Keen-eyed internet users are accusing Will Smith of creating an AI crowd in a recent tour video posted to social media.
Clips posted to social media from Will Smith’s Based on a True Story comeback tour have sparked debate online, with some viewers suggesting elements of the audience were AI-generated.
The footage, compiled from multiple shows, includes a shot where fans hold a sign reading “We <3 You Willy.” While the banner looks authentic, faces in the surrounding crowd appear distorted and blurred. Other online observers have highlighted strangely formed hands, with claims that some figures were rendered with extra fingers, as per reports from Rolling Stone and NME.
Another fan is shown holding a sign that says: “‘You Can Make It’ helped me survive cancer. THX Will,” but his knuckles appear to blur into the sign.
The comments on the video are flooded with AI usage allegations. “Half of the footage is AI,” one comment reads. Another user said: “Imagine using AI and generating a sign about Cancer. This is absolute [clown] behaviour.”
The video has led to speculation that Smith’s team may have used AI to fill out sections of the crowd in his videos. However, the situation is not clear-cut. A recent report from The Atlantic described how YouTube itself has been altering uploaded videos through “AI upscaling,” a process that boosts image resolution by automatically generating details.
Guitarist and YouTuber Rhett Shull voiced concern that the practice could make creators look deceptive: “I think it’s gonna lead people to think that I am using AI to create my videos. Or that it’s been deepfaked. Or that I’m cutting corners somehow. It will inevitably erode viewers’ trust in my content.”
Representatives for both Smith and YouTube have not responded to multiple outlets’ requests for comment.
The blurred lines around authenticity come at a time when AI-generated media continues to disrupt the music world. Fake bands, fabricated songs, and doctored images have circulated widely, including a viral photo of Mick Jagger, Elton John, and Rod Stewart supposedly performing together at Ozzy Osbourne’s memorial service — an event that never happened.
Whether Smith’s tour footage is a case of intentional editing, social platform interference, or internet misinterpretation remains unresolved, but the incident is a clear sign of how suspicious people have become when the internet is flooded with AI-generated media that is often not clearly signposted.
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