ATLANTA: Giant billboards welcome Donald Trump to Atlanta as a “convicted felon,” while television ads show President Joe Biden falling off a bicycle.
Thursday’s debate between the two rivals in the 2024 White House race saw both sides ramp up personal attacks in a campaign already characterized by bitter animosity.
To mark the event in Georgia’s state capital, Biden’s Democratic Party paid for several huge billboards across the city.
“Donald, welcome to Atlanta for the first time since becoming a convicted felon. Congrats — or whatever,” read the sarcastic message under a picture of Trump’s police mugshot.
Trump was recently convicted in New York on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, while the mugshot is from a separate case in Georgia where he has been indicted for trying to overturn the 2020 election results.
Never one to pull its punches, Team Trump had its own attacks ready.
One 30-second television ad to be aired during the debate savagely mocks Biden’s advanced age of 81.
Called “Who’s Laughing Now,” it shows footage of Biden stumbling on the stairs of his Air Force One plane, falling over while clipped into his bike and appearing lost on stage.
The narrator suggests Biden is too frail to complete a second term.
“Do you think the guy who was defeated by the stairs... got taken down by his bike ... lost a fight with his jacket ... and regularly gets lost... makes it four more years in the White House?” the voiceover asks.
Another ad focuses on Biden’s perceived weak points of migration and inflation, saying: “After four years of failure under Joe Biden, it’s time to make America prosperous and strong again.”
The potshots were also fired in social media messages and print ads, with Trump posting hours before the debate that Biden is “a threat to the survival and existence of our country itself.”
Biden’s campaign launched a new drive “laying out Trump’s extreme agenda” if he were to win the November 5 election and then enact a nationwide ban on abortion.
One ad contrasts “Donald Trump’s record as a self-centered criminal to President Biden’s record of fighting for the American people.”
Savage and mocking: Attack ads mark US presidential debate
https://arab.news/4y7vy
Savage and mocking: Attack ads mark US presidential debate
Tunisian filmmaker wins $1 million global AI film contest in Dubai
- The French-language short film, “Lily,” was created entirely using Google’s generative AI tools
- The winning film was selected from 3,500 film submissions
DUBAI: Tunisian filmmaker Zoubeir Jlassi on Saturday won the inaugural $1 million AI film award, launched in collaboration with Google’s Gemini, for his short movie, “Lily.”
He was declared the winner in a ceremony held during the second day of the 1 Billion Followers Summit in Dubai where Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, chairperson of the Dubai Culture and Arts Authority, presented the award.
The French-language short film, “Lily,” created entirely using Google’s generative AI tools — including Gemini, Veo 3, Imagen and Flow — was named after the filmmaker’s daughter, who inspired the story.
The nine-minute film follows a lonely archivist haunted by a doll caught on his car bumper during a hit-and-run accident, forcing him to confront his guilt, confess to the police, and reunite the doll with the injured child in the hospital.
“My daughter has a doll, which is also called Lily. This doll lived with us through our moments of grievances, joy, and victories,” Jlassi told Arab News.
He said the film, which took a month to complete, portrays the doll as the protagonist’s silent witness and secretkeeper, ultimately prompting his moral awakening and bringing him back to life. The film’s message, he added, is that routine can dull self-awareness, preventing people from confronting their own truths and taking responsibility for their mistakes.
“With this film, I hope to inspire aspiring filmmakers to dream, take ideas from their archives, execute them and share them on their own platforms without relying on large production budgets or expensive equipment,” he told Arab News.
“This is the beauty of technology; it unleashes creativity without limits.”
The winning film was selected from 3,500 film submissions from 16 countries, with organizers saying the award aimed to encourage the use of AI in producing meaningful films and enhance the creators’ ability to deliver humanitarian stories.
It also looked to empower young people to leverage technology in boosting their creativity and creating artworks that bridge cultures.
The shortlisting process took place over multiple stages. A jury of international technology experts and filmmakers selected 12 films based on the storytelling originality, narrative structure, visual aesthetics, creative use of AI technologies, overall creativity, emotional impact, and adherence to transparency and ethical principles.
The five finalists were selected after public voting of the works selected by the jury, organizers said.
Each film had to be powered by at least 70 percent generative AI tools from Google — including Veo, Imagen and Flow — or third-party platforms that run on Gemini’s technology. The tech company said that the entries underwent advanced technical assessment and AI verification to ensure submissions met the criteria.
The remaining finalists were “Portrait No. 72” by Rodson Verr Suarez of the Philippines; “Cats Like Warmth” by South Korean director Lee Su Yeol; “Heal” by Egyptian director Mohamed Gomaa; and “The Translator” by US-based Pylyp Li.
The top five AI-generated short films were screened on the first day of the 1 Billion Followers Summit, a gathering of content creators aiming to explore how new media can drive positive change and fuel sustainable economic growth.
