#ai voicing

[xinambercladx]

I return from a haitus to share with you all a wonderful little, animated and AI Voiced fanfilm. Besides the one modern term "un-alived" and "fu**ing" instead of "Karking" being used that find odd, I thought it was pretty well written and very impressively animated by a SINGLE PERSON.

[yusuke-of-valla]

WE LIVE IN A HELL WORLD

Snippets from the article by Karissa Bell:

SAG-AFTRA, the union representing thousands of performers, has struck a deal with an AI voice acting platform aimed at making it easier for actors to license their voice for use in video games. ...

the agreements cover the creation of so-called “digital voice replicas” and how they can be used by game studios and other companies. The deal has provisions for minimum rates, safe storage and transparency requirements, as well as “limitations on the amount of time that a performance replica can be employed without further payment and consent.”

Notably, the agreement does not cover whether actors’ replicas can be used to train large language models (LLMs), though Replica Studios CEO Shreyas Nivas said the company was interested in pursuing such an arrangement. “We have been talking to so many of the large AAA studios about this use case,” Nivas said. He added that LLMs are “out-of-scope of this agreement” but “they will hopefully [be] things that we will continue to work on and partner on.”

...Even so, some well-known voice actors were immediately skeptical of the news, as the BBC reports. In a press release, SAG-AFTRA said the agreement had been approved by "affected members of the union’s voiceover performer community." But on X, voice actors said they had not been given advance notice. "How has this agreement passed without notice or vote," wrote Veronica Taylor, who voiced Ash in Pokémon. "Encouraging/allowing AI replacement is a slippery slope downward." Roger Clark, who voiced Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 2, also suggested he was not notified about the deal. "If I can pay for permission to have an AI rendering of an ‘A-list’ voice actor’s performance for a fraction of their rate I have next to no incentive to employ 90% of the lesser known ‘working’ actors that make up the majority of the industry," Clark wrote.

SAG-AFTRA’s deal with Replica only covers a sliver of the game industry. Separately, the union is also negotiating with several of the major game studios after authorizing a strike last fall. “I certainly hope that the video game companies will take this as an inspiration to help us move forward in that negotiation,” Crabtree said.

And here are some various reactions I've found about things people in/adjacent to this can do

And in OTHER AI games news, Valve is updating it's TOS to allow AI generated content on steam so long as devs promise they have the rights to use it, which you can read more about on Aftermath in this article by Luke Plunkett

[softwaring]

we’re really out here living in an AI dystopian hellscape and this shit has just begun… the future is grim…

[fisherrprince]

I’ve been possessed. If anyone wants to know where Edgeworth is, he’s been watching kamen yaiba with the detective boys for 4 hours

[four-eyed-floozy]

Some shitty transparents of the anniversary gaku and gumi. Yeah, it's got shitty upscaling, but I really wanted to see their outfits, and I didn't want to wait for the full pngs so I got lazy

[beepboopappreciation]

In case I wasn't clear.

[n30n-l1ghts]

Okay, I need to rant. Fuck AI. And I mean seriously. FUCK. A.I. I know I’m probably preaching to the choir here, but more people need to be talking about this, and there’s no point in me saying that if I’m not willing to talk about it too. AI has done nothing but ruin our communities and defile the art that millions of hands have spent millions of hours creating. Fanfiction is a work of passion. Drawing is a work of passion. Voice acting IS A WORK OF PASSION. AI has no passion. It takes the soul out of the things we love and cherish. It steals what we as a collective community have lovingly crafted, and it shatters it to a thousand pieces, spits on it, curses its family, and throws it in a flaming dumpster to be eaten by rats. It is despicable and disgusting.

I won't lie, or pretend I’m a perfect saint. I myself was a user of Character AI until somewhat recently. And as ashamed as I am to admit that, I feel it’s necessary to own up to my own faults. But after seeing the damage it causes, I can’t in good conscience even consider touching that site. Many of us write because it is our passion. Many of us because it is our job. And many of us because it is our *friend*. AI steals the writing of your favorite creators WITHOUT PERMISSION and mashes it together like Frankenstein’s fucked up monster to create storylines that aren’t even fucking coherent. Not only that, but Character AI uses whatever you respond to it with to teach itself as well, which means that the company has access to whatever you chat about, and free reign to do whatever they want with it. They also make absurd amounts of money from it, which in comparison, fanfiction writers, who spend countless hours writing stories for our favorite characters, more often than not charge nothing. And the ones who do charge, tend to have reasonable, if not highly lenient prices for their labor.

