Overview

Using an avatar in a video provides a more human and engaging way of interacting with your viewers. The avatar you use can be selected from a library of ready-made (stock) avatars or you can create a custom avatar to represent someone in your company. Practically speaking, a custom avatar is time and cost-effective, as using an avatar eliminates the need to prepare and film actual people each time their presence is required in the video.

Once added to the scene, the avatar will read the contents of the narration placeholder. An avatar can be added to every scene of the video; alternatively, you may want to present the avatar only in the first and last scenes to add a human element that will also carry over to the other scenes. An added advantage is that, once you've added an avatar to a scene, you can use its voice to narrate any other scene in the video.

In the scene, an avatar can be added directly to the scene background or placed on a media asset, essentially behaving like an overlay. Below are examples showing where an avatar can be positioned:

Example_1_50.png Example_2_50.png
Example_3_50.png Example_4_50.png

Limitations

1. Currently, personalized narrations—either with a personalization token or with audience messaging—are not supported. In a scene that includes a personalized narration, the avatar will narrate the fallback narration.
2. An avatar cannot be added to a video that uses a human, recorded voice.

Avatar Types

The SundaySky platform offers two types of avatars: Stock and Custom.

  1. Stock: stock avatars are created from video footage of human actors who have given their consent to be used in SundaySky videos. Each stock avatar has a distinct look and voice that cannot be disconnected from one another. This means that an avatar can only use its real voice and cannot be switched to any other.

    Stock_avatars.png

  2. Custom: custom avatars are created based on video footage that you supply of yourself or others in your organization. Using AI technology, the video footage you supply is used to create a realistic, human-like avatar. Creating a custom avatar automatically also generates a voice clone. Just as with a stock avatar, the custom avatar can only use the voice of the person who was filmed and cannot be switched to another voice.
    The custom avatar feature—both creation and usage— is being released initially as a beta version.

    Chris_avatar_added.png

Avatar Credits

The avatar functionality is a premium feature. Based on the plan that your company holds, your account will include credits for the following two actions:

  1. Animating an avatar in a scene
  2. Creating a custom avatar

Animation Credits: When first added to a scene, an avatar is static. Animation credits are used when you are ready to animate an avatar and bring it to life. You can animate an avatar at two points:

  1. When previewing the video in the Studio
  2. When approving the video in the Video Page. As animation is an inherent part of an avatar, logic dictates that a video can only be shared after the avatar is animated. A video must be approved before it can be shared.

Animation credits are allocated in minutes, with the current balance displayed in minutes and seconds at the top of the Avatar Library. In the example below, there is a balance of 9 minutes and 46 seconds.

Animating_avatars_balance_80.png

Animation credits are consumed according to the length of the scene in which the avatar appears. For example: if a scene that includes an avatar plays for three seconds, three seconds are deducted from the credits after the avatar is animated.

Custom Avatar Credits: Each credit represents a custom avatar that you can create and then use in your videos. The number of credits added to your account are displayed in the Avatar Library, in the Custom tab. In the example below, there is a balance of 2 credits enabling the creation of 2 custom avatars.

Custom_avatar_balance_80.png

Important note:
To avoid spending credits unnecessarily, we highly recommend that you animate the avatar only after the narration for the scene is completely finalized and you do not anticipate any edits. Once the avatar is animated, any changes made to the narration or pronunciation will require you to animate the avatar again, using additional credits.
Also, if you are sending the video to others for reviewing, we recommend that you send the video with static avatars and only animate the avatars after the video receives final approval.

Here are key points to know about using avatar credits:

1. As mentioned above, animation credits are consumed according to the length of the scene. Examples:
If the scene in which the avatar appears is 5 seconds long, 5 seconds are deducted from the credit balance.
If the scene in which the avatar appears is 1 minute long, 60 seconds are deducted from the credit balance.
2. If you animate an avatar in a scene while previewing, you will not need to use credits to animate the same scene again when approving the video. This is on condition that no changes have been made to the narration, pronunciation, or the avatar selected for the scene.
3. If you make a change to the narration, pronunciation, or replace the avatar after already animating the avatar in a scene, credits will be deducted in order to update the avatar.
4. When previewing the video, you can animate one scene, multiple scenes, or all scenes of the video. This is in contrast to when you are approving the video for sharing. At the latter stage, all unanimated avatars are animated and the relevant credits are deducted from the balance.
5. If an avatar in a scene is animated and then that video is duplicated, you will not need to use credits to animate the avatar in the duplicated video. This is on condition that no changes have been made to the narration, pronunciation, or the avatar selected for the scene.
For example:
In Video A, the avatar "Gloria" says "hello and welcome" in scene #1.
Video A is duplicated and Video B is created.
In Video B, if no changes are made to scene #1, the avatar will be animated and no credits will be consumed.
6. The custom avatar creation can take up to several hours. As soon as a process is initiated by a user in your account, one custom avatar credit is already considered "spent" although the creation process is still in progress. This is important to note when there is only one credit remaining in the account and several users working concurrently. The custom avatar balance, however, will decrease only when the avatar is ready for your use.
7. Once a custom avatar credit has been used to create an avatar, it cannot be refunded.
8. When your account is low on animation credits (less than five minutes) or out of credits completely, the relevant indication (as in the examples below) will be displayed in several locations throughout the platform.
 
Less than 5 minutes No credits remaining
Low_on_credits.png No_credits_remaining.png
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