Super Bowl Ads Sparked by AI

Could you all spot AI in action in the Super Bowl ads this weekend?

There was the most obvious one - Microsoft’s CoPilot ad, encouraging us in a Nike-esque fashion to take matters into our own hands and embrace AI with their newest productivity features.

Now, I can’t 100% validate that AI was used in these two Ads - Babies playing Pickle Ball for E*Trade and Pfizer’s “Here’s to Science” ad featuring singing paintings and textbooks, but if it wasn’t, they certainly did it the hard way. If it were me, I’d use NVIDIA’s Audio2Face for this application.

I could definitely spot some influences of AI used in the brainstorming process if not the final. Can’t B Broken by Verizon shows us what Beyonc-AI looks like - yet she’s not powerful enough to break the Internet. While not directly AI generated, have a look at this Couch Potato ad from PlutoTV which definitely smells of MidJourney dystopia. I wouldn’t be surprised if the creative teams at any of these companies used some ChatGPT sessions along the lines of “generate me a list of ways Beyoncé could break the internet” to fuel their ideation sessions.

In their attempts to sell us with their AI savvy, there are the ads for AI-powered features like Gift Mode on Etsy, Google Pixel’s “Face in Frame” accessibility play, and CrowdStrike’s cybersecurity. None of these companies outright said anything about AI, but it’s clear that it plays a very important role.

And lastly, there are those that made fun of all the AI weirdness. The Despicable Me 4 trailer shows us how the Minions are learning to use AI, and they don’t seem fazed by too many fingers and freaky spaghetti eating. On the other hand, Body Armor’s Field of Fake ad assures us that they do not use AI as part of their product offering, and yet, most likely, they did use some AI in the brainstorming and production process. Similarly, Discover questions the singularity in a humorous conversation between Jennifer Coolidge and a human customer service agent, as they discuss the human-ness of chatbots.

To lay one rumor to rest - the He Gets Us Jesus ad, which definitely feels like AI generated imagery has been confirmed to be “real art” shot by a fine arts photographer. While the visual aesthetic definitely has an AI edge, all those hands and feet would surely still be a challenge to even the best AIs these days.

If you enjoyed playing “spot the AI” during the Super Bowl, and would like to learn more about how you can use AI in your creative process, you should definitely check out NVIDIA GTC coming up in March. You can use this link to register, and if you choose come in person to San Jose, you will get a 20% discount.

Feel free to add comments if you spotted other AI applications in the Super Bowl 24 production.

*This newsletter represents my own perspectives and assessments, not those of my employer.