Film and Video in the Age of AI: Evolution, Not Revolution
AI isn't the end of filmmaking so much as it is yet another change in the way it's done.
When OpenAI presented Sora, their new text-to-video model, the responses were pretty easy to predict. On one end of the spectrum you had the tech bros that went all in on NFTs and crypto declare, “watch out Hollywood you are about to get obliterated.” Then on the other end of the spectrum you had the creatives lamenting and crying out “watch out Hollywood you are about to get obliterated.”
If you haven’t seen the footage from OpenAI you can view it below.
Listen, it’s not unimpressive. However, it’s neither cause for great celebration or great lamenting. Like sound, color, CGI, or digital cameras it will be a tool in the hands of filmmakers. Some will use it well. Some will make junk with it. All of this happened before and all of this will happen again.
My best guess is that most of the AI generated videos will end up on social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. Speaking of YouTube, I recently read Kara Swisher’s “Burn Book” and she shared this bit about what George Lucas had to say about that platform to the faces of its creators:
“You’re ruining storytelling with your service. What you do is like throwing puppies on a freeway.”
Lucas further elaborates on this by saying, “There are two forms of entertaining. Circus is random. And voyeuristic. It’s basically what you see on YouTube now. I call it feeding Christians to the lions. The movie term is throwing puppies on a freeway. It’s very easy. You sit there and watch and see what happens. You don’t have to write anything, you don’t have to do anything, you just sort of watch it happen, and it’s interesting. Then you get to art. Art is where a person contrives the situation and tells a story, and hopefully that story reveals the truth behind the facts. Storytelling is trying to come up with an idea that is insightful in terms of giving you a different insight into how things work or is amusing.” 1
With AI those puppies, as George Lucas would call them, are going to be flying all over social media.
We’ve been here before. Back when Facebook, or Meta as it is now called, decided to “pivot to video” I was foolishly optimistic as a video producer. I thought there would be more opportunities for my fellow video producers. What I naively did not see coming was a whole bunch of websites popping up to help organizations make videos on the fly and on the cheap. The videos were a great example of “you get what you pay for” as many of them were basically stale B-roll over a robotic voice over. Missing from the tidal wave of digital video that swamped the shores of Facebook was a human touch. There was no craftsmanship behind the video. They were easy to scroll right by and ignore.
Of course, I don’t expect any lessons to be learned here. AI Video is going to flood YouTube and other social media platforms because people are going to use it to make the most boring, dumb, and nefarious things you can imagine2. If you go back and look at that AI generated footage it’s impressive, no need to pretend otherwise, but it’s empty.
Beyond social media I also expect AI to be behind a bunch of cheaply made films that will be appearing on Netflix and other streamers before being dismissed and forgotten. I’m also very bullish on audiences quickly souring on those films like they will with social media videos. Back in 2019 when The Mandalorian debuted on Disney+ much was made about “The Volume” being used to help produce that show. At first it was really impressive. Then, like green screen, it felt like it was being overused. This week Lucasfilm released the trailer for the new Star Wars show The Acolyte and they made no small effort to assure audiences that the show was filmed on location rather than the digital landscape provided by “The Volume.” Why? Because audiences get tired of technology when it is used to cut corners. Everything just starts to look…blah.
Also, when Tyler Perry announced that he was cancelling construction on new soon stages because of OpenAI’s Sora AI model, I’m guessing that had more to do with rising interest rates and construction costs than the possibilities of this new technology.
Regardless of the technology the nuts and bolts of storytelling have remained the same. You need a good story with good characters and something you are trying to say with both of them. Even if/when you can generate a whole 120 minute movie from an AI model you will still need to do the work of writing a compelling story and interesting characters. The dozens of unfinished screenplays I have on my hard drive will attest to the fact that it is easier said than done.
Now this doesn’t mean that AI won’t be used in filmmaking. I think it will mostly be used in the post-production process specifically in special effects, ADR (additional dialogue replacement), editing, and others such tasks.
It will disrupt the business a bit in the same way that the addition of sound, color, and digital filmmaking initially disrupted the business. Some jobs will be lost, but new ones will come from this new technology. It has happened before and it will happen again.
Sooner or later, my prediction is that studios will be building their own AI models based on the IP they own. That is, if they aren’t already doing it.
Right now AI is a copyright nightmare, or if you are a copyright lawyer, a potential gold mine. If, say Disney, could train a model based on the movies they have produced then they could build a whole suite of tools for the creatives they employ. A Disney-owned and operated AI model for scriptwriting could be a beneficial tool to help a writer as they develop a story.
Again, notice that I’m talking about using AI as a tool and not a replacement. That’s not because I don’t think studios will use AI to replace humans, I just think it will be a disaster when they do and they will sooner or later realize that AI is best when used by human hands.
Case in point - Adobe has been adding a bunch of “AI features” to Premiere Pro and I use them every day. These features are nearly invisible to the viewer but they have significantly shortened my workflow.
For instance, I use text-based editing for the first pass of any video I do. In Premiere Pro, when I put a clip in a sequence Premiere will immediately begin transcribing the clip. I can then see where the subject stumbled over their words and instantly remove those portions of the video.
I also have been experimenting with “enhance sound” to clean up audio tracks.
I want to note, neither one of these tools are a magic wand. With both of them I need to actually use my post-production knowledge to fine tune. All they are doing is shaving off minutes that it takes for me to finish a video. Those minutes certainly add up. Which as a video producer just means that I’m a little less stressed as I work to meet deadlines.
My advice to my fellow filmmakers and video producers is don’t be afraid of these technology advancements, but don’t be too quick to embrace them. Instead, take the time to understand what’s coming and figure out how to use it in your process. In over a century of filmmaking there have been many technological advancements. There are many examples of people rushing to use new technology as a substitute for tried and true methods of the craft. New tools aren’t meant to be a substitute so much as they are meant to be an improvement. A screwdriver and an electric screwdriver do the same thing, it’s just one is faster.
What I Watched:
I’m going back to the Godzilla Minus One well for a minute because it’s just such a great film. After talking about technology and the need to have a human hand using it to craft a film I want to provide an example of what that looks like in practice. Watch this behind the scenes video of the now Oscar-winning special effects of this film.
Also, check out the new trailer for The Fall Guy. No amount of AI or CGI can ever replicate good old-fashioned chemistry between two very attractive and charismatic actors. To say nothing of the fact that stunt work is far more stunning than CGI any given day of the week.
Excerpt From Burn Book by Kara Swisher https://books.apple.com/us/book/burn-book/id6458744231
I’m not going to get into the multiple nefarious ways AI generated videos will be flooding these sites and likely causing real life damage. Mark Zuckerberg better be practicing his “I’m sorry for the damage this caused” face before the next time he has to go in front of Congress