Eagan Tilghman is seeing his star rise in online animation communities thanks to his excellent Scooby Doo and Five Nights at Freddy's animated short, Scooby Doo, Where Are You? In... SPRINGTRAPPED!
Some fans were even under the impression that the short was stop motion production that used puppets but Tilghman confirmed that the entire project was made in Blender 3.5.
The animator is hoping the project catches the attention of FNaF creator Scott Cawthon in hopes that he gets to pitch a full-length animated feature film. "Scott! Yes you, Scott Cawthon! If you’re seeing this, I wrote a feature-length animated FNAF film that my dream is to have produced and to direct it. So once again, if you’re seeing this, I would really appreciate the opportunity to pitch it to you."
Still, the project is not entirely without any controversy. While virtually everyone is impressed with the animation, more than a few commenters are upset by the use of AI voices.
Tilghman explained that as a fan production, he could only afford to pay for one voice actor, a well-known Shaggy impersonator who goes by @SuiteLifeOfShag on Twitter.
"I am not a fan of AI. The only reason I used AI voices for Fred, Daphne, Velma, and SG Kluger is because I can’t really afford to pay a ton of voice actors ATM, and it’s also difficult to find impersonators for the gang other than Shaggy and Scooby."
"This isn’t intended to make money, it’s honestly created as a portfolio piece and giant joke that took me way too long to animate. so I just used AI considering I’m a one man team and don’t have the means for many voice actors at the moment. If it counts for anything, the rest of the video is painstakingly designed, modeled, textured, animated, lit, rendered, edited, composited, and posted all by me, 1000% from scratch by hand with nothing other than my own brain and creative drive doing the work. I even learned to do a Scooby impression so I could voice Scooby myself!"
Still, the controversy surrounding the use of AI voices continued to rise, so much so that Tilghman has now vowed to use proper voice actors in future projects.
What do you think of the project? Are fans letting the presence of AI voiceovers overshadow this rather impressive, one-man animated production? Let us know in the comment section below.
You can find Eagan Tilghman on Reddit, YouTube, Instagram, and Patreon.