Forum Discussion
AI Avatar Improvements
A few suggestions regarding the AI avatars that I have not seen totally written out elsewhere:
- The Articulate voices (labeled as Owned by Articulate, Aaron - Wes) absolutely need to be listed as options when using the Generate AI Audio feature. Sometimes I need a talking head, sometimes I just need a voiceover - but I almost ALWAYS need the voices to be the same. I have a work around for this, but it is an annoying process and creates a file that is not easily editable in the future.
- When cropping or resizing an AI Avatar the resulting video appears distorted in Storyline, but displays correctly when previewed or published. Not a huge deal, but slightly annoying - I submitted a bug report on this.
- It would be great if I could attach a voice to an Avatar that is the default voice whenever I choose that Avatar.
- It would also be great if I could generate the "script" for the AI Avatar and had the option to Save without actually generating the video (bonus if I could generate just the voiceover, or not at all) - it could just have a placeholder load instead. This would be helpful when I have a script/storyboard that is mostly complete but I need to get further feedback at a later date. I don't like the idea of generating a video and then having to regenerate later when something changes - I try to be conscious of both my time and the resources required to make these videos.
And of course, it would be great to have more granular control of the Avatar and voiceover (adding emphasis, directing the Avatar to point in specific places and such) but those are general improvements that most AI is not fully capable of at this point.
6 Replies
Hello DeckMasterFlex,
Thanks for taking the time to share these ideas. I really appreciate how clearly you outlined both the workflow improvements you'd like to see and the bug you already reported.
A common theme I noticed is how to make AI avatars fit more naturally into an iterative authoring workflow, especially when you're switching between avatars and voiceover-only content.
I'd love to learn a little more:
- What kinds of projects lead you to choose a talking head versus voiceover only?
- About how often do script changes require you to regenerate avatar videos?
- If you could have just one of these improvements first, which would make the biggest difference to your workflow?
Thanks again for the thoughtful feedback. The additional context will help us better understand how these enhancements could support your workflow.
Hey Luciana,
One of the primary projects I am working on right now requires using scenes with an avatar and scenes with a talking head. It is essentially an introduction to the organization with information about how we operate and various legislation, and the team asking for the project likes the use of the AI avatars as it makes it feel more like a real person is talking to them - so when there's a voice change or something along those lines, it can break the illusion.
In an ideal world, script changes wouldn't happen at the point where I am generating AI avatar videos. Unfortunately, sometimes hearing the script out loud triggers changes. It's fairly frequent, but not overwhelmingly so.
If I had to choose one, it would be the selfish one of having the AI avatar voices available as AI text. The current workflow that I use to do this is annoying and time consuming. It has the benefit of being one of the easier fixes on your team, I think.
Thanks!
Happy to answer any other questions.
Hi DeckMasterFlex,
Thanks for coming back with more detail, and for naming your top priority. It helps to see how the avatar voices tie into your project. A consistent voice keeps the avatar and talking head scenes feeling like one real person speaking, and the current workaround is time-consuming. You also mentioned that script changes sometimes come up once you hear the script out loud, fairly often, but not overwhelmingly so.
We appreciate you sharing how this plays out in your work. If more comes up as the project moves along, we’d love to hear it.
hi, Cropping avatar videos does not- when cropping is done and save and close button is pressed the video becomes distorted.see attached
Hi MehdiKasumov-cb,
I just replied to your other post, here!
Thank you,Stephen.
Here is the second improvement that you may look up to:
Each avatar when animated has exactly the same expressions as the others.At first it looks at the camera than within next sentence looks away and then animation repeats itself. Hands of the avatar (if he is not front facing and not hands down or crossed near waist are not animated. By the look of it - you have a 3d animated mesh which is skinned based on the user supplied image which is understandable but not suitable).
second issue when supplying a png transparent image- articulate accepts it but it has to be 16:9 or close to that aspect ratio otherwise cropping does not work.when expanding canvas to approximate 16:9 it works
When transparent mage is used the video becomes non transparent
see the first image- in the application? it is transparent.but when video is played it is not and image artefacts that were not present in the application suddenly appear and back ground becomes non transparent
