In the Beijing Spring Festival Gala broadcast on the first day of the lunar new year, there appeared a program “starry River dreams” performed by virtual people and real people on the same stage.
The program introduction shows that young singer Liu Yu joined hands with virtual human Su Xiaomei to perform the cross dimensional reality stage show “Star River dreams”. The virtual person “Su Xiaomei”, who first appeared on the stage, showed traditional skills such as poetry recitation and sword dance. By using the way of virtual characters, she added a cross dimensional national style science fiction color to the Beijing Satellite TV Spring Festival Gala, leading the audience to immerse themselves in the virtual world.
It is understood that the virtual person “Su Xiaomei” who boarded the Beijing Spring Festival Gala was launched by Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) .
Shell finance reporter learned that this is not the first time that a virtual person has stepped on the stage of a party or concert. At the New Year Concert of Jiangsu Satellite TV broadcast on December 31 last year, the virtual person “Deng Lijun” created by the digital Kingdom sang songs such as “small town story” and “walking the road of life” with singer Zhou Shen. In 2019, China Central Television Network Spring Festival Gala launched “xiaosa”, “Zhu Xiaoxun” and other virtual hosts based on the sample of China Central Television hosts. Looking forward, the famous virtual images Luo Tianyi, tie AI and chuyin future have also held offline concerts. Can virtual people replace real stars in the entertainment circle?
“Su Xiaomei” shows off her dancing skills. What is the difficulty and how much does it cost?
“It’s not technically difficult to get virtual people on the stage, interact with real people in real scenes, and share the stage with real people.” Lu Cheng, a virtual idol industry observer, told shell finance, “First make the 3D model of the virtual human, and then use augmented reality technology to project it onto the stage. This technology is also available in the camera function of Huawei’s mobile phone. Taking the program of Beijing Satellite TV as an example, we should find an actor with real dance skills to be responsible for the dance action capture of the virtual human, and then the actor will cooperate with the virtual human to show the final virtual real interaction Mutual stage effect. “
In an interview with Beijing Youth Daily, program director Guo Yan revealed that the digital virtual character “Su Xiaomei” is based on the legendary sister of Su Dongpo. The recording time of the whole program is as long as 11 hours, which is the longest shooting time of this Beijing Spring Festival Gala, “At the recording scene of” a dream in a starry River “, due to the combination of reality and reality and the particularity of the stage, the director team has very high requirements for the lens picture and stage cooperation. Especially for the stage position of Liu Yu, it is strictly required to be completely consistent every time. In addition to the rehearsal of 3 hours, the empty mirror recording took 4 hours, and the final recording also took 4 hours.”
“Although the technical principle is not complex, the difficulty is that the production of virtual human requires many steps, including 3D modeling, motion capture, acousto-optic rendering, etc. the cooperation between them tests the producer, and each step is very ‘money burning’.” Lucheng said.
the company behind “Su Xiaomei” is Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) . Why do many companies layout virtual people one after another?
It is understood that the virtual person “Su Xiaomei” who boarded the Beijing Spring Festival Gala was released by Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) on January 1, 2022, Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) said that this is its “landmark landing of meta universe strategy and will open a new layout of Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) virtual IP services.”
Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) said that at present, with the development of virtual technology, virtual assets (including virtual people, virtual objects and virtual environment) will be essential element assets in the meta universe. In the future, Bluefocus Intelligent Communications Group Co.Ltd(300058) will also lay out the virtual IP market for a long time. Together with vertical industry partners, it will make efforts to create virtual cultural and creative, virtual music, virtual idols and other tracks, create more virtual IP with industrial applications and create beautiful imagination, and meet the multiple needs of users and commercial customers.
The reporter of shell finance and economics learned that at present, there are many companies engaged in virtual human related businesses in China. While stepping on the stage to attract the eyes, receiving endorsements, live broadcasting and becoming online celebrities are several mainstream “businesses” of virtual people.
\u3000\u3000 “After the epidemic, offline TVC and plane are difficult to shoot, but the brand still needs to output a large number of materials to establish links with users, so many companies begin to use digital content production; in addition, the rollover rate in the entertainment industry is very high, and the brand needs a safe, technical and flow human image to wear clothes and shoot plane on behalf of the brand ； At the same time, since last year, the popularity of concepts such as metauniverse, NFT, blockchain and Quanzhen Internet has made brands feel crisis and want to be digital assets. Virtual people are the most understandable digital assets. These things determine that almost all brands will not refuse to cooperate with virtual people. ” Chen Yan, founder of Cishi culture company, which has multiple virtual human IP’s such as Ling and taosman, told the reporter of shell finance.
it is difficult for virtual people to replace real stars in the short term
However, the shell finance reporter found that although the virtual human industry is still in the tuyere, the continuous wind may not be as “strong” as people think.
Before that, Oriental satellite TV had announced that actor Huang Xiaoming would appear on the stage with the virtual character “Guofeng Xiaoming” for the first time in the Spring Festival Gala of the year of the tiger and have a dialogue with “another self”. Oriental satellite TV said in the publicity that “Guofeng Xiaoming” is based on scanning the whole body of a real person, supplemented by mobile capture technology, which not only ensures the true restoration of the characters, but also gives them a layer of fantasy color. However, in the end, the reporter did not see the program in the Spring Festival Gala of the year of the tiger on Oriental satellite TV. In addition, in the Spring Festival Gala of China Central Television in the year of the tiger, virtual stars, oceans, thousands of miles of rivers and mountains and other virtual and real combination scenes composed of XR, AR, holography and other technologies have become the highlights of the Spring Festival Gala program, but the virtual human did not appear.
Behind this is the high cost of virtual human business.
Last year, Liu Yexi, a virtual human who was accompanied by the tiktok concept, released a 2 minute make-up video in the trembling sound, and he gained 1 million 300 thousand fans in 30 hours. Liu Yok Hsien, founder of technology, founder of tiktok, told reporters in the Beijing News shell economic news that the video is only a notice of Liu Yexi’s debut. The follow-up story will be released in a single episode. At present, Chuangyi technology company serves more than 150 large and medium-sized teams behind Liu Yexi, while the number of small front desk teams is less than 10.
“Liu Yexi” team said in an interview with shell finance reporters that in more than half a year before the launch of “Liu Yexi”, the investment in R & D cost, personnel cost and technology cost “far exceeded one million”.
Even if the production is not so sophisticated virtual human image, its cost is difficult for ordinary people to bear. Lucheng said that at present, the relative cost of virtual human with secondary image is low, but the cost of an ordinary short video is also thousands of yuan, and the cost of a few minutes of video is tens of thousands. If Liu Yexi’s super realistic virtual human is made into video, its cost per second “is at least tens of thousands.”
However, affected by the concept fire of the meta universe, many companies are still committed to the tide of the virtual human industry. So, can virtual people replace real stars and subvert the entertainment industry in the future?
\u3000\u3000 “The virtual human industry has developed for many years, but due to the impact of high production costs, the more sophisticated virtual human is, the more difficult it is to interact with the audience frequently. In addition, since strong artificial intelligence has not appeared at present, behind most popular virtual human is actually a ‘Leather actor’ wearing mobile capture equipment. Virtual human wants to replace real stars in the short term I can’t find it. ” Lucheng said.
