Transcript: 43 Minutes in Three Weeks: Afro Futcha on Building an AI Film in Public

Diane joins: a top three creator on the weekly show

0:07 [music] And we are back. Andrew giving it the drum roll. See Marcus in the chat straight away. Martin in the chat straight away. Let's go, guys. Sorry we had a bit of a delay there. And we have such a special guest with us today. Actually, I told her um prior to us being in the green room, she's easily in the top three we've ever curated on our main show. Andrew, uh her and Ryan are just so prolific. It's actually kind of unbelievable to even think that people can keep pace at this. You know, we have almost weekly videos that we've watched from Diane aka Afroofutcher. You may know her by both names. Um but yes, so happy to have you on the show.

0:55 Thank you so much. Yes, a fan favorite. Um, what what can we say, Mary, and all you guys that are watching? How much do you love uh Dian's stuff? We've seen so much of it in the past. Been following you really for I'd say the best part of two years now. Like almost two years. Yeah. Yeah. Like weekly sort of updates that you give to us throughout social media. And there's a bit a few bits that we're going to watch today that we've never actually seen from you. That's really, really cool that there's stuff that we have. My worry about this episode was, "Oh my god, everyone's going to know all your stuff because we've seen it all on the main show." But actually, you're showing me bits that we don't have seen yet, which is even awesome. You know what it reminds me of? Like in back in the day in record stores, you've got the stuff that's on the shelf and then you got the stuff that's like underneath the shelf like

1:45 behind the behind the the shelf that no one sees. That's what today's The regular customer can't buy this stuff, that's for sure. And I love it. Some mixture of client work and and some really interesting topics that we're going to be talking about. But yeah, just thank you so much for joining us on the show on the creator session. I'm so pleased to be here. I'm always sitting in the goo like listening and watching every week when I can tune in. So I'm super privileged that you guys have me this week. Honestly, thank you. Oh god. Yeah. As I said, Andrew and I have wanted you for so long and you're so busy with all the workshops you're doing and everything. And um yeah, anybody that's in London and hasn't seen you on the scene, I don't know where the hell you've been because like I you're just everywhere all of the time.

2:32 You and Aaron and Ryan, but now Ryan's in his cave as we know until the mid of October like doing the goblin stuff, working away on some secret stuff and you know, but you're still getting about all of the time. What have you been doing in the last couple of weeks that you want to let people know about? Oh, so um the past couple of weeks has been wild. Um I was doing I did two workshops. Um, one in particular, the last one that I did was uh within video and it was called Day Job and uh a bunch of people showed up at 10:00 in the morning till 8:00 at night and we built a film. I fed them, watered them, we had credits, it was great and we all created films around about 23

Two workshops and a film-a-day Day Job

3:22 or four films we created that day. Wow. Fantastic. Amazing. Um and then as soon as that had finished, well actually there was another one I did as well like a two two two weeks prior I did another workshop which was similar but we we did it over a period of a week. Um so there's been all this creative energy in me and I wasn't able to build anything cuz I'm helping everybody else build. Yeah. You're leading these sessions rather than taking yourself exactly that I'm sitting there like oh my god I want to play with sea dance. I think speed dance 2.5 just came out at that time. Um so I ended up once all of the um uh workshops had finished I started on this new project called 6 minutes which is

6 Minutes: from 30 seconds to 43 minutes

4:08 the it's yeah I didn't even think that it would take me where it is. But it's a project that started off with like 30 seconds of a clip that that ultimately became 43 minutes of a film. It's the longest AI film I've ever done and it ended up being I didn't know what the story was so I was like building it as I was going along and it was interesting getting feedback from people um trying to figure out like what people thought of the characters and stuff like that. It was just a really interesting project and I'm still fixing it [laughter] but so far it's out in the wild. People can see it in its current form and I'm kind of like showing people as I'm going along the process which I'm making this film.

4:55 So, it's building in public. You're doing what all of the tech [clears throat] people do. We discussed this in the show as we we've been what following along, you know, watching chunks bits at a time as you release them and you're telling us how much you've added. But yeah, when you showed me the link, I was like 43 minutes, Andrew, it's up to now. Yeah. Yeah. And it's all complete now. It's all It's all packed to bed and nobody guessed the ending, which is my favorite part. Nobody realized what was going to happen at the end. Did you Did you kind of have an idea at the beginning and the end and then try and worked out the middle the middle or was it This is what I'm This is what Marco told us last week, Andrew, wasn't it? It was just building as he made sense, you know, in the moment like fully in the like a totally different medium of film making

5:41 than what you've just stumbled into. But you remember the overall goal, which is something I really want to emphasize, is improving your music and sound effects and this being the underlying goal of this longer form project. You didn't really know where it was going, but you had this fundamental thing to try to improve your sound design, right? Well, the sound design definitely was a major part of it and I'm still working on that. So, all you sound designers out there with your critical I don't what you got to say, I'm still working on it. Leave me alone. Um, so, um, [laughter] um, the sound design definitely was a major part of it, but I think for me the biggest part was the the storytelling of it because I had to tell a story in the wild and I had to keep people engaged because people were watching the

Telling a story in the wild

6:28 same film over and over every every other day. Do you know what I mean? But then little bits would change in it. So it was still keeping people's attention even though I know they just it was like watching a film bit by bit for five minutes every other and then going back and watching it again and again and people did that which was bizarre to me because you know apparently we live in this world where our attention span is only 3 minutes but people were coming back and watching it again and watching it again. So, keeping the momentum of that and then also making sure that I left on a slight cliffhanger so they came back the next day and then um wanting people to actually see how the story progressed. That was a lot for me as well. Um but also showing people what I was doing because a lot of people that follow me are still kind of students.

7:17 I'm still a student myself. Um, but showing people how that like the process of making a 43 minute film was for and even though I did it quite quick because I did it within 3 weeks, not a lot of people can say they they've done a film that quick in 3 weeks. But again, it was just really showing people process, making sure I kept the story tight. Um, which I did because none of you guys knew what the hell was going on. [laughter] No spoilers, by the way. No spoilers. Um, so yeah, that was the main that was the main goal really. That's awesome. And just being so like transparent about us all learning is just such a great approach as well instead of the here's the everything I know and how do you do it approach, you know, the in your face. I really like that sort of attitude of we're all students, we're all learning, this is new, I'm building in public, I'm sharing,

8:10 you're also buying into a thing. And as you said, attention spans is nonsense that data of like people just No, I think w with that I think it is our attention span is decreasing initially. If you got someone's attention then you keep them longer. That's why. Yes. Oh, totally. They binge watch Netflix in a day or or in a way. I think if you get their attention and that's what you've managed buying into a premise, you're right. And I always think that's a really key thing. And one thing I'd love to find out from from you though is where did it all begin, you know, cuz it's not a case of you must have had some experience being able to say, "Right, I'm going to just like make a film like and having that creative idea." Yeah. What I mean by that, not necessarily a film background, but you must have had some type of creativity background and stuff.

Where did it all begin?

9:02 Yeah. So, in I I don't have a film background at all. Um my background is in web design actually, but I am a creative like through and through. It doesn't matter what you put in front of me. I'm going to create some with it. That's just how I am. Whether it's a sewing machine, whether it's a whether it's logic or reason or whatever it's whatever you put in front of me, I'm going to create something with it. So, it was just another AI to me is just another medium for me to be creative. But getting into this has now made me think, damn, I wish I went to film school. [laughter] Yeah. Right. You know, and I'm kind of doing it backwards right now.

9:49 So, I'm kind of doing the film while learning about, you know, film making and editing and and sound design and story. So, it's been really interesting. I feel like I'm in my second win at the moment, but I my background is definitely techbased. So, did web design for like 15 years. Before that, I was a radio DJ. Um, what about what you did? Uh, I did it for two, well, three stations. One of them was called New Wave Station, which you guys know Four Hero, right? So, there's a guy, you know, Four Hero, Chris. No, I don't. I do. Drum and bass. Four Hero back in the day. Oh, I should do. Yeah, I probably should do four Hero. There's a guy called Mark Mack within Four Hero that had a radio station called New Waves.

