EurekAlert! Science News: Commercial drone products can tackle some automated tasks, but one thing those systems don't address is filming artistically. A team led by Carnegie Mellon University researchers has proposed a complete system for aerial cinematography that learns humans' visual preferences. The fully autonomous system does not require scripted scenes, GPS tags to localize targets or prior maps of the environment.
6 comments:
I don’t quite appreciate this particular article or idea. Although the article describes that the drones are learning to design their own shots simply for democratize drones, it still feels as though designers are attempting to recreate the work of a cinematographer through a robot. In thinking about it, this just seems particularly artificial for films, and I think that in this case, the removal of the “middle man” AKA the cinematographer, even if in aerial shots, just creates a very unfulfilling and separated portion of film. Through films, these aerial shots often come from a source of passion for the director and cinematographer, and to try and digitize this kind of thought process just seems ridiculous to me. I understand trying it once or twice because it seems cool, but I think automating the process just simply makes films and media in general much less personal as a piece of art, instead creating a piece of automation.
I think this is an interesting development in drone use and programming. However, I do not think its a good development for film. The use of drone shots in films and long crane shots are becoming more widely used, but that does not mean that we should replace the human eye with an artificial one. Yes, we can get pretty close to filming 'interesting' shots with drones, but that doesn't mean we should. Many cinematographers and directors use drone shots to provide aerial shots of their subject or background. The cinematographers themselves pilot the drone and camera angles to achieve the look and feel they want. We shouldn't use technology to replace humans, when the humans are doing just fine. I think it is really cool that CMU is a fore-runner in drone technology and its intersection with the arts. It seems like an amazing idea to use computers to adjust to human likes and dislikes in a way that can be quantitative and qualitative. I just don't think that it should be used specifically for film in this context. Maybe they could use the programming in other uses for drones or artificial intelligence as a whole?
It's very interesting to see how people try to communicate with robots to make them more "human-like". In this instance, students at Carnegie Mellon University are attempting to create a drone that can have a camera like sense that a director would have. To do this, the students are making programs to teach the autonomous drone about camera angles, what makes a shot visually appealing, as well as including tracking the actors or figures in the frame. All this is very difficult to measure as its more artistically creative and can be subject to opinion rather than in a quantifiable a mathematical formula. This areal system first needs to get good at tracking what is intended inside the frame while not crashing into any obstacles in the way, but if this new form of technology can succeed it can be useful in entertainment and sporting networks as well as even carrying into the film industry as a new and easier way of filming different angles/takes.
-Pablo Anton
Although I think that this is a very cool idea in terms of technological advancements, I’m not sure I agree with it. There will always be some technology that can learn what people like. That technology is a great clean, easy, logical way to facilitate some actions and ideas. Film, however, is not logical. It can, often times, be technical, but the viewer - the human brain - needs emotion, too. Human direction can cause the viewer to emote in a way that a pretty shot will not necessarily. Especially in the case of aerial cinematography, the cinematographer - the camera person - is necessary. Sure, drones could get cool shots all on their own, but they may not fit the feel of the film or the vision of the director if they are automated purely based on an algorithm that defines aesthetic. This new technology, too, invalidates the skill of the people who operate the camera and reduce it to a mathematical capability.
This development for what I am taking to be smart filming drones is a technology that really freaks me out. I am all for seeing the patterns in things, in fact I there is a beautiful art to mathematics and pattern. Math and art have a symbiotic relationship in a way that many people like to try to cover up. There tends to always be a battle between the arts and science: with science being rational and arts being emotional, with one being smart and the other being creative. I think that is an incredibly shallow way to think about these two genres or fields. Art is based in patterns and science is based in creative problem solving. But turning art into a math problem for a computer to solve really grinds my gears. The most important part of the art is the human part of it. What creates new art is our ability to screw up that math problem or purposely throwing it out the window. Maybe this technology will be helpful for shooting films or tracking patterns, but to advertise it as “Putting the power of a film director in an autonomous drone”
is destroying and reducing the idea of a director to a pattern, and art is more than just a creative pattern.
I can truthfully say at this point that I think the whole concept of robots trying to do human jobs is stupid. Especially in art. As I was walking down Forbes the other day, a robot that UPitt has to deliver thing to dorms I assume was stumbling around. running into people, crossing the street and hitting cars, and generally just being stupid. I think that when we try to replace things that could be done by a human with robots for no reason were fully just being dumb. It's not even more efficient. This in particular frustrates me because it's replacing an artist. The whole purpose of having movies made is as a creative outlet for people involved in making it, and this invention just makes it even more about industry and less about the actual people. I really dislike it, and wish the world wasn't making it so that all I see in my future is bright white stupid robots stumbling around everywhere.
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