by Matthew Musolino

As artificial intelligence tools become increasingly present within the creative process of filmmaking, it changes the approach on how workers go about their craft. From writing to post production, professionals are approaching the emerging technology with both optimism and concern for the future of their profession.

Independent filmmaker Brian Ackley, known for 2050, a film that centers around a man who seeks the attention of an AI companion. He has also worked on the film Alienated and teaches screenwriting workshops for high school students through nonprofit organization, WOO films.

Ackley on the set on his film Alienated.

Ackley uses ChatGPT for lesson planning and experimented with it to write a script. The project ended up being quite underwhelming, with Ackley calling it an “aloof assistant.” Ackley is still unsure if he and his partners have come with a solid draft.

“AI can deliver endless story ideas and suggest nonstop story fix-its if you're looking for a place to start or have a problem to solve. It comes with a world of suggestions. It can also put sentences together in clever and dramatic ways,” Ackley said. “It can do the work of screenwriting.”

“The lazy writer can follow AI's suggestions all the way to the end, but this will probably not be a rewarding experience, and it certainly won't yield any meaningful outcomes,” Ackley said.

Ackley suggests young writers should avoid AI because it could stunt your creative and intellectual growth. It could become too tempting to rely on its suggestions so that the writer never learns for themselves.

“Falling into cliches, losing your creativity, and creating something generic that won't hold any meaning, neither for yourself nor anyone reading/watching,” Ackley said.

Screenwriter Ben Snyder encourages inexperienced writers to use AI as a tool for researching purposes and suggests that they should not fear that AI will take the place of the writer. “One of the settlements from the writers' Guild strike was that writers can use AI as a tool when and how they see fit,” Snyder said.

Synder talking to actress Liza Colon-Zayas on set of Allswell in New York via Synder’s Instagram.

According to the Writers Guild of America West, “Neither traditional AI (technologies including those used in CGI and VFX) nor generative AI (GAI, meaning artificial intelligence that produces content including written material) is a writer, so no written material produced by traditional AI or GAI can be considered literary material.” Additionally, the document mentions how a writer can choose to use AI if the production company consents to its use.

Academy award winning makeup artist Paul Molnar worries that a solid portion of his job will be affected by AI use, specifically with doing touch ups on background actors.

“It is a big deal because that was one of the jobs that was fulfilled like a great portion of the union makeup artist,” Molnar said. “So take all those of, uh, makeup artists out that you're talking about thirty makeup artists a day replaced by AI…maybe one, one person's there.”

Via https://molnarmakeupartist.com/about-paul

Molnar spoke about a recent encounter he had working on the television show Powerbook: Ghost and how they preferred to “fix it in post.” Molnar assumes that practical effects will become relics and fade away similar to film stock use.

Colleague of Molnar, film compositor Jimmy Smith has less concern for AI infiltrating his craft. Smith, who has worked on The Walking Dead: Dead City and 911, is given tasks in post production such as: removing hair frizz, makeup correction, de-aging techniques etc. He was suggested to use the LLM called Copycat, to fix fly away hairs on an actress.

“It did get a pretty good key out of that, or as we would call it, a good mat from it. And it still needed massaging,” Smith said.  “It kind of helped, it's like something that either would have been really frustrating to do or would have required another method.”

When hired to do a job by a specific post production company, compositors adhere to the company’s standards. “Usually I'm logging into their computers and I'm using their software and stuff like that… whatever AI software I may have at home may not work in their pipeline,” Smith said.

Smith mentioned how AI programs are based on iteration and lack the control a compositor needs to be effective at their job. “Now, on smaller levels, if I wanted to generate a mat of something, it seems to be able to do that pretty well. It could do that,” Smith said. “It's an assist. It's just another tool.”