Lucasfilm hires the YouTube deepfaker

Lucasfilm hires the YouTube deepfaker who put its Luke, Leia and Tarkin cameos to shame

…it’s hired a YouTuber who specializes in deepfaking Star Wars and other big-budget movies, showing up their CGI de-aging techniques. Shamook is the one who “fixed” Luke Skywalker’s cameo in The Mandalorian to the tune of 1.9 million videos, and the improvements to Rogue One’s Tarkin are phenomenal

So far that sounds like great news.

Instead of ordering YouTube to yank the content or sending cease-and-desists, IndieWire now reports Lucasfilm decided to hire Shamook instead to do what they apparently love. “[Industrial Light and Magic is] always on the lookout for talented artists and have in fact hired the artist that goes by the online persona ‘Shamook,’” a Lucasfilm representative told IndieWire (via CNET). “Over the past several years ILM has been investing in both machine learning and A.I. as a means to produce compelling visual effects work and it’s been terrific to see momentum building in this space as the technology advances.”

Once again, this is great news.

I’m not sure Shamook’s results are always better than the originals; many still have that uncanny, mask-like quality that’s still common to a lot of deepfakes today, and they don’t have the benefit of all the additional CG lighting work that clearly went into Disney’s modern films and shows. But perhaps by combining ideas, they can reach new heights.

So that is your issues?

You want the BEST NOW on everything, and can’t wait for the technology/funds/time to do it.

I call that a sore loser.