We have been reading the complaints of those hating the AI music video for sometime now. TikiKiti’s business was founded on the modern music video and we see all types of videos daily. Including many made with AI. It is our conclusion that these opinions are all based on fear. Fear of technology that is propagated by an artistic field without any clear direction. Artists who use AI are more intimidated by the haters. The haters have a louder voice and tend to just shout over what they do not understand.
For example, here is a video, using AI generated imagery to satirize the trend to condemn what is not understood. The author of this post, AI video generator FLEX, says in the comments, “This video is made entirely from extreme anti-AI comments pulled from real online discussions. The irony is intentional.”
What we see here has become the foundation for the anti-AI fervor that is currently sweeping the world. These comments are more common than most would like to admit. I was reminded of what happened one year earlier. Last year Pink Floyd held a contest for people to submit animations for each of the songs on the “Dark Side of The Moon” album in honor of its 50th anniversary. This animation shown below was the only AI animation that won for the song “Any Colour You Like.”
Every single comment on this video reflects what FLEX on his YouTube channel to the video shown above. Every single comment is from people patting themselves on the back for being witty while exposing their ignorance and fear. Ignorance because most people are clueless about how this animation is created and how much work actually goes into making something like a music video with AI.
This article is not just about the fear behind the hate — let’s call it what it is — fear. Fear based on ignorance because no one that commented on these videos has ever created anything like a music video, let alone one with AI.
Here at TikiKiti we see a lot of AI music videos. In fact, today we almost never see the fan-made video that is not AI. One thing we never did was judge this new technology before we tried to understand it. In fact, our first priority was to understand it. That is, we wanted to know what made it work, how and why artists were using it, and where it took them. This goal took us to meet Patrick Hanser of the Brazilian grunge-rock group Bacará and the AI video he made to the his song "Cores." We ended up doing a podcast with him on this subject because he had so much great information (please excuse the poor audio and all the sniffles and grunts — it was a bad day for allergies). Here is a link to that podcast as well as an article we did as a companion piece:
Read the companion article here: https://www.tikikiti.video/community/patrick-hanser
In this article we address the concept of fear to a great degree. One definition of fear is: “The motivation many need to enable personal growth.” It may seem that we were being too generous. Some haters have no interest in personal growth.
To this day, the AI animation by Patrick Hanser is still one of the most creative and original animations TikiKiti has seen. One of the fundamental reasons for the success of this animation is that it starts with existing video. Hanser took video from live shows he saw and various locations. Plus he had his brother take video of him while playing his guitar. And the song is also a great kick-ass grunge rock song. Here is the link to the song with the AI animation:
As a student of history I here are is my personal experience that is pertinent to what is happening with the AI music video and the opposition it is facing. If there is anyone reading this that was alive and cognizant in 1990 this may make sense. If not, please just bear with me.
In early 1990 the graphic design art world changed forever. This was the year that Adobe’s Photoshop™ was released to the public. Along with Illustrator™, released in 1987, these two programs changed the face of graphic design, but, not without considerable opposition. I learned both of these programs while part of a film production team. We were able to create animations for our film that would not have been possible otherwise.
Early in 1992, I moved to Dallas, Texas, carrying my graphic design portfolio with me. I did not expect to find a metropolitan area the size of Dallas/Forth Worth with so little knowledge of these programs. Even less did I anticipate the downright hostility towards them. What was worse was most ad agencies and graphic design firms I talked to did not even have a computer. If they did, it was a small Mac shoved in corner with out-of-date systems and not single design program. This lonely computer was usually left untouched as all the graphic artists who continued to cut up art with Xacto Knives and used glue to combine images. The apprehension and fear of the computer was palpable.
It didn’t take me long to give up on this place and return home to Oregon. Soon after started my own business offering these graphic services. Then I was offered a position at local community college to teach Photoshop to graphic design students. To the Media Arts department Photoshop was something that all their students needed to learn. For five years I taught Photoshop. Then as the Internet grew and web sites were in demand my business grew was able to adjust. I then started teaching web design.
This is where we are at now. Many users to SunoAI are discovering how deep they are able to delve into how this program works. Many are able to use it as a recording studio. On Reddit user sacredpunctuation (https://www.reddit.com/user/sacredpunctuation/) says, “…It has changed my opinion of AI music tools. I thought it was simply prompting and taking what you got like a slot machine -- but I honestly spent about 10 minutes in Suno before moving the stems over to Ableton and spending hours tweaking and adjusting. I learned more about song structure and composition in a few hours with Suno than I ever have in hundreds of hours of tutorials.” Before this turns into an advertisement for SunoAI, it’s important to read the comments here as well. Staying informed is necessary to make the decisions on where to take your own music videos.