Radio DJ and the beatmaking housewife

10:38 New wave station. Um there is what other one I did Brixton radio and I did a radio station called Play Vibes where I got to interview don't know if you know of a singer called Tina Marie for any of my old school heads. I got to interview her on my station. Um and then before that I was doing some like doing a stupid job working for the council but creatively I have always been into like music production. Music production was my thing. People used to know me as the uh the beatmaking housewife because I just used to make beats. Um and again, that's all from like my my family kind of background. They're all heavily into music. Nice. That's awesome. Yeah, I was uh Andrew doesn't know uh your music background and I kind of withheld that from him intentionally to make it a nice live talking

11:32 point. Yeah, I knew that when you asked that question, which Andrew always asks every guest on the creative session, you know, uh what started all this, you know, and people, it's so interesting where people thinks it takes off from as well, isn't it, Andrew? The answers differ from person to person. That's the best. Yeah. Yeah. I know. Exactly. It's such a general question that people latch on to the, you know, where they think the timeline began. So, for you, it was digital marketing giving you the tech enablement to get into the AI sphere. storytelling, as you say, problem solving, creatively expressing yourself through whatever tool or medium, be it music, DAWs, or be it AI tools, doesn't really matter. Um, I love it and I just love the raw like I'm building in public uh attitude that you have towards it. And as I say, you're in the top three curated on the show for a reason.

12:18 And that's not just through us finding you. That's actually through suggestions from the viewers as well. Um, even when you do competitions, and this is the talking point I want to bring up, you work so well to a deadline and competitions and stuff like this, and it's intimidating for many of us because you're just able to crunch out things like we watch Beans on toast and many of your Gen Jam entries and things like this, right? Like, do you think that your brain in your creative workflow is sort of just well adapted to that? Is there any sort of teachings you can give to others that you've learned about why that works for you that similar-minded people might be able to get something from or Yeah. So, well, yeah. So, I and I'm always talking about this.

How does she work so fast to deadlines?

13:06 I'm ADHD and I'm autistic. My ADHD side always trumps my autis autistic side. Um, so my brain is forever on fire thinking about things all the time, which often if I'm if I have a project which is has a very long timeline, my brain can't hold on to the um what can I put it? I can't hold on to the excitement of that moment for too long. So um and and I would o often overthink about things and often doubt myself in those periods. Whereas, if I'm only given a very short time span to do something, then I cut I automatically cut all of that out. Then it's just about working, working, working, working.

13:53 For some people, that works for them. For other people, it doesn't work. So, it's not a case of like this is a great hack because it's not like I'm Do you know what I'm saying? It just means I'm able to get work done. Yeah. You've recognized your abilities to do this type of thing. Exactly. And so you've, you know, as you say, if that's not what you know actually [snorts] inspires you creatively or you work to that, then maybe it's not the way to pursue things and everyone's going to pursue the industry differently, aren't they? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. For me, I didn't until I started doing machine cinema. Big shout out to Machine Cinema. Yeah. They're going on live right after us. I let them know in the chat today. I was like, you literally starts at 5:30 Machine Cinema live viewing. Cool. So with them with their kind of jen jam stuff, it really takes you out of your element where you've only got four hours to create

Machine Cinema Gen Jams: a film in four hours

14:45 something. So you know the the mulling over, okay, should I do this story? Like you ain't got time to be thinking about that. You just need to go with the flow. Yeah. Yeah. And that really that definitely works for me. And I think the the same as six minutes because I was giving myself a deadline of okay, I would wake up in the morning and I would think about the story. I would write the story out of that day. I would generate my um video. I would edit everything out. And by the next morning, the next morning was my deadline to put stuff out. Um regardless of what uh uh fashion it was, regardless of the sound wasn't right or regardless if, you know, his face drifted or whatever. It was just like, "No, put it out and then move on to the next." And when I do my workshops, I'm often telling people that because um I find that people get so stuck in their head that they forget that this is just we're playing.

A deadline every morning

15:38 Do you know what I mean? This is just this is adventure time. We're just in we're just enjoying ourselves. This ain't serious. [laughter] We're just playing around with a bit of tech here. So, um for me, bring back silly. That's what I've been saying all this time. I'm like, this is where clients work. you know, all those creative ideas that got abandoned because they didn't make ROI sense to the brand or whatever, that's what we should be using AI for. Andrew also said, you know, all of the music videos that never got made on the album where only the single got a music video. You know, the B side of the album, that's where AI is great for. You know, these ideas that were just chopped away or left on the table because they were in quotes ROI savvy or whatever they may have been the reason to stop them being a thing. So you bring back silly and yeah the attitude that everything needs to be serious and stuff is just so bonkers.

16:29 This thing is like you know the exact opposite. It enables anything and everything. Yeah. But that's that's that's what people get trapped up into when they're starting to build with the and I see that a lot with the workshops that I do. And it's about taking them out of that zone of like girl don't worry about that. Bobby, don't worry about that. Let's just get let's just do a clip and throw that on a timeline. Get a clip to and we'll work it out later on. But right now, let's just get things together and then we'll, you know, we'll we'll we'll perfect it later. Have you heard of Parkinson's law? That was the law I was thinking about and I couldn't remember it, but that's exactly what it is. Yeah. Parkinson's law. Um, it seems like you've combined because this is what I had to do. I didn't I don't have ADHD, but because I have repetitive strain injury, I can't use my hands properly.

17:15 So for me, I had to use Parkinson's law in the sense that I only had a short amount of time mixed in with Parat's law, which is the 8020 principle. So it seems like what you've just said there is the same because you're like, look, we don't have time. Let's just do this. Like take away this, stop overthinking and let's do this because we've only got a short amount of time. And that is one of the most productive ways you can get things done. So it's really really nice to hear you say that. Yeah, that's definitely that's definitely what I teach without even me knowing what those things were. That's definitely how I teach and that's definitely how it it works for me. Otherwise, and that's how I was able to get a 43 minute film done within 3 weeks because I was like, forget about all that, just put it down on the timeline. We'll work it out in the mix. Yeah, I think learning hands-on, like Danny says as well, this comment's great.

18:06 You know, moving so fast, there's no traditional education that can really help. We're all learning hands-on and people like yourself who are willing to be the course leaders and step back from the creative app. You know, it's great because we need more and more people like you to enable more people to get on board to where because you're doing it otherwise, you know, you don't need any of these workshops anymore to just do that. Obviously, this 43minute film is the example of that. You're just doing it in the wild and you're like out there now, which is so awesome. But I want to set you up um for the first video. Please tell us more about Quiet Please. Uh tell me about this project. Tell me uh it's client work, you know, and tell us more about how that came to be. Yeah. So, Quiet Please is a film that I did with a company that I was working with in January

Setting up Quiet Please

18:54 called well from January up until about July uh called Nura Studios. Uh you guys should check them out because they have like a whole suite where you can actually build films with their uh tools. Amazing platform. And um I created a film called Quiet Please, which was about my son, actually. And I'm so glad he's not here, cuz he will bust in the room and be like, "Why are you talking about me again?" About me. [laughter] So, I'm glad he's not here. Um but he'll be here soon, so I better make it quick. Um so, um he he's autistic and he also has ADHD. His autism trumps his ADHD. He has a thing in regards to sound sensitivity, which is something I definitely can remember.