Which leads me into another side rant. SUPPORT WRITERS THAT YOU LIKE. It’s really not that hard, it takes two fucking seconds of your time and it makes someone's day. Reblog. Share with your friends. Like. Comment. Just let the writer know that you saw it, and that you liked it. The amount of fanfic writers I have seen get completely discouraged from writing because of lack of engagement is astounding. I’ve seen several posts on Tumblr or Twitter or Bluesky talking about creators that were incredibly popular but never knew it due to lack of engagement is appalling. If you can rant about your love for their work on Discord, you can rant about your love for their work in the comments. Just fucking copy paste it. Tell them how much you love it. Show them support. Especially the ones that don’t charge. Because for those of us that don’t, our only payment, is your feedback. Even constructive criticism is greatly appreciated by damn near every writer I can think of. Because even that shows that you read it, absorbed it, and thought about it enough to have something to actually say about it.

The same thing goes for artists and voice actors. You see a drawing or animation you enjoy? Comment. Like. Share. You see a character in an anime or a game and you love their voice? Go check out their voice actor, maybe they do some other cool stuff, and you might just discover your new favorite series or streamer. A perfect example is Alejandro Saab. I became a fan of his through his astounding performance in several series dear to me, and lo and behold, he’s also a streamer I enjoy. Same story with Aleks Le, or Ray Chase. Yuri Lowenthal, Lizzie Freeman, Landon Mcdonald, Zeno Robinson, the list goes on. But seriously, it’s not that much effort to just show a little love to the creators you enjoy. The people who breathe life into the series’ that we all hold dear. AI does not breathe that life. Using AI, and supporting those companies, will destroy those pillars of our community. And if that happens, the AI would crumble too, it would have no new information to use. SO really, what’s the benefit? I’ll tell you. There is none.

Stop using AI. All it does is bring harm and slowly kill our community. It’s disgusting, appalling, and downright fucking egregious.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

[ayyy-imma-ninja]

In light of recent events involving the use of AI in the TSBS fandom, I feel the need to say something:

There is apparently quite a good number of AI on character.ai that uses the voices of some of the VAs (Davis, Reed, Kat, Matt) and some have used their voices to make AI covers for songs. I have heard samples of a few and I'm in shock by how accurate they sound. But don't mistake this for any kind of praise, because it's not.

Please stop using them.

The VAs have stated that they don't condone the use of their voices for AI purposes. It doesn't matter if it's for something as harmless as roleplay or wanting to hear your favorite characters sing a song. By using these AI voices, you are actively disrespecting the VAs' wishes and their boundaries. These things can be absolutely damaging and detrimental to their careers if someone were to misuse them. This is an especially concerning matter to me because they are my friends.

That being said: please please PLEASE don't go around harassing people about this. If you see or know anyone who is using them, please just advise them to kindly respect the boundaries of the VAs.

-

On an additional note semi related to this topic:

I'd like to quickly make an official statement and say that I don't want any character.ai bots to be made from characters from my AUs, or any AI voices attached to them. As far as I am aware, the only ones I know exist are some from my Fairy AU and the SK AU.

If you've seen them or made them, please stop using them or remove them. I am no longer comfortable with the thought that my characters could potentially be misused with this technology and not know it.

Think that's it for now; thank you for reading and happy Friday 👍🏻

[fedoraspooky]

dusting off the ol' running Mabel meme after all these years because i am Tired

[gojoest]

love when tall men lean in to hear you better

[prokopetz]

Asking the voice actors on my video game project to consent to having AI models of their voices created specifically and exclusively for the purpose of making the dialogue say the player character's name out loud at appropriate junctures no matter what the player chooses.

[jojo-schmo]

Click here to directly send feedback to Tumblr Support about the new feature of training AI generators with OUR creations.

@staff turned off replies on their post about AI implementation. They’re dropping this on us, plugging their ears, and looking the other way and we can’t even tell them how we feel. That’s unacceptable.

This is a suggestion box that the Tumblr Staff themselves have set up. Let’s use it.

Tell them exactly how you feel about this new AI generation- its effects on the artist and writer communities, the blatant theft of our hard work and opportunities, the saturation of online feeds with these soulless, misshapen images and unintelligible writing. Express that disappointment, sadness, fear, and anger. They need to know.

And!! I haven’t see anything about using just art and images to train their AI generators. Writing is probably also fair game!! Everyone who posts on this site is affected by this!

Select the category “Feedback” and “New Features” and let the people in charge here know exactly how we feel about being automatically opted in to train AI generators with our creations.

Yes, you are opted into this by default!! If you still need to turn off third party sharing for your blog, Here is a quick guide on how to opt out of training AI with your blog’s creations. It’s just a hidden switch to flip in your Settings menu.

Together, our voices will be loud and clear.

[deathberi]

HOSHINO RUBY... YOU'VE GROWN TO BE A REAL BEAUTY. I'D EXPECT NO LESS... SINCE SHE'S OUR CHILD.

[emositecc]

It just occurred to me that I have NOT posted this masterpiece here on Tumblr. So here it is!!

Vocals by @swiblettheduk

[calicorobin]

Meenah: Recommend Tame Impala

[panthermouthh]

Slowly working out what the creature looks like. Gotta find the balance between handsome and creepy