An AI-generated image of Tilly Norwood. Illustration: Particle 6View image in fullscreenAn AI-generated image of Tilly Norwood. Illustration: Particle 6Creator of AI actor Tilly Norwood says she received death threats over projectEline van der Velden says she developed her ‘digital twin’ to provoke discussion but backlash from some has been worse than expectedThe creator of the AI actor Tilly Norwood has said she received death threats after a global backlash against the project, and said she developed it to “provoke thoughts and discussion” about the impact of AI in the entertainment world.Eline van der Velden caused anger and panic in Hollywood and beyond last year after she said talent agents had been interested in signing her creation. Prominent actors and acting unions immediately condemned the idea.In an interview with the Guardian, Van der Velden said she had been prepared for a backlash against the provocative idea of AI performers. However, she said she was “quite shocked by the vitriol” that followed.“The death threats and the hate … my goodness, loads,” she said. “That’s still going, but much less now. I totally understand the reaction. I made her to represent the fear – and to represent this change in AI as an art piece, in a way. I was just like, this is the zeitgeist.”Van der Velden, who founded the production company Particle6 and its AI arm, Xicoia, debuted Norwood in a short comedy sketch called AI Commissioner last autumn. Norwood has her own social media accounts, with 141,000 followers on Instagram.An immediate backlash came from actors including Melissa Barrera, Mara Wilson and Ralph Ineson. The actors’ unions Sag-Aftra and Equity also raised concerns. When asked about Norwood on a podcast, the actor Emily Blunt said: “Good lord, we’re screwed.”Van der Velden said it had been a deliberately provocative exercise to shock the industry into understanding how far the technology had come. “You’re trying to provoke thoughts and discussion,” she said. “So yes, I wanted to make people sit up and go ‘holy moly’. So in a way I achieved my goal.”View image in fullscreenAn AI-generated image of Tilly Norwood. Illustration: Particle 6Van der Velden continues to be an advocate for the use of AI. She said the technology “might actually be a blessing” for some actors who wish to avoid fame. She said avatars like Norwood could be controlled by real performers using motion capture technology.“I think it’s great for some actors, it might actually be a blessing that they can have a digital twin,” she said. “They don’t have to be a known name. For example, Tilly is famous. I’m not. That’s wonderful. Fame is a horrible thing.”She has now featured Norwood in a new music video, with the lyrics written by an AI chatbot. Van der Velden controls Norwood’s avatar using motion capture techniques.“I’m the actor behind Tilly and she could play multiple different characters,” she said. “It’s great. I don’t have to get plastic surgery. I don’t have to get Botox. I don’t even have to put makeup on. And yet I can play all these different roles.“It’s very freeing as an actor. When I play Tilly, it’s all down to the craft. It’s like doing theatre, right? It’s all about the emotion that you convey … I think a lot of actors will enjoy it.”She said she had turned down offers for her creation to feature in real productions. “A lot of people came to us with films,” she said. “We said no to all of them, because that was not the purpose for her to replace a real actor. However, we are creating a micro drama with her, writing a full series with her.”Van der Velden said Norwood had been created using publicly available tools, which meant it was impossible to say what or whose data had contributed to it.“Tilly’s not trained on anything specific,” she said. “We just use general models. We just use the same publicly available models as everybody else has access to.“Any of these black boxes are trained on lots and lots of data. The reason I make peace with it is because I just think: OK, fine, it’s trained on all of our data, but I am allowed to use these tools to make art, creative stuff going forward. So I’m building on the whole of humanity that came before me.“Hopefully [this is] opening the creative door for people to use these tools in a positive way.”Explore more on these topicsAI (artificial intelligence)newsShareReuse this content