At the recent IBC Show in Amsterdam, the “Digital Replicas and Talent ID: Provenance, Verification and New Automated Workflows” Accelerator project was front and center, offering a look at the need for a standardized ID framework to enable talent authentication of digital replicas for the media supply chain.
Headed by HAND (Human & Digital), other project participants include Videntifier, The Scan Truck, WaveSeven Consulting, WILD CAPTURE, EZDRM, and, of course, EIDR, which is assisting in mapping the workflows for the project.
More than that, Hollie Choi, managing director of EIDR, has taken the lead on helping HAND set up a new online resource for the project, offering details around workflows, use cases, legal and ethical concerns, background on everyone involved with the project, and resources for industry players interested in digital replicas and all the technology entails.
The resource includes a detailed account of how actor Evan Shafran (Barbie, Rebel Moon) had a digital replica created, and registered with HAND ID, a resolvable, unique, and interoperable public identifier.
“The laws on this are changing daily, and the entire purpose of this is to protect actors who are allowing digital replicas of themselves to be made,” Choi said, adding that when an actor has a digital replica created, they should be able to “keep and own it.”
“He may way want to license his replica out elsewhere,” she said.
Another critical area of the online resource deals with the ever-changing laws around AI and digital creations. Choi said she aims to keep that section constantly updated, to address worldwide government regulatory updates.
“[This project] not only benefits the actor, it benefits the studio and everyone involved in the production of content, because as we start to move into a world where AI is generating content, we need to be able to know how that content was produced, and how it’s been manipulated from the beginning,” Choi said during an online IBC interview.