TRASH Launches Video Styles, including Music Videos And Tools for Independent Artists
What’s Next for AI and Content In 2020
What We’re Launching Today:
1. Video styles!
Video styles are AI shortcuts to help you create cutting edge videos on our app TRASH. Based on types of videos we saw people creating on TRASH already, Styles can help you create a recap, an artsy video, a narrative story-style video and more with a single tap. Styles aren’t meant to be the final thing (though sometimes you get lucky with the AI!) you’re the storyteller — so you can tweak it from there.
Now, when you watch someone’s video, you’ll see what style they used to create it so that you can tap on that style and make your own.
Plus, we’re launching this on the web too — so that when you share your TRASH vids on desktop, your friends can be inspired to create that way too! Because Styles are not templates, and they are also not copying, they’re unique every time. Everyone gets to shine. :) Check out this playlist of music videos using Styles for inspiration.
2. Music videos & TRASH for Artists
Speaking of music videos, one of our Styles is for making full-length music videos, and we’re also launching TRASH for Artists today! If you’re an independent musician, you can add your tracks to TRASH and make your own music video or promo vid in minutes. Plus, the whole community can join in.
Today, Grammy-nominated artist D’Leau is sharing the video for his new song in his own remix channel, and up and coming artist / TikTok influencer Okayceci is kicking things off with the first remix! Check it out and add your own, and watch all the music videos made so far here.
What’s next for AI in 2020
It’s Sunday night. You turn off the playlist Spotify recommended you should listen to while clearing up dinner, and sit down on the sofa to wind down. You’re blip-blipping through your Netflix recommendations on the TV while scrolling your feeds on your phone at the same time, replying to DMs and getting lost in your TikTok “For You Page” before deciding on a show to try.
Relatable?
Today, the most influential and successful platforms are using AI for curation. Based on your first couple of bites, the platform gets smarter and feeds you more content based on your taste. My first brush with this was in 2006 when I worked at Last.fm, a precursor to Spotify, and the company that invented tracking what you listen to give you music recommendations. I spent six years leading design and PM-ing many features to market there. By the time I decided to move on, I’d been steeped in recommender systems. I find it impossible not to think about recommendation algorithms when I think about content, the two go hand in hand for me.
14 years later, the crazy new concept I struggled to explain to my family, friends and our users back then (I remember writing an FAQ entry explaining collaborative filtering wasn’t “spyware”, and family gatherings were like “So what exactly do you do again? Computers…?”) is now so commonplace we barely think about it. This technology is now so powerful that in 2019 TikTok rose to #1 with its “For You” Page feed algorithm that doesn’t even need you to be signed in. You barely even need to watch a few seconds of a video for TikTok to start recommending content.
AI for Creation
If the last frontier was algorithms for curation, then what’s the next one? Algorithms for creation. It’s already starting to happen, and it’s going to be most powerful for mediums that are difficult for humans to create in, because that’s where it’s the most needed.
As I type this article, Google Docs suggests what I might want to say next with predictive text. It’s not totally in my voice yet, I can tell — because I only use the suggestions about half the time, but sure, that’s coming. As I type, Grammarly is cleaning up my errors and making suggestions (again, not always helpful cuz Grammarly’s not always down with my multiple cities worth of slang, innit) but increasingly — I outsource this to a computer brain so I can focus on what I’m writing. Put a photo into Meitu and it will automatically make some recommendations on how to make you better looking without you even asking. Chill, cuz all I wanted to do was post a hot selfie to Insta anyway, speed and on-the-go is of the essence in this scenario. In the last few years, creating with AI has become more complex, venturing into mediums that pose a high technical and creative barrier for most. Companies have sprung up to help you edit your podcasts, compose music, master your recordings, and now, create videos, which is what our app does.
What AI for Creation is Not
1. A replacement for creativity: AI is not going to write the blog post for you, it’s just going to help you finish sentences
2. Going to turn your crap into art: you get out what you put in. A great filter on a crappy shot only goes so far*
*So, there’s actually a chance it miiiiight turn your mercury into gold– in the vein of Dadaist or Surrealist happy accidents, and, similar to recent experiments with choreography, this is what we try to do at TRASH, leverage the unexpectedness of AI for artistic expression — like a dialog with a collaborative partner — but like the game of Exquisite Corpse, it’s not always going to turn out brilliantly.
What AI for Creation Will Do
- Inspire you to get started with suggestions, rough cuts, potential arrangements that can get you over the blank canvas and into making.
- Let your creative spirit run free by dealing with the tools and technology for you, and letting you express yourself in new mediums you didn’t think you knew how to use
- The annoying work! AI can handle the stuff that humans don’t need to do — the annoying technical tasks like re-synching a soundtrack and more.
- Help you along by suggesting what color grading might look best, recommending you add some drums to that synthesizer, etc…
If you’re a creative person, you’re nodding your head at those four things, because you know how hard they are! Getting started. It suuuuuucks! Even award-winning author Margaret Atwood is a self-proclaimed procrastination queen when it comes to getting started. Just being inspired and having an idea for what to make blocks so many people. Then, ugh — when tools get in the way! It’s so frustrating when you can see it in your mind’s eye but you can’t think about it because you’re trying to figure out how the damn app works. Then, of course, changing your mind and doing it over again. The worst! Finishing projects can feel impossible, if you don’t have a half-finished DIY/cooking/craft/creative project in a cupboard or on your hard drive right now, I don’t believe you’re real.
What we’ve built isn’t about AI doing the work for you, it’s about the tools that actually help you break past creative blocks. As creatives ourselves, we knew how hard it was to look at a blank page. TRASH Video Styles make that page a little less intimidating, and a lot more fun. Download TRASH and check it out!
