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Adobe Is Working On 'Photoshop For Audio' That Will Let You Add Words Someone Never Said (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Adobe is working on a new piece of software that would act like a Photoshop for audio, according to Adobe developer Zeyu Jin, who spoke at the Adobe MAX conference in San Diego, California today. The software is codenamed Project VoCo, and it's not clear at this time when it will materialize as a commercial product. The standout feature, however, is the ability to add words not originally found in the audio file. Like Photoshop, Project VoCo is designed to be a state-of-the-art audio editing application. Beyond your standard speech editing and noise cancellation features, Project VoCo can also apparently generate new words using a speaker's recorded voice. Essentially, the software can understand the makeup of a person's voice and replicate it, so long as there's about 20 minutes of recorded speech. In Jin's demo, the developer showcased how Project VoCo let him add a word to a sentence in a near-perfect replication of the speaker, according to Creative Bloq. So similar to how Photoshop ushered in a new era of editing and image creation, this tool could transform how audio engineers work with sound, polish clips, and clean up recordings and podcasts. "When recording voiceovers, dialog, and narration, people would often like to change or insert a word or a few words due to either a mistake they made or simply because they would like to change part of the narrative," reads an official Adobe statement. "We have developed a technology called Project VoCo in which you can simply type in the word or words that you would like to change or insert into the voiceover. The algorithm does the rest and makes it sound like the original speaker said those words."
When recording voiceovers, dialog, and narration, people would often like to change or insert a word or a few words due to either a mistake they made or simply because they would like to change part of the narrative...
When recording suspects, police would often like change or insert a word or a few words in order to manufacture evidence by changing part of the narrative.
FTFY
OTOH, if it's really good enough to be undetectable, it might cause a lot of legitimate and unaltered recordings to be thrown out of court on the grounds of reasonable doubt.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
"...So similar to how Photoshop ushered in a new era of editing and image creation, this tool could transform how audio engineers work with sound, polish clips, and clean up recordings and podcasts."
Enough with this "innocent" sales bullshit. I am far more concerned about how this tool can and will be used against me, in a court of law, forcing me to hire enough expertise to defend against shit I never said.
The average citizen can't even remotely afford a good legal defense these days. This is going to make that even more difficult by having to hire appropriate audio experts to analyze audio recordings to determine if they've been manipulated or not.
And no, this isn't like Photoshop, where often the only tool that is necessary to validate manipulation is the human eye and common sense (yeah, I'm talking to you magazine editors, who still feel the need to digitally alter some of the most naturally beautiful humans on the planet.)
Yes, what a service indeed. Now we finally will have the ability to set people up like in the movie Running Man.
Hollywood's asking for it. They'll start making sure their contracts regarding perpetual use of likeness of actors can be used to leave actors out of payroll entirely on the next animated film. Especially low-budget direct to video sequels.
“Convictions are more dangerous foes of truth than lies.”
Friedrich Nietzsche
People will believe what they are told because they already want to believe it. It wont even matter that the real audio source is available for independent review.