AI is making films. Will it steal human creativity soon?
"Never say never," says the founder of Wētā. Meanwhile, the world might soon be "overloaded with creativity."
Photograph: Shutterstock
AI has extended its tentacles into every corner of the realm of creativity. Hollywood was in deep fear about AI making films, the world was shocked by the videos that OpenAI’s Sora created, not to mention the growing list of AI tools that are “invading” creativity—a word that was only attached to humans.
Nevertheless, bald minds are still exploring the potential of AI in creativity, especially in filmmaking. With more than 500 film entries from 89 countries, Dubai Expo City hosted its first-ever Artificial Intelligence Film Festival (AIFF). A panel of 12 expert judges including award-winning creative technologist Ben Grossmann and Sir Richard Leslie Taylor, the founder of New Zealand special effects company Wētā Workshop selected the Best Film and Best Director and shared their thoughts on the the crossroad of AI and filmmaking.
Behind the masterpiece of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, Sir Richard and his company Wētā created all the props, costumes, prosthetics, miniatures, and weaponry for the films. The makeup, costumes, and visual effects from Wētā won four Academy Awards. As a veteran in the film industry and someone who has embraced technological advancement in creativity, Sir Richard refrained from the idea that AI could never defeat human creativity. “I guess never say never,” he remarked in an interview with WIRED Middle East. “But I would like to think that the chaotic spontaneity that exists in the human creative brings something palatable, textural, and perceptive to the human audience that AI may struggle to grasp that love of the craft truly.” Drawing back to the epic Lord of the Rings, “you can actually feel the sense of the love of the craft coming off the screen while you watch the movie,” he says. “And I think [AI is] a while away from that.”
Ben Grossmann, the Hollywood native who won an Oscar award for Hugo in 2012, and an Emmy award for The Triangle in 2006, looked at AI and creativity (in film) from a very practical and realistic perspective. “So far, AI hasn’t created anything by itself, somebody has to ask it for something,” he says to WIRED Middle East. “And I think many people who don’t understand the technology think it does for some reason. Now, ironically, when a director asks people for something, they don’t do it themselves, they ask other people to do things for them.” So what if AI takes the place of these “middlemen”?
“I think that the concern is that we will discover over time, that many of the jobs in the creative industry were commoditized and there wasn’t any unique value being added by that particular role,” Grossmann says. “We will be seeing that less people can create more. And some stories that couldn’t be told before will be able to be told and these will all be great things.” He points out that it could be a double-edged sword as many of those who had a “commoditized” role in the film industry would have to either upskill or find new jobs, but it will certainly force human creatives to change. Grossmann has taken this belief into his work, co-founding a cross-reality company, Magnopus, that merges AI and immersive experience. He also directed the largest cross-reality geospatial metaverse to date at Expo 2020 Dubai.
Sir Richard also agrees that there’s no option but to embrace technological advancements. “We’ve stayed in business by innovating new methodologies, and that’s obviously innovating new technologies,” he says. “If we just stayed as a handcraft-based company, we wouldn’t have been successful. You can’t conjure new methodology out of your mind unless you’ve got a mindset that aspires to find new methodologies. And we’re all testing right now in the form of AI.”
He also remains optimistic about the conflict between technology and human labor. As an example, Sir Richard says that Wētā purchased the first 3D printer commercially available in the world which enabled them to produce through the night and lessen labor. “All of our team originally thought that it would lessen jobs, but it’s actually done the opposite. It just took away the dross work and allowed us to focus on the heightened creative opportunity within the workforce,” he adds. “So it’s a funny balance.”
“I think one of the biggest challenges we face in the future is that, in a sense, [AI] allows one person to create so much creativity, that the world can become overloaded with creativity to which we no longer value creativity,” Grossmann warns at the end. “It remains to be seen how this relationship ends. But it’s very dangerous right now, in my opinion.”
