AI and Digital Avatars
- (Harvard University - Harvard Taiwan Student Association)
- Overview
An avatar is a digital representation of an individual, often used in video games, virtual reality, and online communication platforms. They can be created using a variety of methods, including manually designing and animating 3D models, or automatically generating avatars using AI, ML, and DL techniques.
Utilizing advanced AI models, such as Natural Language Processing (NLP) algorithms, the AI Avatar is a completely different kind of humanoid that lives independently in the virtual world without relying on human agency. This means they can have their own backstory and personality, and easily interact with human users in real time.
The Artificial Intelligence Foundation, one of the world's leading AI companies, describes these types of virtual beings as "a digital representation of you, like a video or photo, but with intelligence.
- Avatars and Digital Twins
Broadly speaking, an avatar is a reproduction of a user or object in a virtual environment. They can be anything from cartoon characters to more complex animation designs. These types of virtual presences can also be three-dimensional images in online games or virtual worlds, or two-dimensional images commonly used in social networks, forums, and online communities.
More recently, avatars have been described as digital twins, digital humans, or virtual doubles, as they are extensions of real-life human entity identities. We are now seeing the development of increasingly complex virtual human replicas created through computer graphics and motion capture.
It's worth noting that traditional avatars are controlled and managed by humans, regardless of background. These characters are a common sight in the gaming world, for example, but businesses are now also using them to streamline processes such as responding to inquiries and training new employees.
These digital twins are especially helpful in providing a more realistic, immersive and "present" experience for humans navigating virtual environments. For example, in the Metaverse, users and their avatars are able to see, hear, feel, and interact meaningfully with elements of the virtual world thanks to the incorporation of XR technology.
- [Barcelona, Spain]
- AI Avatars
We've long dreamed of intelligent virtual beings from science fiction literature and movies, but now they're finally a reality.
An AI avatar is a digital character powered by artificial intelligence that lives in a virtual environment, such as a game, social network, dating app, or online world.
These types of avatars can take many shapes, but they are more often designed as humanoid robots that can easily interact with and maintain relationships with "real humans" to varying degrees.
They're also a step up from the ubiquitous AI chatbots, which also rely on artificial intelligence to mimic human communication. Chatbots have come a long way in the past three decades. Kuki AI (formerly Mitsuku) is one of the best chatbot platforms out there, winning the prestigious Loebner Award for "human-like behavior" four times in a row.
However, no matter how advanced AI chatbots are, they lack long-term memory; they cannot remember past conversations and specifics of the people they have come into contact with. Instead, they were simply trained to respond in the context of the most recent conversation history.
On the other hand, AI avatars have powerful abilities, including memory, emotion, and creativity.
- AI Avatar Generators
AI Avatar Generator is an artistic generator that uses artificial intelligence, algorithms, and neural networks to create unique AI avatars based on user input and prompts.
These avatars are available on the internet and are widely used as profile pictures for social media accounts. AI avatars typically use a selfie or photo as a starting point. However, some can start with simple text prompts.
AI avatars are more than just static images. It is possible to create AI avatars that can be used in videos. AI avatars can be used in games, live broadcasts, tutorials and business presentations.