A film about her son

19:40 Um, when I was young, I had of like issues with like everyday noises, even like flushing the toilet. It would be too loud for me and whatnot. And my son, when he would go to school, he wouldn't eat at the school because he didn't like the sound of people eating and it would cause him distress. So, he would walk around the playground at school and he was like, "Oh, no, Mom. I'm cool. this is my like it was his favorite time where it was just quiet and he was able to walk around. So I took his story and I decided I wanted to make a story about that because I don't see stories about that. I don't see stories of little brown boys having issues, you know, um with sound or neurological issues. And I thought this would be a great thing for me to to write about.

20:27 And it's very close to my heart and it's um it's been played at different places. I've had people message me telling me that they've cried over it, which made me feel good because, you know, the fact that you can get emotion from my film is what I really aim for. Um, and you know, lots of people who have got issues themselves could definitely relate to the main character of the story. And this one actually has got no um dialogue in it. So, it's completely b like I I I you you will experience this film through sound. Oh, amazing. Yes. So, you'll get to feel the the tension that he feels and then you'll get to feel the the slow time where he's by himself. I wanted to take you through that journey, not just visually, but also through audio.

21:16 What a beautiful thing to have got such a personal story into client work as well. By the way, it's something that we try to work with, you know, clients a lot more these days is actually telling stories that we want to say, not just answering briefs and stuff, you know. So, it's like really nice that someone's like, you know, taken this on board and really backed it. And do you know, do you know why I think that is is because when I was talking to my boss about it, she saw my face lit up when I spoke about the story and she asked me to speak about like multiple different ideas and projects. And when she saw my face light up, she was like, "That's the story you need to work on." I love that. You know what I mean? for the she saw the creativity that was about to flow through you. I'm telling you and I think that's what maybe is missing from a lot of these creative environments is that we're not tapping into

The boss who saw her face light up

22:05 what the individual creator is really passionate about because that's where you're going to get the best stories. And my boss at the time, Isabelle, big shout out to Isabelle. Was amazing and I was able to see how she was guiding me and I was like that's exactly how I want to be kind of guided is like I want to see what you're into and I'm going to bring that story out of you and that's what she did for me. So well I'm excited to watch this. So am I. And look at these look these comments coming in from Mary and others, you know, prior to even watching this, like how brave of that woman to believe in you like that and the sort of like powerful relief of being understood as a creative, you know, I think we can all empathize with that. You know, I think the the biggest term I've encountered in the last few years when a lot of my friends have become creatives, as many weren't before

22:52 they're sort of getting into the creative industry now, is this idea of micromanagement. You know, just the idea that that you don't really get to be creative. You're just being told how and what to do. Yeah. As a creative, you know, you're not really expressing yourself creatively at all. It's like here's the things you need to do. Just get them done. Like a list of stuff, you know? U micromanage me. I ain't going to lie. I am at my best when you just say, "Diane, I leave it in your hands." And that's a problem for some agencies because, you know, they have got all of these things. Uh they've got these tight tight tight breeds, but for me, my best work comes out when you're like, Diane, do your thing. Love it. And I think that you're one of the rare people in the world that you can be totally entrusted that that will be the thing that you know, like Ryan,

23:39 too. I think you are really in that handful of people that the show has just seen over and over again as whatever you make, we love it. The tone of you and all that, but you've given us such a nice setup, so I'm not going to ruin it. Let's uh let's watch Quiet, please. and strap in guys. This one's a seven minute watch. Um yeah, and leave all your comments and questions for after about how this was made and other things. But let's enjoy it. Heat. Heat.

QUIET PLEASE

24:52 Heat. Heat. [panting] Sorry.

25:38 Oh my god. [laughter] [laughter] Come on, guys. [music]

27:27 [sighs] [sighs]

28:25 Come [snorts] [laughter] [laughter] on. [sighs]

Less sci-fi, more personal stories

31:02 Wow. Pretty good. I was getting very emotional with that outro there with the piano and everything. Yeah, the piano gets me. Oh god. Yes. And uh piano gets me every time. Honestly, the lens from the start wearing headphones was actually the thing I was I was like, "Wow, this is intense." From second one, headphones were like right up, you know, I wanted to really experience what it's like to be in that school canteen through that lens. And it felt exactly like that, you know. So I think a very very good uh authentic interesting lens that you've put that through there. Beautiful. And more you know we said actually one of the se this is what I want to talk about here. Can we have less sci-fi and more of this please?

31:49 You know, like um for real that is beautiful and that feels like what AI should be used for emotional storytelling like that, you know, and I'm seeing a lot less people use it for that purpose than I am them creating sci-fi and horror and stuff like this, you know, like. So, I would like to see a lot more of that type of personal storytelling. Edmund who's uh watching did a very personal storytelling piece as well which is one of my favorites of the year as well and um that really stood out to me. So I'm not surprised that you've had feedback that people have cried during that. I was very very at that end but uh especially with the outro music I was like oh no here we go. [laughter] What were your thoughts on Andrew? Oh my god.

32:36 Yeah, [laughter] California girl said it looks like Chris and Andrew on the first scene on the bench. [laughter] We could bring it that was it when they bring the cartoon to to life like the action movie or the real life action movie. We can we can play that out. Um I thought that was brilliant. I thought to myself that obviously sound plays a huge part. The fact that you can tell such a really impactful story. Um, I've always said that when it comes to AI, I think nail cartoons. I think cartoons going to be the Yeah, that's going to be the a massive really helped. Yeah. And I really like that style of cartoon. Not having it photo realistic really helped actually. And the fist bump even the anime sort of fist bump. It was beautiful. I love the sort of

33:23 feeling of it. Yeah. Even the the charact the main character's fade. He had a really good fade and good haircut as well. [laughter] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I noticed that as I had to go and comb my hair. I was like, "Wow, I need [laughter] I need to fix up." Um, but I thought that was really, really good, really powerful. I really like that one. And you could just see the comments as well in in the chat. Mary had a good question. She said, "What did Quiet Please teach you about AI film making that you carry into your next project? Technical storytelling, workflow, or otherwise?" Great question, Mary. Yeah. So, yeah, great question. Thank you, Mary. Um, so technically that technically that that quiet please taught me a lot actually. So that was I created that back in January when sea dance um 2.0 I think just came out.

What did Quiet Please teach her?

34:14 Um well actually no I had it I had it before I had sea dance before everybody else had seancer. I was just playing around with it at that time. You're right. And this project taught me that I don't have to make a thousand1 images. Um so with this actual film I only had three well I only had well realistically I had one image. Um but then I only really had three images that I created using this whole film. And that you know what that's crazy cuz Marco who's watching created his entire film with four images last week. And how this is converging is crazy. Exactly. We're not setting this up, guys. This is just happening in the create sessions week to week. People are relating to each other without even knowing how much that

35:03 How the hell did you pull that off with only Explain Explain. So basically um what I noticed with Sea Dance at that time was that it had the the the fidelity of the consistency of keeping the style and the look consistent throughout the the the uh 10 seconds of the film or 15 seconds of the film. There was nothing else like it at that time. So instead of me generating multiple images over and over again, I was like, well, why don't I use the video as my image generator and I can just say cut to this scene, cut to this scene, cut to this scene. So especially for instance the um the beginning scene where he's in the in the cafeteria,

One image, and Seedance as the image generator

35:50 the canteen or whatever you call it, wherever you are in whatever country. Um you that scene again it was like I had him stand and then I was like cut to these people doing that, these people doing that, these people doing that and then I said cut to him being outside. Um, so I would use one image as a base image and then have it change the scene within the video and then I would take screenshots from that video, upscale them and then those would be like the starting point of another cut to cut to cut to. So again, a multi-shot just changed the game, didn't it? This is just multi-shot. Like anybody that was like not wanting to create an entire asset of first and last frames and do the old school route,

36:38 you know, multi-shot without editing skills as well. That makes so much more sense as well. While you're doing that approach and that um and everyone finds their own way, too. And um it's not to say that people don't and can't still use story boards or a bank of images and get good results. They definitely can. But like uh yeah, everyone just finds their own way uh and their previous skill set and and all that other things in order to enable this. But yeah, fascinate Mary. Such a good question. You're so good with your questions and I'm so glad you answered it technically as well. You know, like what you took away from that because yeah, I got early access to seed dance at the same time. We were so lucky to get beta access, weren't we? I had a lot of people so that we knew what multi-shot meant. You know this is like totally different to first and last frame in terms of the way of thinking and planning and creation and all

37:27 everything changed on multi-shot like it overnight in fact in and it's hard to go back actually once you've used mult in nano banana for 3 weeks trying to figure out I just want you to turn this way so I can get this view of the room. I ain't got time for all of that. [laughter] Hey Felipe just joined in. Legends in the house, guys. Hey, and we've got another buddy of mine joining in. Let's Let's go. Let's go. Can I just also say one other thing in regards to the storytelling was um when I when I started working with Nura Studios, they were very adamant that they wanted like 90 second clips. And I said, well, I'm not a 90second woman.

