Commissioned by ODI’s Data as Culture programme, The Wizard of AI is a 20-minute (AI-generated) video essay by Alan Warburton about the cultural impacts of generative AI. Produced over three weeks at the end of October 2023, one year after the release of the infamous Midjourney v4, the video itself is “99% AI” and was produced using generative AI tools like Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, Runway and Pika.
Using creative workflows unthinkable before October 2023, he takes us on a colourful journey behind the curtain of AI – through Oz, pink slime, Kanye’s ‘Futch’ and a deep sea dredge – to explain and critique the legal, aesthetic and ethical problems engendered by AI-automated platforms. Most importantly, he focusses on the real impacts this disruptive wave of technology continues to have on artists and designers around the world.
AI Tools used: Runway Gen 2 to generate 16:9 ‘AI Collaborator’ video clips; Midjourney, Stable Diffusion and DALLE 3 to generate still images; Pika to generate 3 second fish loops; TikTok for detective speech synthesis; HeyGen to generate AI talking detective head; Adobe Photoshop AI to expand images; Topaz Gigapixel AI to upscale images, and Adobe After Effects to put everything together.
- Written, directed, voiced, animated and soundtracked by Alan Warburton.
- Back to The Futch animation by Ewan Jones Morris.
- Thanks to Joanne McNeil, Tom Pounder, Hannah Redler-Hawes and Omar.
- Wonderpanic Theme by Sonny Baker.
- Research Assistance from Fabian Mosele.
- Steve Ballmer Genie by Christian Schlaeffer.
- Pretty fishes by UglyStupidHonest
- In Memoriam images by Alex Czetwertynski
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