Recently I read about a man who owned a recording studio. Rather than criticizing the software that is used to develop music he dove in head first to learn it. He is using Suno™ (https://suno.com/home) and instead of closing down his studio, he now offers his knowledge and experience of this program much in the same way as I did with Photoshop 30 years ago. There will always be a place for someone who becomes an expert to sell their services when others are faced with the daunting task of becoming expert at something.
This mentality is what one calls “professional.” Instead of all the criticism you find in comments by wannabe animators or musicians, you have those that maintain more of a professional, can-do approach. It is these artists and technicians this article is about.TikiKiti has the good fortune to watch videos from some of the most talented artists around today. One such artist is Robert Mann and his Everymann Productions. Here is one of his most poignant productions:
Starting off with Plato’s story of The Cave, he reinvents it to fit today’s world of how we are all addicted to our screens. His music and lyrics are original. He uses Suno AI to convert his poetry to song lyrics. He uses Kling to create the video. Nothing is easy here. He spends hours, if not days working on this until he can see his vision come to life. He also says, “It took 3 songs to try and tell the story. But so far, I have only made the first into a video.” We anxiously await the next two videos.
This is what critics do not understand. The amount of work involved is determined by what it takes to bring an artistic vision to life.
Here is another video from Robert Mann with one of his recurring themes; that of dreams and of the beautiful natural world. Robert does play guitar and his work may be reflected in the guitar solo in this song. He did construct the music to meet his visions.
Another artist along the same lines, although with a completely different style, is Jason Popow of Waste of Time Productions. Like Robert Mann, Jason’s lyrics are completely original. Unlike others, Waste of Time Productions uses all original video taken on his many trips across country. Jason is a professional driver who drives long-haul. His music and videos are all about his trips and the life of a trucker who lives on the road. They are beautiful in the way he documents his trips. His music is very personal reflecting his job and all that it means to him. Much of his lyrics are about what it is like to be on the road, all the loneliness, the traffic, the weather, and all the things most people take for granted. Here is Outlaw; a song that seems very personal to him and to many truck drivers:
Another of his videos that is indicative of the type of songs he makes and the videos he produces is “Backroads & Hidden Gems.” This song has just the right amount of country twang and beautiful American scenery to match.
An artist we need to highlight is from France — Zenith Apex. Here is the very beautiful, “Heartbeat in the Quiet Hours.” Both music and video are AI generated. And like all the other videos highlighted here, he has sculpted each song to work with each video. “Night settles into deeper tone; A muted field inside your chest. A faint vibration gathers strength; Signaling a quiet quest."
From Hungary here is another producer using original video as a source and original music in their videos is Monyo Project. Starting with Endre and his jaw-dropping amazing guitar work, and layered with Baba’s ethereal voice, their videos are beautifully simple and memorable. Here is “Last Angel”:
As mentioned earlier, TikiKiti sees a lot of the fan-made and unofficial videos. It is from these videos where we started rating. Recently, nearly all these videos are produced using AI. One such is this from Lou Zeffer. Here is song from Yes, ”Owner Of A Lonely Heart”:
All of these videos highlighted here show an artistic vision coupled with the experience of learning the programs to bring them to reality. But what about the future. Here we have a video with director Christopher Nolan and his perspective on AI and some of the obstacles this technology faces in today’s world:
Here he discusses human creativity and how AI is not likely to replace this input. This is the same perspective this article has been working to make. With all the fear and apprehension we are currently experiencing, replacing human creativity is not likely to happen. At least not as soon as the fear mongers would have us believe. There is one thing these same people have not anticipated: With every fundamental shift in technology, humans, — all of us — have managed to grow beyond the technology to create a different era. With the difficulties we face everyday, our ability to create something unique may be our saving grace.
Here is an example of why so many fear AI — especially actors and those in the dramatic production, such as Hollywood types. From Brad Clark we have “The Waiting Room”:
As a way to close out this article, here is one more AI generated video made using original music and also created with AI. Coming from Australia here is “Star Goth” from Lamar Lowder. This is one of our favorite videos and will always be share it when possible.