I'm not a 90-second woman

38:13 I'm so sorry, but I like to take my time. Do you know what I mean? I'm I'm here for the foreplay. I'm not here for the quick quick quick quick. So she I had to convince her that doing a film like as long as I got the story right people will stay to watch. So true. And when I did uh Quiet, please it totally changed the game in Europe where they were like, "Okay, let's start working towards more. If we can get really good storytelling, then it doesn't matter about the the length." Because she was worried that people would watch it and not want to continue watching it or would stop at 30 seconds or whatever. And I was just so adamant that, you know, if we can watch Game of Thrones in a weekend, you can watch Quiet Please for six minutes. You know what I mean? Exactly. [laughter] Exactly. So yeah, and some stories don't need rushing either.

39:03 And that like you said, attention spans like Andrew nails it. It's really like we've got a lot of time for stuff that we're into. We just don't have a lot of time for stuff we're not, you know, and that's very quick decision making that we all do uh nowadays, but when we're in, like you said, you can binge watch entire things. Like I've seen YouTube channels where you watch something like a short form clip and you're like, "Oh, I love this guy's podcast." And then suddenly you're watching a three-hour long stream, you know, and people will do it. They'll like it it it's wrong some of the stats that they put out there about everyone's attention just constantly dwindling. It is just changing. It's always it's never as black and white as that. It's always something in the middle, you know, um is the truth of the actual what's happening and

Setting up The Truth About Love

39:49 everything like that. All right. Well, the the next one I want to watch um is I've got it titled as latest client music video. Um I want to watch a music video because um you know we talked uh that's what I want to find out from you. [laughter] Truth about love is it animated visual. Okay. Yeah. So tell us a quick synopsis of truth about love and then we'll get all the questions in from the audience. Gather your questions up everybody as we watch it. So, the truth about love is a music video and I I say client but I use that term very loosely because it was really a passion project. I heard the song and I could not stop playing this song for weeks.

40:37 And as I was listening to the song, I was just like, I can create something to this. So, I contacted the guy and I said, let me do a video for you. And he was like, yeah, sure. And I did the video. I think I did it in like um I did it in like two days or or so. And it's a it's a great video. I mean, the beat is fantastic. The guy who did the beat, he's a Grammy nominated uh producer. Uh uh King Michael Koy, his name is have to give him a shout out. D Prosper, if anyone goes to New York, you may have heard of a place called Soul in the Horn, which is a nightclub that plays amazing music. He's the one who organizes it. and he just put out this amazing album which has got loads of different people on this album and this was just and funny enough the track that I chose was actually the track that he

41:28 was rapping on. So I didn't choose any of the other celebrities. I just literally chose his one. It was just so great for me. So I did a music video for for that. So that's what you're going to see. How cool. And so um did he buy it or did you do it for free or did you like you know was when you say client work was it something that was a paid gig or No. So this was not paid. This was just literally me saying hey bro let me do this music videoing. And that's the reason why I put on my LinkedIn that it's funny how every time I do a music like if I do a music video for clients whether they're paying or not it's always award winning or award nominated. And I don't do this anymore. Like I don't really do music videos for people anymore unless it's a passion thing.

42:13 Um but yeah, this song I really I really enjoyed doing this song. Well, I was quite honored that you said that one of my beats got stuck in your head for a little while. So I'm very very I'm very very happy to hear that this beat's about to get stuck in my head for the next couple of weeks. Um so without further ado, guys, let's check it out. [music] The truth about love. [music] The truth about love. Only the broken heart know the truth about love. [music] [music] begins with

THE TRUTH ABOUT LOVE

43:07 a smile, throws with a kiss, ends tear drops to true love. [music] I got a right to sing to lose the woman I love. How did I lose? Trust betray [music] chase and tell. Why the hell did I phone that Why she went through my phone [music] and Women's intuition, I guess. Broke her heart, left a mess. Got a stressed. She broke up with me. Told me it was for the best before she left. Said she was in pursuit [music] of a hat. Love begins with a smile. Grows with a kiss, ends in tear drops. The true love exists. I know it does. Only the [music] brokenhearted know the truth about love begins with a smile. Rose with a kiss, [music] ends in tear drops. The true love exists.

43:55 I don't know what it does. Only the broken heart. They know the truth. Nobody loves the queen. [music] Does it still mean you were king? So many reasons. Enjoy your freedom. Let it ring. The pain stings. Life starts the next chapter. Loyalty determined factor. [music] Some people don't know. If you love someone, let them go. If they return to yours, if they don't, [music] then it's pain you endure. Just put your all in. The tear drops falling down your face, they keep falling. All [music] my life and my heart are yearning for you. So many things in life I learned from you. You've been through the storm. I can't believe you gone. In love with one [music] who ain't in love with you. To say goodbye, it's always hard to do. Especially when you break someone's heart and love begins with a smile, glows [music] with a kiss, ends in tear drops.

44:44 The truth love exists. I [music] don't know if it does. Only the broken hearted know the truth about love begins with a smile, grows with a kiss, ends in tear drops. The true love exists. I [music] don't know if it does. Only the broken hearted know the truth about love. The truth about love. [music] The truth about love. Only the broken [music] hearted know the truth about love. The truth about love. The truth about love. [music] Only the broken hearted know the truth about love. [music] [music] Ro

45:41 [music] [music] the broken heart know about love. Nice. What an awesome Yeah. What did they say when they when you gave it back to them? Were they Were they like, "Oh, listen. There's a new project coming out of this." Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] They're like, "Right, and that's a paid one, so we're all good over here." Yes. [laughter] If that was not paid, this better have led to paid work. Is very very happy to hear that. That is so stylish.

Why dreamy visuals for a painful song?

46:27 Mary came in straight away with the question that was ringing in my head as well like was such a deep subject like you know the like dreamy like uh contrast of the visuals. Was that the sort of picture that when you when you said prior to us watching this that you had like a like vision for how this like beat in your head? Is that this like thing that you thought, oh, I could contrast this beautifully with this style or what was the what was the thing? So, I think contrast I think is just so important in film anyway. Um, so I like doing I like even like with most of my films actually I notice I do that quite a bit where I will have something which is quite deep but then I'll have you know a a very vibrant kind of looking

47:18 uh tone to it or whatever. Um, and I don't know why I gravitate towards that. Like I've it's not something that I I I I think about. It's not like I have to do it so it's separate. It just it it has to click for me. And whatever that click is, I can't explain it. It's just spiritual almost like it just feels like yeah, that's the right tone. That's the right look. That's the right feel. And I don't know where it comes from or whatever. That particular style as well. I had actually been working on that style for a long time in midjourney. So that's the midjourney story. That was Danny's question about midjourney gens there. Yeah. So, makes a lot of sense. Yeah. It was a style that I created

48:03 mid Journey that I've been working on for a while. So, when I put those two together, it was like that's what I'm looking for. And originally, I had a guy with just walking down the street talking this story and like loads of things was happening while the the um while he was walking. That was my original kind of thought about it. But then I thought it would be so funny if I could just have these random couples hugging on each other one minute and then cussing each other out the next. Do you know what I mean? Cuz that is pretty much what love is about. It's the ups and the downs. It's the breaking up and making up. It's the all of that. So, I just thought totally I should just have that I should have that in there. So, yeah. And plus dating and relationships is one of my favorite topics to talk about in [laughter] my films anyway.

