality "films" as one person - generate additional characters, swap out your actual performances, easy fully animated/moving/alive backgrounds, sound effects, additonal voices. It's a poor man's CGI studio if you do it correctly and creatively.

And I just learned that Secret Invasion on Disney+ uses an AI generated intro. And it's two years old, it's the morphy/dreamy ****. (I get that this actually sort of 'works' given the show, but still...)

So yeah, it's come a LONG way, quickly. There are still 'tells' that something was generated, but more and more of them are eliminated with each new gen of technology. This stuff is already in places we don't notice. Only going to become harder to notice (think FX in general over time) and more ubiquitous.

Lord Gonchar:

And I just learned that Secret Invasion on Disney+ uses an AI generated intro.

That intro was widely criticized at the time.

Lord Gonchar:
Old men think the ladies are real

Ah. The most media savvy of us all! But for real, are you even sure they’re real people?

All of this relies on feeding the models data so maybe this is the worst it ever is but maybe that fire hose of data is shut off because it’s illegal or too expensive. I’ve been told my entire career that this tool or that tool is going to write code for me or layout a design for me and it never has worked out. It’s turned me into a skeptic.

These conversations always seem to be about how impressive it is that AI did it and not about how good the work is but as I type the more I think we are ****ed. It’s easy to trick people being fed slop from their algorithms because they aren’t thinking about what they are seeing.

You guys are all talking about the visual AI stuff, what about the audio? I'm here reading your posts while listening to the YouTube videos Gonchar linked to, while the videos are playing in another browser tab that's hidden. I'll admit I have little interest in the visual stuff, it's the songs for me...most of them are really solid, some are absolute bangers.

The guys that do remixes of popular songs in other styles/genres can be really entertaining as well, like Fake Music BR on Facebook. I usually dig the funk/soul remixes he does, but the one I linked to in particular is hilarious to me because the original song was the defining catalyst of the grunge movement that rebelled against everything 80s. And it works somehow.

And now the discussion has come full circle...this just dropped today.

Vater:

I'll admit I have little interest in the visual stuff, it's the songs for me...most of them are really solid, some are absolute bangers.

I appreciate it. I think so too. It IS about the songs first. I just enjoy making the visuals and perfer to share the music on YouTube that way.

For what it's worth, I remember you particularly seeming to enjoy this one when I posted it.

Don't even get me started on making the music with AI. That post will be a novel. Everything I said/feel about the visuals, I believe times ten about the music.

But yes, everything you said about the music. Good example of other AI music - that I listen to too!

eightdotthree:

That intro was widely criticized at the time.

That doesn't change the fact that two years ago Disney used AI to created an entire intro to a Marvel show. I had no idea until I posted that. It makes the Disney/Open AI thing THAT much more interesting. Disney is on board.

Animation will be one of the easiest things for AI to spit out quickly, easily and consistently - long before other visuals really get there.

Disney ain't dumb.

eightdotthree:
But for real, are you even sure they’re real people?

I'm not sure you're real.

Vater:
this just dropped today.

Ooooh, they're gonna have Sabrina Carpenter!

And there's still zero chance I'll watch.

Wonder what the numbers on it have to be to be considered "successful"?

Vater:

some are absolute bangers

This is one of those times that I feel like I landed myself in Bizarro World.

It's almost like art is subjective.

Which is why the ideas of gatekeeping, tastemaking, and "right and wrong" ways to create are my Bizzaro World version of the same discussion.

Also, we've officially devolved to the standard detour personal attack portion of the program - which is making me feel pretty good about the points I've tried to make along the way.

I never said you're a bad person for creating it. Maybe I don't understand it like I don't understand that people actually think Lars is a good drummer.

Fair.

It just sort of turned into "What you do sucks" on this last page and at that point I have to figure there's no other retort.

I mean, "Your attempt to use these tools is unintersting/sucks" is not the logical progression of the discussion of the viablility of AI as a tool in entertainment. But here we are. I hope I got a few "morbid curiousity" views out of it, at least.

