{"id":13559,"date":"2017-07-28T20:31:32","date_gmt":"2017-07-29T03:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pocketwisdominsights.com\/pwicolab\/?p=13559"},"modified":"2019-02-18T20:59:58","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T04:59:58","slug":"disneys-watching-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pocketwisdominsights.com\/pwicolab\/leadership\/leadership-co-lab\/leadership-co-lab-blogs\/pwi-co-lab-staff\/disneys-watching-you\/","title":{"rendered":"Disney\u2019s Next Movie Could Be Watching You, Too"},"content":{"rendered":"

Opening Insights<\/h2>\n

The company\u2019s research arm is experimenting with facial recognition to gauge how audiences react.<\/h3>\n
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Pocket Wisdom Insights (PWI) invites you to explore the following\u00a0Co-Lab Blog<\/strong>.<\/em>
\n This blog features parts of an \u00a0insightful article featured outside of the\u00a0PWI\u00a0Co-Lab,<\/strong><\/em>
\n written by Marc Wilsdon<\/strong> on July 28th, 2017, published by\u00a0FastCompany<\/a>.<\/em>
\n We have republished this content in respect of the author\u2019s vision, message and research.<\/em><\/p>\n

We invite\u00a0exploration<\/em>\u00a0of this topic in online discussions in the\u00a0Co-Lab<\/strong>.\u00a0Co-Labs<\/strong>\u00a0are designed to
\nbring people together to collaborate, share knowledge, insights and perspectives.<\/p>\n

Let Co-Lab Blogs be the\u00a0window<\/em>\u00a0to finding new insight to add to\u00a0your pocket.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

Informational Insights<\/h2>\n
\n

There\u2019s this term in the processed food industry for when something is quantifiably at its most delicious, but also\u2013critically\u2013still unsatisfying enough that you always crave more. It\u2019s called the\u00a0bliss point<\/a>, and it\u2019s what ensures that you always want another sip of that soft drink, or the crunch of that potato chip. It\u2019s about maximizing the bliss of consumption so that you consume more.<\/p>\n

Now, Disney Research\u00a0has developed a neural network<\/a>\u00a0that seems to be chasing\u00a0a similar idea\u2013but for the world of movies.\u00a0The system has been trained to watch an audience of theatergoers as they watch a film. It can track reactions like smiling and laughter on hundreds of faces in a dark theater, allowing Disney to quantify whether or not a film is working as intended on a granular scale. It\u2019s easy to imagine such technology eventually reaching well beyond the movie theater, into the real world, where Disney parks could react to your mood with real-time Disney magic.<\/p>\n

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[Image:\u00a0Disney Research<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Disney\u2019s researchers tested the system across 150 showings of several Disney films like\u00a0The Jungle Book<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0Star Wars: The Force Awakens<\/i>\u00a0in\u00a0movie theaters. Studios like Disney have used the reactions of test audiences to gauge early cuts of films for decades, often making changes to the edit or ending if the film wasn\u2019t hitting as hoped. What\u2019s different in this instance is the sheer amount of analysis\u00a0Disney Research was able to produce with this methodology: 3,179 people generated 16 million points of data..<\/p>\n

As Disney Research\u00a0scientist Peter Carr\u00a0put it to\u00a0Phys.org<\/em><\/a>:\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s more data than a human is going to look through. That\u2019s where computers come in\u2013to summarize the data without losing important details.\u201d Impressively, the neural net isn\u2019t just capable of summarizing takeaways. Within just a few minutes of watching a filmgoer, it could predict their facial expressions throughout the rest of the film.<\/p>\n

Disney is far from the only company working on big data in media. Snap, most notably,\u00a0actually measures the shot-by-shot performance of its Snapchat Shows<\/a>. That means the company can see if a certain 10-second blip is losing its audience\u2019s attention. Such insights are actually shaping the way Snap produces content.<\/p>\n

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[Image:\u00a0Disney Research<\/a>]<\/p>\n

As AI allows media companies to take advantage of these insights in real time, one can imagine Disney not just changing the way a film is cut during the test market phase, but actually recutting content in real time for a viewer\u2019s maximum pleasure. In past decades, the industry was dominated by an\u00a0arms race of CGI\u2013a competition between who could present audiences with the most stunning special effects. Now, we could be moving toward an age when AI is the crucial differentiator of media, an age where cameras lurk in movie theaters\u2013or even our smartphones\u2013and every entertainment company\u2019s best weapon is its ability to reshape content, dynamically, to our liking.<\/p>\n

Microsoft Research has used computer vision systems to measure facial and body language for a long time now. In one instance,\u00a0its researchers actually programmed an elevator<\/a>\u00a0to know whether it\u00a0should open or close for a person walking past. How? The system measured each person\u2019s facial expression and body language.\u00a0Disney Research claims its system can scale beyond people in a movie theater, and can even capture the intricacies of real-world movements, like trees blowing in the wind, with applications in animation. At the very least, one can imagine Disney bringing this technology into its parks, like the upcoming\u00a0Star Wars<\/em>\u00a0world<\/a>\u2013customizing the space and the characters you interacted with to your liking. It\u2019s easy to imagine sentiment-analysis cameras making their\u00a0way into other consumer\u00a0experiences, too, like vending machines or fast food restaurants.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Possibilities for Consideration<\/h2>\n
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As you take a bite of those new buffalo chicken fries, an AI could be watching, tallying your reaction with everyone else, ages 18-35.\u00a0If you don\u2019t mind how creepy it all is, camera-based AI might help the whole world find its bliss point, keeping us perpetually\u00a0craving the next bite of life.<\/p>\n

Source: FastCompany<\/a<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Take a moment and examine\u2026<\/h3>\n