48:52 So, yeah. Wow. Did you recent got hooked on that song? Was this your most recent one? That was the one I did about four weeks ago. Yeah. Actually, no, that's not my most recent one. My mo That's my most recent client one, but I did put out another song called Silly Me, which I would love for you to play as well. Oh, should we do that back to back? Yes. So, that one, this one is my music. This one is my music video. Um, and it's got my like I use my visuals in there as well, but I again this is I love talking about relationships. So, this is another one that we can watch for sure. Okay. Oh, yes. Andrew, you just set us up perfectly there. Please tell us more. Um, as a synopsis, you know, just quickly, what silly me? So, it's your music that you've made and made your own visuals and is this under the banner

Setting up Silly Me

49:44 of your musicianship? You know, is this like a or you know, what what is this under the banner of? Um, I would That's a very interesting question because I never think about any of that when I'm making them. I'm just like, "Oh, Sunno's just come out. I want to make a new song." [laughter] So, I think the new version of Sununo came out and I'm a big jazz head. I'm a big R& like not R&B head. I'm more like a soul head from like the 70s and the and the the 80s. So, a lot of my music is kind of leaning jazzle leaning. And then Sunno just came out with the new version. Me and you, Chris, was was was geeking out about this. And yeah, so this was just a um um a great excuse to like make something. And the funny thing is the video the video was the shortest like I it took me

50:34 and I'm not gloating here. It took me about 3 hours to do this video. And the reason why it took me three hours to do the video was because I just wanted people to listen to my music. I didn't even really care too much about the video, but I put it out and so many people loved the video. Like, it's they really loved it. And it's so funny considering I took a very short amount of time to bloody make it, but um I think I can't remember what um director said that they only make films so you could listen to their music. I feel exactly the same. [laughter] That's brilliant. Exactly the same. [snorts] Well, what a great setup. And by the way, Cavan told us, which was what we should have made more of a fuss about this in the episode, Andrew, but that you know when he pitched

51:21 Chronicles of Bone, nobody believed in it. Now look at it. 50 million plays on like stories of that. There's so many stories. No one believed me at first and now look at me. You know, so many people gone through that. It is. It's a common thing, isn't it? And so, like, you know, even though you didn't really know that this visual style would catch on this way, it's obviously something that's, you know, pulled people in. So, let's check it out and see what it's about. [music] [music] Oh, silly me. [music] [music] with me.

SILLY ME

52:10 Oh, feeling me. [music] I can only give. [music] You can only take. [music] Oh, what a difference to [music] love be made. Can only love. I don't know any different but love [music] I don't know any different [music] me [music]

52:59 I go again [music] that I go I give too much, you give too little. [music] I stay too long. We never meet in the middle. [music] [singing] P it out. You drink it up. But still I love love love [music] still I love [music] I can only love love [music] don't know any different but to love [music] I

53:48 don't know any different maybe one day one day one day I'll learn to [music] before. There's nothing nothing left [music] of me. Oo, [music] silly me. Silly silly me. There I go again. Give [music] it my all. There I go [music] again. But I keep moving, moving on. I [music] keep [music]

54:42 [music] There I go. Still you still [music] there. I go again. [music] Oh god. I know what I'm remixing later. Oh [laughter] that is so good. Oh, the airy vocals, you know, just those beautiful like oh aireriness of it and the pinks and the pallets and you know, I can see some Wes Anderson inspiration, but I can see some other inspiration.

55:28 I can see all sorts of stuff. But the beach just and that style married together. It was like Pleasantville. I don't know if you've seen the film Pleasantville. Had that Pleasantville vibe. Um with Re is it Reese Witherspoon? I think she's in it. There's a film. It's very like that type of style. Um really good. I really really like that. I'm listening to that and I'm thinking I know that you said you r you kind of rushed the video, but I just think that video was really powerful. I really thought that was really powerful. I thought it was too looking at looking at someone else's relationship thinking I wish that was me and going back and then the bit when she's looking at the mirror and different like facial expressions and I I thought of casting yourself as well like Dary says and we saw that with Marco casting himself as well in his film and I like that that's another thing that you're doing.

56:17 Yeah, there's a good question in there as well and yeah casting yourself are these different expressions of your personality. Yes, exactly. Um, so I think there's always a part of myself in everything I make. Anyway, that goes without saying. And I think with Silly Me, um, there's So, I am a big fan of 19 uh 40s and 1950s swing dresses, which is what she was wearing. And there was a period of time where every time everyone saw me, I was in a swing dress. All every time. Yes. So there is a part of me that really loves that Steepford wife kind of look um uh visually but not that Stepppford wife kind of lifestyle. And um the song actually came around because a guy who I was like

Why does she cast herself?

57:08 super super like in love with but didn't love me back. He called me up one day and was like, "Hey, how are you?" And I'm like, "Oh, I'm cool." And all this like animosity that I had for him because he didn't call me just disappeared into thin air as soon as he called me. And I was like, "Oh, silly me. Here I go again." Do you know what I mean? And then I decided to write the song. And this was this all happened in one day. So he called me, I wrote the song, I did the video, and then I put it out. And [laughter] um so there's always a part of me in all of the things that I kind of I I do for sure. And even in six minutes, I cast myself in six minutes, but I um I didn't it wasn't I did it purposely,

57:55 but um I was a bit nervous about casting. I've kind of been nervous about casting myself because often times when I do it, it makes me into a Latino woman. It it does every other completely changes you. As I found out earlier when I was trying to make a video in the like uh promotion of this show, I found out this exact issue that you must experience all the time with casting yourself into things. Yeah. Yes. And I don't know if it's because my nose is straight or what my hair I don't know what it is, but it just it's sometimes very difficult to cast myself. So when I do um I enjoy seeing the process and I think I also enjoy it as well because when I was young I went to drama school and I did want to be an actress for a long time and then that dream fell when I was about 17 or 18 cuz life was

58:48 so kind of seeing myself in these films makes there's like a a connection look at me kind of acting even though I'm not acting. Cool. I like that. It is kind of cool. And also when you were saying about the um the guy called you at the in the morning and then by the end of the day you had the song out that's very much like a artist like the amount of music I've met where it's like this song came because of this situation in my life or this song came because of this scenario and stuff like that that's how they express themselves. It's like I can't express I express myself through music. You know, you see that that's every time I watch music, every [clears throat] time I watch a music documentary, there's some like, oh, our biggest hit came to us in less than four hours because we did it this way and that way and oh, such and

59:38 such had a guitar riff and then I had a bass lick that perfectly match and then piano guy came in and it's added a riff on top of that and within four hours it was done. And and then others they're like, "Oh, you know, it took months and months of grinding and it didn't really uh you know, come out to what we wanted it to." And it's funny how that is again a common story, you know, like the the best is just quick sometimes because it's like happened in a moment and you're able to express that creativity quickly enough that an audience latches on to it and it grows from there, you know. And going back to what you were saying earlier on, it's that time. It's like because if you would have sat down and you said, "Let me do it next week." It probably come out like that. It's that right, I need I've captured the excitement or I've captured this emotion right now.