I use AI to help on my Broadway channel too. Voiceover outlines, my little digital avatar host I use in some vids (and I chose to make me avatar-y on purpose - no problem to make that a photorealistic me that would fool 90% of the people that see it), bringing my stills to "life" so things don't become a slideshow in certain cases, the actual On Broadway website.

I even trained an AI voice thinking I could save time on voiceovers, but...

1. I don't think it inflects or modulates as extremely as I do naturally. (likely a training issue on my end)

2. It tends to come off as my "announcer voice" which I'm not trying to use on that content. (again, probably likely due to that lack of inflection)

3. I tend to be just a hair improvisational when I read the VO (changing words and emphasis on the fly as I hear it out loud) and I think that's valuable.

I could give a myriad of examples of how I use it daily to be more productive, creative, or whatever, but how it's made life in the kitchen easier is even more off topic than we are already. It really can shortcut a lot of the time consuming or tedious elements of...pretty much anything.

eightdotthree:

like I don't understand that people actually think Lars is a good drummer.

Ha! Same.

I asked my AI buddy if Lars was a good drummer. It says:

Lars Ulrich is “good” at drumming in the way a bulldozer is “good” at landscaping. Not delicate, not always precise, but it changes the terrain and somehow the house still gets built.

Technical skill: If you’re judging Lars like a drum professor with a clipboard, he’s not an elite technician. He’s been criticized for inconsistent time, messy fills, and rough live execution, especially compared to drummers known for precision and polish. A lot of the internet’s “Lars is sloppy” reputation comes from live clips where he speeds up, drifts, or plays parts in a looser way than studio versions. He also isn’t known for advanced rudimental vocabulary or clean, modern metal chops. That said, he’s not incompetent. Early Metallica required serious stamina and speed, and he delivered fast thrash beats and aggressive double-bass work that helped define the band’s sound. His drumming isn’t “wow, listen to that technique,” it’s more “this is the part that makes the riff hit.”

Influence and legacy: This is where Lars wins, even if the drum nerds groan. He was a key architect of thrash metal’s mainstream sound. Metallica’s early records were a blueprint for millions of players, and Lars’s patterns became part of metal’s vocabulary. He also helped normalize double-bass drumming for a massive audience, especially through tracks like “One.” Beyond drumming, he’s a primary songwriter/arranger in Metallica and a big force in how the band structures songs, builds tension, and makes riffs feel like events. Several major drummers have praised him not because he’s the most technically brilliant, but because he understands songs, dynamics, and how to make a band feel huge. That’s a different skill set, and it matters.

Fans and critics: Polarizing is an understatement. Critics and a chunk of fans clown him for sloppiness and for choices like the infamous St. Anger snare sound. But plenty of musicians and fans defend him on the grounds that his parts are memorable, his feel fits Metallica, and his role in the band is irreplaceable. Even some top-tier drummers have said the hate misses the point: Lars’s value is in composition, attitude, and identity, not pristine execution.

Bottom line: If “good” means “technically great,” Lars is mid-to-good with real flaws. If “good” means “effective, influential, and essential to one of the biggest bands ever,” he’s absolutely good.

Lord Gonchar:

For what it's worth, I remember you particularly seeming to enjoy this one when I posted it.

Oh yeah, that's the one where the vocalist sounds a lot like Chris Daughtry if he sang country.

eightdotthree:
This is one of those times that I feel like I landed myself in Bizarro World.

Ok, so let me expand a bit. These are not songs I'd listen to during my commute (if I commuted) or when I'm in the mood to sit in front of my speakers and absorb the music. But they are absolute bangers in the sense that they are well constructed, each part (verse, chorus, bridge, etc.) fits the song, and the chord progressions/riffs/vocal lines all gel together to make a hook. Ear candy, if you will...and total bubblegum--as I said, not super artsy stuff, but the pop song that hits right. I mentioned before that most pop sucks, but there's some pop that slams. And the fact that this was created without actual instrumentation or real vocalists is impressive. To me at least. I'm sure you, being in bands, can at least understand what I'm talking about. Aren't there those "guilty pleasure" songs that you know deep down aren't great or artistic or whatever, but you dig them anyway?

