McCann London uses deepfake technology to remember a Life Cut Short

Using a combination of deepfake tech, audio manipulation, and collaboration with members of the grime community, McCann London's film for The Joshua Ribera Foundation manages the impossible: giving voice to an artist from beyond the grave.

Created in partnership with SBTV, Life Cut Short sees rapper Depzman, whose life was tragically cut short in 2013, tell the tale of his childhood, career and the night that he died. 

Devised by creatives Elliot Lee and Rory Peyton-Jones (who also directed under their alias BRIGHTNIGHT), the campaign was inspired by an attempt to find a new way to talk to young people about knife crime through culture; discovering an authentic voice that young people would listen to in Depzman.

Midlands’ rappers ShadowCV and T-Roadz ghost-wrote the lyrics with support from Alison Cope, Depzman’s mum, and the track was produced by music company Native Music. The lyrics were inspired by Depzman’s life and music, emulating his flow and even using some of his old lyrics.

To bring the vocal to life a base recording was manipulated by Native Studios to recreate Depzman’s voice, combining samples, different voices and autotuning. The team researched recordings from around 2013 and implemented the same techniques he was using at that time, such as double tracking parts of the vocal, and subtle reverb, to try to be as faithful as possible to his sound. They also reached out to Depzman’s old crew, Invasion, to make sure it was authentic, resulting in a sound that matched the artist's voice at 18.