1:00:23 Let me just get it out of me. Express it. Yeah. And that's the beauty of AI for me is that I'm able to I'm able to do that. I'm able seance 2.5. That was Seance 2.5. Yeah. Yeah. incredible honestly and I love it. And we need to rattle through because I recognize we're already over the hour and we've still got quite a lot more videos from you. I'm so excited actually that we get another episode like this, Andrew, because in previous episodes it's all about one film or you know, but this week we've just got an absolute load of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Same. Exactly. So, what do I know is the next video that I've got um titled up for me. Okay. Um, what would you like us to know about what do I know? Okay, so what do I know was my first ever client video that I did

Ty, grief and Midjourney

1:01:13 and it was made in 2024. Um, and it won me Project Odyssey. And the reason why this particular film means a lot to me is, and I'm going to try and keep this story as as quick as I can because I know we're running out of time. So I got into AI back in 2022 and during that time I was also going through grief because a very good good good friend of mine called Tai um died during CO and was it the rapper? Yes. He's my he's my he's my father's godfather actually. Heard about that. Oh really? Oh no. I remember I remember I I knew Tai as well. So yeah sad. So he was a very very very close friend of mine. I was going through mourning during that period

1:02:03 and um one of the things that actually got me out of bed was midjourney and um so I kind of got into midjourney like super super hard. Um literally it was the only thing that was getting me out of bed and um by the time it reached to 2024, the end of 2024, a friend of mine was saying to me, "Listen, you need to just get yourself out there. Just put out some work. Just just do something, but don't keep hiding yourself. So, um, my exartner at the time, he approached me and he said, "Look, I've got this song that I did with Tai. Would you mind doing a music video for it cuz I see that you've kind of put out a few things and I was like,

1:02:49 "Yes, I'll do it." It was such an emotional roller coaster for me cuz I had to recreate Tai as a cartoon character and then, you know, and then I had to listen to the song on repeat. It was a lot for me at the time. Um, but I put it out there with no kind of um I put it out there with no idea of where it was going to go. And I ended up winning Project Odyssey first place in the music video award for it. And that that this video is actually what kickstarted everything off for me. So it's there's it means a lot because it's like it's got Tai involved and Tai was really one of the reasons why I got into into AI. So of course and thank you again for being so transparent about all of that.

1:03:35 You know I think so many people right now will have seen what you are doing you know in the modern day and not knowing the back history and where it came from and how you know trapped you were and feeling in bed and all of that. Like it's horrible. It made me really hurt when you said that to me. I knew so many people that lost people in CO. Um and yeah, they were totally feeling the same, you know, not wanting to leave their house. I had to ask many people to leave their house. Yeah. You know, like many people were just months and months indoors, trapped indoors, and I was begging people to come out and just be a bit more social because I knew what they were going through and everything. And uh so yeah, very very uh emotional story. when you submitted it to Project Odyssey under the music video category.

1:04:21 Was this literally your first music video? It was it was my first client music video. Okay. I had made at least two music videos before then and I think the reason why this music video one was because the storytelling. There was a beautiful story that was being told above the visuals and then there was a visual story being told as well. So I think that might have been one of the reasons why I I won it. But yeah, it was awesome. Well, without further ado, let's watch it, guys. What do I know? [music] Yeah. Huh? Yeah. Listen. Living below [music] the minimum. Plus, she's a minimum. Only 16 years old, about to have a son.

WHAT DO I KNOW

1:05:09 In hindsight, what [music] if he didn't come? GCSC results would have been above the minimum. [music] predicted the name straight some. Hey hun, heads up. I know you're fed up. You want to keep your bread up. So working two jobs cuz the silly sod bailed out, mailed out your [music] CV for opportunities in TV. Had aspirations as an actress. You was like, "See me, I'm going to be famous, but it takes practice. It's dangerous to assume [music] anything." She never got the point. Like a cactus, he didn't get that job as an actress. Lying [music] on a mattress, thinking back to that night, getting pissed off with flashes. He pressured her somewhat, but she was curious. Come to think of it, this mother [music] was notorious for picking on young girls. He should have known better. Now he's crushed the whole world. And she's looking vendettas, sending letters upon letters [music] upon letters. She would have had an abortion.

1:05:57 If he I ain't got time to play. I got fines to pay. I [music] know a couple young boys who might die today. I know a couple young girls who might lose the weight. This used [music] to be a problem, but who's to say? Huh? What do I know? I'm just the man in the mirror. What do [music] I know? I see the anger getting nearer. What do I know? I'm just a man with a dream who doesn't [music] want to see our kids scream. I know a young genius that was only 15. Caught up in the peer. Pressure to the extreme. [music] Had the smarts to pass exams but wanted to hang on the street with a gang cuz his cousins could bang and the street Fred was high. Clothes [music] were fly. People exhibit the fear whenever they walk by. Learn to disrespect women cuz they thought it was cool. The smartest people never acknowledge what makes them a fool. [music] One by one

1:06:44 things come to a head. Wakes up to a call that big cousy is dead. Shot dead by a [music] fellow colleague. Couldn't believe the info received. What it is what it is. Lifting cousy on his shoulders at the funeral parlor. Parents screaming, [music] tears screaming, it hits home harder. The penny drops. Why we living like rats? Baseball bats and cracks. Council flats [music] and raps. A symphony and flat failure. We need to backtrack and analyze our behavior. You see, on [music] planet Earth, many hearts stay broke. Some survive the pain, some don't, some choke. In a world where depression is alive, no [music] joke. Got to search for the lessons and the fire to cope. In a world where depression is alive, no joke. Got to search for the lessons in the fire to co. I ain't got time to play. [music] I got to pay. I know a couple young boys who might die today.

1:07:32 I know a couple young girls who might lose the weight. There used to be a problem, but who's [music] to say? Huh? What do I know? I'm just the man in the mirror. What do I [music] know? I see the anger and nearer. What do I know? I'm just a man with a dream who doesn't want to see our kids scream. Believe beautiful. Exactly. And Andrew, just a note to self here. I'm so glad we did it in the order that we did. You know, seeing recent things and then going back to 2024 to make people appreciate to see how far the space has come and but what you pulled off there was incredible actually. No doubt you should have won that competition, you know, like I don't know anyone that was doing music videos even looking remotely looking like that at that time.

2024 versus now

1:08:21 So that's when you fell on our radar, I think. I think we saw stuff like this and we were like, "Okay." So we started following you and then you know you're so prolific as I said earlier you and Ryan uniquely we're like oh my god we've got weekly material from you guys so you make our show literally on a near weekly basis unless you got a workshop or something else [laughter] yeah yeah or something else as 404 film said this was pre- nano pre dance not sure people appreciate just how hard it would have been to make this um there's a lot of jeans watch in that know, you know, that know, you know, that we're right in this start. Yeah. And Megan definitely knows. I think we all met over MidJourney, by the way.

1:09:06 You saying Mid Journey got you out of bed actually had an emotional reaction to me because I was like, Midjourney got me into this whole scene. Yeah. You know, really, it was meeting Megan and having those early audio chats. Remember Andrew, we just started an audio room. It wasn't a live video like this where we get great content to watch. It's just nerds chatting about Midjourney and I can't uh the difference between version two and three and the changes are so rapid and oh my god this is incredible. Like this is a new storytelling era and here we are. The sea dance 2.5 plus midjourney is one hell of a combo. I can tell you that like I love your SR styles and your mood boards and stuff by the way. Uh such a cool unique visual palette that you've created for yourself. Um and and and they differ so much, you know, as well, like from video to video.

1:09:55 I love that you're able to pull off this style so consistently. But your web design, your web experience must help here, like the way you can connect things. I thought that the way Yeah. Yeah. Your visual language understanding almost of like how to portray like an experience like a website, you know, has to all be coherent and smooth and everything. People on the page. Yeah. Yeah. Get the story across. Yeah, I'm I I I I definitely feel that there is definitely some connections there. I'm still trying to work it out because again, a lot of what I feel like I do is very much based on my intuition. Like it's very much does this feel right to me? And if it doesn't, if I don't get that visceral feeling, then I'm just I'm not going to mess with it.