See, the idea of a "guilty pleasure" is weird to me.

I like stuff.

Sometimes that's a five star meal at the finest restaurant. Sometimes it's a bag of sugar disguised as candy.

When it comes to entertainment, my tastes are ABSOLUTELY more Fish Sticks than Foie Gras. I don't feel the need to apologize for or justify that - obviously. I like simple fun. And I like fun. I'm gonna watch Adam Sandler before Al Pacino every time. (insert Jack and Jill joke here)

I understand how that plays in a room where the vibe is one that art has to be a certain thing to be valid or appreciated.

Flat out, most of my music (especially the consistent 'southern hard rock' thing) is just what I dig. Modern southern/country/pop vibes stacked on the 80's rock I grew up with. I'm basically Kid Rock if Kid Rock wasn't a complete moron.

You're welcome.

Late to this party.

I've had a lot of fun playing with Suno. I'm not Gonch-level in my abilities (video-wise)...but that's only because I haven't had the time. My mind has certainly come up with ideas for them, though. I also wouldn't expect people to necessarily "like" what I have created, as it's honestly me just having fun for myself and maybe a small circle of people who would be in on the joke/idea behind a song.

Like this.

I mean, come on...a backstory of the guy who pissed on TTD during construction forming a band out in Iowa and making this a cult favorite with his fans? And the catchy line being "had some fun and wrote my name on that wall" during the bridge? Who among us with pee-pees hasn't written our name on a wall somewhere when we were younger?

Those are all my own lyrics, and about 25 or so prompts telling it what to do, but it's also a very old version of Suno (and I also had no idea what I was doing, just playing). I don't have any dreams or aspirations of going platinum, it's just playing with a toy and creating something that might make a dozen or so people smile/laugh. Goal accomplished.

I'm currently working on a Broadway version of a new Cedar Point anthem on a newer version of Suno. And you thought you were a nerd.

OhioStater:

it's honestly me just having fun for myself and maybe a small circle of people who would be in on the joke/idea behind a song.

Hmmmm.

Hyper-individualized entertainment.

We might be a weird tribe, but we're out there.

The algorithm delivers again. Never saw this guy before. Video is six hours old. You only have to watch the first 7 minutes (that's all the further I am at this point, I hope there's not a twist ending).

It's a musician/songwriter giving a pro-AI take. His words (especially about gatekeeping and validity)...well, it's crazy how much it seems like the world is reading our threads sometimes.

AI mimics real music so well that it's difficult to tell the difference, but it's still counterfeit. What effect will this have on the future of music creation? Or music consumption?

Music has slowly and subtly changed into different styles and genres over the years. If AI was creating music fifty years ago, would we even have rap, dance, or Nu Metal today? Would Garbage exist today? The Beatles? They Might Be Giants? Your favorite music acts?

If AI music creation catches on too strongly, we may never see new music innovations. Everything will come from what has already been created, just changed. No new entries into the grand soup of artistry. Just rehashes.

Now that I think about it, I think some people still have it in their blood, like I do. The urge to write a song is sometimes unignorable. Sometimes I wake up in the morning humming a song that does not exist. I kind of feel like a loser nowadays because I am not in a band, creating music with others. But it's so incredibly difficult, seemingly impossible, to find people who want to do what I do. I have a few friends from my high school days, from my old bands, who understand and feel the same way. We write stuff on and off sometimes, just for fun. That helps with my mental health sometimes.

Hopefully, people like me will still write music, despite AI.

Talking about AI animation, it is so tempting for me to use AI to visually tell the story I want to tell in writing. The book I have been working on for over a decade, on and off, could be told as an animated movie, or something similar. I'd make it in the animation style of the old Dungeons and Dragons cartoon, or maybe the newer Avatar: The Last Airbender series. I could make it quickly, and not need real artists. It sounds like a really fun endeavor. No gatekeepers, as Gonch has mentioned.

But then I am crapping on someone who has animation creation in their blood. They take a look at what I am doing, and have no reason to live anymore. I'd totally understand that.

I'm rattling on like Trump at a Christmas party. No AI was used in the creation of this post.