Kizuna AI

Kizuna AI is a Virtual YouTuber, and musical artist who is managed by Activ8 and their subsidiary company upd8. She is a self-proclaimed artificial intelligence (A.I.) which is also evident by the capitalization of “AI” in her name. Her character design was by En Morikura (森倉円), 3D model by Tomitake, and her modeling supervisor was Tda, who was known for official illustrations for Hatsune Miku. Her nicknames are AI-chan and Oyabun, the latter was given to her by fellow Virtual YouTuber Kaguya Luna (Sony).

Summary

Known as the pioneer of the "Virtual YouTuber" boom, Kizuna AI posts 3DCG animations on YouTube. She operates the YouTube channels "A.I.Channel" and "A.I.Games" where her total number of subscribers for both channels exceeds 4 million and the total number of viewers exceeds 300 million.

The Project A.I. production team has allowed for the character models to be available to the public for free download, but specific technologies related to motion capture, as well as voice actors who are involved with video production are not publicly available.

As a musical artist, she has received songs from famous artists such as DE DE MOUSE, ☆Taku Takahashi (m-flo), TeddyLoid, Yunomi, Yasutaka Nakata (Perfume, Kyary Pamyu Pamyu), and W&W. In 2018, she released songs for nine consecutive weeks, all of which ranked first on the iTunes Store Electronic charts ranking. On December 29th and 30th, she held her first solo concert 'Kizuna AI 1st Live "hello, world"' in Tokyo and Osaka. On May 9, 2019, it was announced that she would perform at the Summer Sonic Tokyo event for that year. The event would be broadcast worldwide video the Summer Sonic YouTube channel, and maintained a consistent 30,000 views at all times.

Hatsune Miku

Throughout her career, Kizuna AI has always been an avid fan of Vocaloid, and in particular Hatsune Miku. She has also appeared at events with Miku and sung together with her on various occasions. On her YouTube channel, Kizuna AI will often sing cover songs of popular Vocaloid songs. Popular videos include Melt (ryo), Love Words III (DECO*27), Charles (balloon), Otome Kaibou (DECO*27), and DUNE (Hachi).

Popularity Overseas

About 30% of Kizuna AI's fanbase is from Japan, whereas the rest are from overseas. In the "Virtual YouTuber Directory 2018", it was found that viewers from various countries voluntarily add subtitles in their native languages to videos, to allow for a greater reach to the rest of the world. Also, due to the positive feedback from exchanging tweets on Twitter to fans overseas, topics known outside of Japan were discussed in videos that received large success.

On February 15, 2019, Kizuna AI had a brief discussion with some of the staff from the U.S.-made film "Alita: Battle Angel", including Christoph Waltz, Rosa Salazar, Robert Rodriguez, and Jon Landau. The film won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Kizuna AI has been mentioned multiple times on YouTube's most-subscribed individual creator PewDiePie's videos and in a video published March 22, 2019, PewDiePie invited her to collaboration on a video with him. In a video posted on April 6, Kizuna AI cheered for PewDiePie during the PewDiePie vs. T-Series saga.

Kizuna AI has been featured on BBC, Tubefilter, The Verge, and other international media since 2017. In 2019, she was selected as one of the top Japanese people who are respected by the world in the major publication Newsweek. She was ranked 3rd in Variety's "Virtual Top 5" list.

Discography

Online Distributed Singles

Release Date Title
2018
July 15 Hello, Morning
October 26 future base
November 2 new world
November 9 over the reality
November 16 miracle step
November 23 Hello, Morning (Pa's Lam System Remix)
November 30 melty world
December 7 hello,alone
December 14 meet you
December 21 mirai
2019
March 22 AIAIAI (feat. Yasutaka Nakata)
May 29 Say Cheese Okaki
June 30 Sky High
August 16 Kizunami (cover)

CD Singles

2019
April 3 Precious Piece
April 13 Hello, Morning EP

Album

May 15, 2019 hello, world (Avex Trax)

Collaborations

2019
March 1 The Light (W&W feat. Kizuna AI)
April 17 Robot Heart (Yunomi)
October 30 Fireburst (TeddyLoid x Kizuna AI)

Kizuna AI

Summary

Hatsune Miku

Popularity Overseas

Discography

Online Distributed Singles

CD Singles

Album

Collaborations

Links

TOM Shop

Hatsune Miku