1:10:41 Um, but I I don't know whether I can pinpoint it to a particular thing that I've done in my career or whether the stars were aligned on that. I don't know what it is. It's just something that I've got within me that just makes me feel like this is the right and I guess everybody's got that that aha moment, you know. Y totally. Right. I'm going to put this up to you um because I recognize that we're not going to have time to watch all three that I had lined up and we're definitely going to have you on for creative session two if you'll have us. Obviously, we've done a second one only with Cavan so far, but we've got so many more videos from you to watch that we would love to have you back as soon as you're able to. Someone said that they we could do this do another one this time next week and you can come up with a whole bunch of new stuff.

How did 6 Minutes start?

1:11:27 Yeah. Two hours be able [laughter] to watch easy. There's only a handful of people I would trust that to Ryan and Diane. They're the three I would I would think that could pump you out that content in a week. But yeah, we've got Give It to Me, we've got Warm Coat, or we've got the six minutes projects. Um, which of the three would you like our audience to see of those the most for this session at least? And then we'll start the next session with the others. Um, we can do six minutes, but we maybe won't have we don't maybe don't have to play the whole of that segment that we spoke about, but we could do six minutes. This is the most recent one. Yeah. Oh, I love that. So, we just went a blast from the past. We're straight backwards.

1:12:16 So, let's um I know I want to give a bit of a backstory because we've been following along with this project. Andrew's been loving it. The new format, the new idea of building in public, you know, adding minute along chunks and stuff, but you tell us, you know, where it came from, what what how it's got so long, you know, tell us tell us. Well, originally it came from me just putting out a 30-second um video of me walking in some nightclub and then finding this my partner, dancing with another person, and then I walk out of the nightclub and then there's a man following me and I posted that with no intention of doing anything with it. I think I had to go to a talk that day. So, I posted it on social media, went to the talk, and then came home. woman and I was getting all these messages from people like, "What's going on?

1:13:07 Why is that white guy following you? What's going on?" [laughter] So, I asked everyone, I was like, "Look, this is just a video. This is just a video that I made with Sea Dance." I think Cance 2.5 just came out and I asked everyone like, "Okay, if I do another 30 seconds, should I move it forward in time or should I go back in time?" And they said, "Go forward in time." That's awesome. So, uh, the next morning I woke up and I was like, "Right, should like what do I do? Like, should I get this white guy to attack me?" And I thought, "That's too cliche. Let me not do that." So, I started it off with um people being interviewed about me being missing. And that was the next [clears throat] 30 seconds. And I posted that online. And then it just became this thing of people just wanted to see what was going to happen the next 30 seconds.

1:13:59 And then I wasn't doing 32nd generations anymore. I was doing like a 2 minutes or 3 minutes of of it and I would uh publish it online. So eventually it grew to be this big um 43 minute film. So if anybody's into things like Murder She Wrote or Columbbo, this is very much in that same vein. I'm born in the 80s, so I love all of those type of programs from that region. And I I set it from the n it's a 1985 film which is one of my favorite uh time periods as well. So um yeah this is what we're going to watch. Oh that's such a cool uh premise as and you know Andrew give us some notes about what you've thought about it. You know we've been following along a little bit in the live show and just loving the way that you know [snorts] my I'll give you a segue actually.

World models, Bandersnatch and Dubplate Drama

1:14:51 I'll how much does this converge with world models? You know, when we talk to Blacklight about world models and having like different interactions, you know, and the audience decides in which path that goes, you know, how much does that sort of converge this new storytelling that Dian's thought of here? Two world models and this outcome and in audience interaction. I definitely think it's definitely similar to that. But you know what I think is more similar to it's you know you got those there was um Black Cham Mirror and they had um I think it was called Bander Snatch or something like that and then you guessed what but that was already done. This is taking it to the next level. This is we don't know what's coming next and I don't know what's coming next. [laughter] It's almost like there and that's the thing. Brilliant.

1:15:38 There was a show back in the day called Dublate Drama. Don't know if you remember that show, but there it was similar to that and that had all like like a lot of UK rappers, grind people in that where every week there was a new episode and you had to vote, but it was on channel 4 and it was it's similar to yours in the sense that we don't know what's going to happen next, but yours is not the audience doesn't decide. You might get information from them for actually that might be a good idea. It's a bit of inspiration, but it's like you're deciding. And I think that's where it's like really really cool. It's choose your own adventure books. Yeah. And that's where that's where um I think it's really good. It's almost like and forgive me to say this person's name. I remember R. Kelly, he had this this song where he started off and it was and it ended up in a cliffhanger and then he done the ne everyone was

1:16:26 waiting for the next one and then he done it again. It's called I think it was called something like in the closet or something. I remember that and it was a massive thing. People was waiting for the next week for the next what was going to happen. Oh man, this is marketing 101 though, isn't it? It's just genius ways to spread your album or [clears throat] whatever your medium is, you know, like it's just really, really creative. And this is why I think this story is a story. And what I mean by that is this is the type of thing that the BBC will pick up as in say, look, this look, let's look at what this person done cuz this goes beyond prompting. Yeah. you know, this is a completely new way of of coming up with stuff. And I just think that's a you've got the temp not a template, you've got the

1:17:13 the I wouldn't say blueprint, but you've got something here where you could say you were the first to do it or Yes. And that's and that cuz I can just see a lot more people doing stuff like this. So yeah, [snorts] I definitely think everyone you said in fact in Greek messages it's inspired a lot of others to do similar sort of building in public stuff, right? So, that's another thing. It is going to start a whole load of new stuff. Um, but yeah, I don't want to be called the first to anything. Number one, just in case there is someone out there who is [laughter] going to be like, "Hey, publicly like it came out publicly that a lot of people knew." [laughter] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was actually going to say that, but I was thinking I hope I do I might I didn't want to offend, [laughter] but that's that's that's

1:17:58 uh what I mean. Oh, brilliant. All right. So, let's watch it, guys. Let's watch it. [snorts] [music]

6 MINUTES (OPENING)

1:18:52 Great. Good job. You must stop. [panting]

1:19:46 [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] Police are searching for Alexia Smith, a dancer

1:20:34 [music] and actress last seen leaving Sam's bar in upper Manhattan. Anyone with information? I'm not coming in today. I got robbed last night. No, I'm fine. Just got roughed up a little and they took my wallet. I'll be back tomorrow. [music]

1:21:34 Hello. Morning, Detective Rogers. I'm investigating Alexia's disappearance. I've been told you know her and may have information that could help. [music] Rough night. You could say that. Bang my head on the bathroom cabinet. It happens to [music] the best of us. I just need to ask you a few questions about Friday night. I understand you saw Alexi at the bar. Yeah, she was there. It was late, maybe 11:00, somewhere around there. And what happened? Hi, Danny. Hi. Let me call you back. Are you okay? Just leave me alone, Danny. I'm fine.

1:22:30 So, you left her there? Yeah. I went back to the bar and had a drink. Tell me about you and Alexia. What exactly is your relationship with her? We're friends. I know her from the dance studio. She's an incredible dancer. You sound like quite a fan. I suppose I am. I first saw her in a theater production a couple years ago. Small place downtown. She walked onto that stage and everybody else just disappeared. She had this presence. You couldn't look at anybody else. I understand there was some trouble between you and Marcus after Alexia left. Wasn't really trouble. What was it? I made a fool of myself.

