Wasting time with the eternal struggle of tuning algorithms to show you something unexpected (while not revealing too much of true yourself to the big data profiling) today took me over to Chinese channels showing hours long anime series / movies all generated with AI during past year. Have to admit I’m impressed by the sheer quality/quantity they’ve reached. Technically, they’re about watchable, could bring myself to sustain interest through one serie, partially because of the novelty of not knowing what “cultivation”-genre is and having the luxury of seeing it for first time without being overburdened by the repeating tropes. This came also from not having watched anime in decades.
Cinematography was good, chracter consistency held, there was a long season arch and shorter episode archs. Technical hiccups didn’t distract too much, writing was passable, pacing worked ok and action scenes looked great holding it together. Overall felt inspired and elevated after gotten invested enough to go through one of them – while clearly the edge of those series happens in platforms like tiktok.
However what really stroke me was the abundance of them. I trust I saw only an peak of an iceberg. Nothing like that in West, even best AI filmmakers I know are not producing on comparable pace, tho best out there appear to have higher ambition, I have no doubts that Asia has their share of more serious and artistic AI-cinema brewing. Now I want to know their production processes and budgets, what tools and workflows they’re using to up my game on this regard.
Meanwhile, been reading some old comics and books off from the library to freshen up and build library of ideas for projects to come. Not their time yet, but I know the spark won’t be there without batteries recharcted with refreshed resources to knit accessories of an story together by hand.
Also, as cultural differences go, how much gaming has influenced these animations is staggering. Of course you have quest logs and sentient AI assistant guiding the adventures – reincarnation is but an portal to next level. Cultivating immortality takes lifetimes.
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