Type a name into our machine for your own bespoke music video story...
This machine was devised for the Algorithm music video .
My research for the video began with shopping and dating algorithms, then moved on to narrative software—such as Wordsmith and Narrative Sciences— which takes data and turns it into narratives for e-commerce and reporting. Artist Daniel Swan and I decided to 'ask' an algorithm to write the video for us.
With the help of Nicolas Seymour-Smith, a programmer and artist, we built a machine that generates music-video treatments using natural language processing algorithms. We taught the machine what a music video plot was by feeding it synopses of music videos—classics like "Thriller" and "Scream", and modern favourites from Lady Gaga and Katy Perry. The machine began generating its own plots based on what it had learned, offering us insights into its dreamlike grasp of the stories we told it.