1:23:19 Tell me what happened. I saw him dancing with another woman. I went over there. What did you say? I told him he didn't deserve Alexia. Did you hit him? No. I fell over. What made you angry enough to swing at him? He was dancing with another woman while Alexi was out there upset. How did you know she was upset? I saw her watching them. Did she say anything to you about it? I could see it. Right, we're going to pause there. Oh my freaking god. We need to do more backto back of 2024 and then modernday stuff. The emotion involved there and just how in how realistic it looks, the wounds, the face, the everything doesn't look plastic

The final edit, and a second session

1:24:13 anymore. It's like that looks like a real human being to me now. And I'm like sucked into this thing. You know what I mean? like compared to just moments before seeing a 2024 piece that looked ahead of its time for then with no nano banana and that you know but now what you've transferred your skills into and this project is next level honestly that's why it's suckered so many people in that's why so many people are engaging wanting to know the outcomes wanting to even tell you what the outcome should be and you know as Andrew said you can take on their inspiration as much as you want I guess uh or as little as you want. Uh which is fascinating to see this evolve like this locked in. Um when is the full thing coming out is I guess the question you know the full thing is already out so people can watch it from

1:25:05 [clears throat] beginning to end to find out what actually happened to Alexa. And like I said, nobody has guessed the ending of this series yet. At the moment, what I'm doing is I'm working on color grading and I'm working on sound. Um, because there's some bits where the sound's dipping in and out and some sound tracks don't really go with with with uh certain parts of the film. There was a lot of face drifting going on as well, which I had to go back and fix. Um, but overall I'm kind of in my final edit stage right now and I'm like I'm so proud of this story because it's it's really when you see this when you watch it from beginning to end your idea of who you think done it totally changes and

1:25:52 then your idea of what six minutes means also changes. Yes. Which I've screwed up earlier. I thought you were adding a six-minute chunk. I've come to find out that's the name of the entire project. Name of the film, but then within the film, within the film, I kind of guide you to believe in something and then, you know, I guess like the same with every mystery, the the writer knows exactly what they're doing in terms of they're guiding you one place, but the red herring is over here, right? I love it. So, yeah, the um I'm really really proud of this story and no spoilers have been given, so you can still watch it. Um absolutely. Where can they watch it? Oh, it's on my Yes, on your YouTube page, right? Yeah, it's on my YouTube page.

1:26:38 Yes, we will give all of the links. Make sure you sign up on luma.com tomorrow because the newsletter will be going out about the show with all the links to all of the projects we watch. I'm sorry we didn't get through enough. I knew that was going to be the case though because Andrew and uh I think we uniquely have the most in common from digital marketing to music to everything. You know, our backgrounds have been oddly similar, even radio and all of that. It's kind of fascinating how similar uh our backgrounds have been. So, we're going to get you on for another creative session as soon as you're able to. Um we know how busy you are. We've got Kareem next week as well, which I'm really excited to have Kareem on. And whenever you know in October time uh or November time that you get another Wednesday, we can line up a whole bunch of other projects cuz you sent me a bunch more links that like I say we could have got through to today.

1:27:28 But just it's awesome. I and I'm so glad what you said earlier that you didn't squeeze things down. You know that project that was like seven minutes that they wanted 90 seconds. I think that's a great takeaway to fight back on like you know client demands on like uh times and deadlines and and even like you know how long [clears throat] it needs to be as a length in total like just fight back on it if you feel like your story needs to be longer and that's another great takeaway from this session. Loved it. I knew I would though. I knew I'd love this session. Thank you. Definitely one of my favorites. Yes, one of my favorites and a long time coming. And as I said, you're top three in the show. You're a fan favorite week to week. People are suggesting your stuff now in our community. So, you're really standing out to the people in our community cuz they send it to me in DMs and WhatsApps.

1:28:16 They're like, "Oh, you have to have this one on the next week's show, you know, add this to the list and stuff like that." It's awesome to see. Um, for everyone else, the alilive.com is a website now. It has a submit link and everything. You'll see all the future shows there. Um, and yeah, sign up to the luma.comtheive show newsletter and you'll get all of the links to everything we watched today. Uh, but go and watch the full what is it? 40 something minutes 40 minutes and 90 seconds. Yeah. I also did um um out takes of it as well. So I did like a little video to kind of um humanize the characters because it was an intense film. [laughter] I've done like a little out. It's only like three minutes out take which is really cool to watch as well.

1:29:04 I want it right now. Yeah, I know what I'm doing this afternoon. I'm watching the full thing and I'm doing the remix as well. So, yeah, you've [laughter] got me the rest of the evening. And thank you so much to all you loyal guys that show up every week. You know, you guys are the best. Martin, again, thanks for filling in for me again this week with Aaron's show. Really appreciate that. Um, I was down in Bite Plus. I didn't even mention any of that. Andrew, we'll get on to it on the next show. Uh uh about, you know, things that you've been doing, things I've been doing as well. Martin, I've been meeting up with. I love going out and seeing the London guys. Jimmy, I saw as well in person. Love seeing you guys in person as well. Uh if you're uh coming to Shake Festival, that's the next thing I'll be at. I'll be in France uh the second to the 3rd of October in uh the birthplace of cinema, mate.

1:29:51 Uh the where it all started. We're literally in the hometown. The mayor has given Jeremy from Shake the green light to have, you know, the first AI event in the birthplace of cinema. So really awesome. And I'm hosting this. Yes. In fact, I'm coming through. You're going. Yes. You know what's awesome? I'm doing this project called the 100 Love Letters to Cinema. And there are hundred directors going to be there where I'm going to round robin interview people in my little corner of the room. He's shown me the corner of the room that I'll be in and live I I'll likely be live streaming from there as well. So, look out for that, guys. Uh yeah, a live link from there. Andrew, maybe you could join us virtually. I don't know. Um my birthday my it's my birthday weekend.

1:30:37 Oh Of course it is, mate. I told him how close it was to my birthday and like it's like two days away from my birthday. I might stay in France for my birthday. But I'm I'll be in London from the 6th. Oh, awesome. If anything's going on, if anything's going on that week, let us know. Yes, let us know what you guys are doing as well. Filipe doing all of her awesome things in Lisbon Lores in Portugal. Go and check that out if you're local there. And she came over. I did the London event here. It's the London Laura's Takeover. That was awesome fun as well. Awesome. So, so many cool things happening. What are you doing next, Diane? Um, next, well, I'm going to the shake thing next. Um, I'm gonna be doing TED AI in October. That's incredible. Yes. I should have written. That's incredible. But I they asked me

What's next: Shake Film Festival and TED AI Vienna

1:31:27 Vienna. They asked me to go to Vienna last year and I literally they hired out a 100-year-old cinema for me and I was able to talk about my journey into AI. And then they invited me back this year to host their first ever AI horror competition. Wow. Which I'm very proud of. Yeah. They have you have Jeffrey Hinton talking. Yeah. Whoa. And I'm so desperate to go and see [laughter] him and shake his hand. But yeah, that should be it's going to be so The Godfather. Yeah, that is You really deserve it, too. I'm so glad that they recognized you for doing that as well. The, you know, I do do lectures, which is kind of like the TED talk but smaller in Wales. Um, is that's how they literally brand themselves, you know. Um, so I'm so glad that you got that main platform.

1:32:16 TED AI, is it a separate just fully AI version of TED TED talks? So you've got you've got TED, you've got TEDex, and then you've got TED. Yeah, I knew about TED X is it own thing. Yeah, TEDex is more like community based TED, but then TED TED and TEDI are like the big events that happen once a year. And I think it happens once in San Francisco and once in Vienna, which is where their their head office is in Vienna. It's a three-day event. All like high class minds go to a go to this event and it's you just don't know who you're sitting next to. It's just such a weird weird place, but it's such a beautiful place in the middle of Vienna. Um it's in a it's in a castle in Viet. It's like a Yeah, it's like a a palace. It's absolutely beautiful. I guess you don't get Jeffrey in to turn up to just any old thing.

1:33:07 Yeah. It's like [laughter] best. Yeah, it best be good. It best be in a castle. But yeah, cheers guys for tuning in and we'll see you all again in a future episode. Brilliant. Thanks everyone. Thank you. Cheers. to see.