Ill be back! - A look at the Synthespian

Cinema was the first ever medium to truly immortalise actors and performers. From the earliest big screen names to the latest Hollywood stars, all these performances will be recorded and stored forever in the minds in the visual heavy media of the modern age. However due to the advancement in computer technology some stars are making posthumous appearances on screen and television. In some instances where an actor has died during the making of a film certain directors would either wrap up shooting or if there is enough footage of said actor use careful editing techniques along with doubles to complete the production. This technique has been used somewhat laughably in Ed Wood’s seminal B Movie Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959), where the headline actor Bella Lugosi, who had only been used for barely 5 minutes, was replaced. In the early nineties a similar tragedy struck the production of The Crow (dir Alex Proyas, 1994) where lead actor Brandon Lee was killed by a loaded prop weapon. The producers of the film were able to finish the film by painting Lees digitally composited onto that of a body double. This method was also utilised for Oliver Reed’s character in the 2000 blockbuster Gladiator (dir Ridley Scott) as well as recreating the famous signature tune of the film musical Singing in the Rain with the exception of Gene Kelly break dancing as opposed to his normal routine and most astonishingly the creation of an entirely new character using the image of Shakespearian actor Lawrence Oliver in the 2004 science fiction film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. Such modes were developed early on by the Kleiser-Walczak Construction company who created the Synthespian Project in order to “create life-like figures based on the digital animation of clay models.”

The appeal of bringing back some of Hollywood’s seminal actors has been conceived in the early days in the creation of virtual humans. Rendezvous in Montreal, a simple scenario where a crude models of Humphrey Bogart and Marilyn Munroe meet for a coffee, was an early use of virtual humans created by Thalman in 1987 for a demonstration of CG humans at an electronics fair. This has however brought issues to light regarding the treatment of the rights of images, one such law known as the ‘Astaire Bill’ which was drawn up by the California Senate. The estate of Fred Astaire, with backing from the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), “sought to restrict the use of computer generated images of the late actor,” However in light of such possibilities many actors have chosen to have their faces digitally scanned in order to be used for future projects along with certain studios buying the rights to the images of such famous stars such as Marlene Dietrich and Vincent Price. “Arnolds famous threat, ‘I’ll be back’, may take on new meaning.