Step into the future on Friday, December 8th, with the Department of Film & Media Arts inaugural Deepfake Festival, an evening of artificial intelligence and installation-based media.
This festival is the brainchild of Professor Kenneth Collins, who joined the University of Utah this year. Collins is a transdisplinary artist working performance, film, installation, and other media. He is best known for his work with the company Temporary Distortion, a nonprofit arts organization in New York City, and he has an MFA in Directing and Digital Media Design from the University of Iowa.
Still from The Other Side, a work by John Estringer featured in the festival
Deepfake Festival will feature student works created in Collins’ two classes this semester, Media Arts in the Age of AI and Immersion/Interaction/Installation. “”Media Arts in the Age of AI” empowers students to leverage bleeding-edge AI technology in the creation of innovative short films,” Collins described, “while “Immersion/Interaction/Installation” focuses on the development of multi-screen gallery films and interactive video installations.”
New media and technology, specifically artificial intelligence, can be a fraught topic. For example, the recent WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes both had artificial intelligence as one of their key issues under negotiation. Collins’ course aims to help students use AI as a tool, while exploring what that tool means for human creativity, originality, and ethics. And the Deepfake Festival shares these creations and gives the U community the chance to directly engage with these technologies.
And ‘directly engage’ is no exaggeration. The event is very interactive, Collins said, with the films, installations, and performances taking place “throughout the Film & Media Arts building.” Attendees are welcome “to come and go freely to explore the various events staged throughout the building.”
“Immersive and AI-generated film are here to stay,” said Dr. Andrew Patrick Nelson, Chair of the Department of Film & Media Arts. “I’m excited for the wider community to experience how our students are using the latest technologies to expand the boundaries of what’s possible in moving image arts.”