James Cameron firmly shuts down THIS ‘horrifying’ AI innovation

James Cameron has come out against AI actors in a significant defence of his own filmmaking practices.

During a new interview on CBS Sunday Morning, the 71-year-old director and writer explained how his approach to Avatar was vastly different from what is currently happening in the industry with the likes of Tilly Norwood, an AI actress.

“For years, there was this sense that, ‘Oh, they’re doing something strange with computers and they’re replacing actors,’ when in fact, once you really drill down and you see what we’re doing, it’s a celebration of the actor-director moment,” he shared while defending the employment of motion capture technology which became mainstream following the release of his 2010 sci-fi epic.

Whereas he went on to highlight “the other end of the spectrum” with generative AI, “where they can make up a character”.

“They can make up an actor. They can make up a performance from scratch with a text prompt. It’s like, no. That’s horrifying to me. That’s the opposite. That’s exactly what we’re not doing,” Cameron stated.

The Canadian filmmaker further ruled out AI replacing human creation, adding that its generative branch cannot “create something new that’s never been seen.”

“If you think about it, the models – it is a magic trick, what they can do is quite astonishing. But the models are trained on everything that’s ever been done before that; it can’t be trained on that which has never been done,” he explained.

For context, Tilly Norwood is an AI model created by comedian, actress, and producer Eline Van der Velden, first launching the aspiring “actress” at the Zurich Summit in September.

Championing the technology during a conversation with Variety, Van der Valden had said, “I’m sure in the coming year, there’ll be plenty of effects that will be made with AI.”

Meanwhile, a third installment of James Cameron’s Avatar franchise, titled Fire and Ash, will release later this year, December 19.