Lil Uzi Vert sparks a new wave of deepfake music videos (2020)
Though artists kept tinkering with various forms of seemingly digitally altered videos over the next few years, the real wave of deepfake music videos really started to take off around 2020 with this video made for rapper Lil Uzi Vert’s track Wassup.
Produced by Bill Posters, who previously created this deepfake video of Mark Zuckerberg roasting himself, Wassup’s videos is made up of a collection of “Boom” video calls with a variety of celebrities. Boom, is a spin on Zoom and the entire video pokes at the surreal reality of pandemic-era video communication. The opening frames of the video show a number of rappers and politicians, including Obama, Trump, and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un all joining the remote call. Drake, Ye West, Rhianna, and Young Thug also make appearances.
Though crude compared to more polished deep fake videos in 2023, Wassup was able to make animated videos based on still celebrity headshots to make it seem like they are lip-synching the lyrics of the song. That breakthrough helped pave the way for future videos that would refine that process to create a video based solely on an individual’s headshot.
