The most notable feature of VASA-1 is that it allows users to animate any image. They can take a photo of a person and make that person move expressively, talk, and sing. What's interesting about this AI solution is the high level of realism it provides.
VASA-1 can make photos more vivid
The VASA-1 solution focuses on improving accessibility for people with communication difficulties. It seeks to provide companionship or therapeutic support to those who need it, allowing for the creation of realistic talking faces in real time. VASA-1's request was just an image of the person's face whose voice they wanted to add. Additionally, it allows users to add other elements to make things more realistic. Users can also edit the position of the eyes or the movements of the mouth, making the face smile or scream.
Microsoft emphasizes how realistic and immersive these videos are created from a person's photos, but it's not just about the ability to add voice and easy, realistic movements to drawings or collages , VASA-1 has the ability to add emotions, facial expressions, and the ability to add movement to the head.
VASA-1 will not be released to everyone
However, like OpenAI's Sora, Microsoft warns that VASA-1 will not be accessible because they will not publish any demos, APIs, products or services related to VASA-1. Maybe this is just the first version of this new technology and is in the development stage, and Microsoft is concerned about the risk of deepfake being used for malicious purposes. Therefore, it seems to be used only in arrangements with specialized centers working with people with various communication problems.
Perhaps in the future VASA-1 will be deployed, but in a controlled way to avoid problems. The facilities that VASA-A targets are public organizations that can create more user-friendly virtual assistants, and can also be an additional feature to Copilot, creating virtual assistants near right in Windows.
However, even if that happens, Microsoft is very concerned about security issues to avoid being used for fraudulent platforms or encouraging investment in fraudulent activities.
