Category Archives: Media

#ArtsFriday | Artificial Intelligence and Its Impact on the Film Industry

Arts Friday, Cinema, Essay, Media, News, Pop Culture, , ,

Artificial intelligence (AI) is quickly becoming a game-changer in the film industry. From script writing and casting to special effects and distribution, AI is transforming the way movies are made and seen.

While there are many benefits to using AI in filmmaking, there are also potential downsides that need to be considered.

What impact will AI (artificial intelligence) have on Hollywood?

Who better to answer that question than ChatGPT, a thrilling but scary chatbot developed by OpenAI.

When VanRamblings asked ChatGPT about AI‘s potential impact on the film industry, it made the following points (note: only the single, numbered paragraphs represent the ChatGPT input):

1. Scriptwriting: AI can be used to analyze existing screenplays and create new ones, potentially leading to more efficient and cost-effective screenwriting.

In addition, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos recently told Business Insider’s tech reporter, Stephanie Palazzolo.

“Employing AI to create new scripts will help filmmakers deal with this task more efficiently. Being fed with large amounts of data in the form of movie scripts, machine learning algorithms analyze the data, learn from them, and come up with unique scripts. This makes the process much faster, saving significant time and resources for filmmakers.”

Sarandos went on to state, “Artificial Intelligence will also be used for analyzing scripts that will be made into a film. AI algorithms can study the script storyline, bring forward possible questions, uncertainties, and suggestions, thus making the process of script analysis much easier and faster.”

2. Pre-production: AI can be used to streamline the pre-production process, saving time and resources, including casting, location scouting and storyboarding.

“AI has great potential to simplify the pre-production process by helping to plan schedules, find locations that best fit the storylines and support in other preparatory processes,” says Disney chief, Bob Iger. “Implementing AI will automate the planning of shooting schedules according to the availability of actors that will save time, and increase efficiency.”

In addition, AI systems can analyze the locations described in screenplays and recommend  sites for shooting the scene, saving resources in location scouting.

Even now, AI is being used to improve the accuracy and efficiency of casting decisions. AI-powered platforms can analyze a vast amount of data, including past performance data and social media activity, to predict which actors are most likely to be successful in a given role. This can help casting directors make more informed decisions and save time and resources.

3. Special effects: AI can be used to create more realistic and immersive special effects, potentially reducing the need for practical effects and saving time and money in post-production.

AI is currently being used to enhance visual effects (VFX) in Marvel films. Machine learning algorithms have been trained to recognize and classify different objects in a scene, making it easier and faster to add VFX elements, saving time and money for VFX studios, as well as enhance the overall quality of the film.

4. Audience analysis: AI can be used to analyze audience data and preferences, helping studios make more informed decisions about which films to greenlight and how to market them.

Monica Landers, founder and CEO of StoryFit, acknowledges the peculiarity of using AI to evaluate audience connections with narratives or characters.

Says Landers, “Warner Bros. has turned to Cinelytic AI-based platform to predict the success of its movies and box office receipts. 20th Century Fox has integrated the Merlin system that uses AI and machine learning to match movies to particular genres and audiences, as well as provide complete demographics for any movie.”

5. Distribution: AI can be used to personalize movie recommendations for viewers and optimize distribution strategies, potentially leading to higher ticket sales and revenue.

University of Southern California film professor Siranush Andriasyan, in a recently published research paper, writes …

“Film studios have been using AI for effective advertising and promotion. Analyzing different factors such as audience base, actors’ popularity across the globe, film studios may plan their campaigns according to certain locations where they expect the highest interest from the audience. For example, 20th Century Fox has developed the Merlin Video neural network to predict the success of promotional videos.”

There are, however, potential downsides to the use of AI in the film industry, says retired USC Berkeley film studies professor, Eric Ironside.

One major concern, he states, is the potential for AI to replace human jobs. As algorithms become more advanced, there’s a risk they could replace human casting directors, screenwriters, and VFX artists, leading to film industry job losses.


Response to deal | SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher and Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, Chief Negotiator

“If you want to get hired, you have to be ready to consent to be replicated, so there are people who are out there saying that consent at the time of engagement is coercion because they won’t hire you unless you give them those rights,” Shaan Sharma, an alternate member of the Screen Actors Guild negotiating committee told Rolling Stone.

AI cloning set to impact the film industry, and jobs in Hollywood

“And it’s only those with considerable leverage that will have the ability to say no to the replication, but still be hired. That really concerns me because most members don’t have the leverage to say no at the time of engagement.”

Another potential downside is the loss of human creativity and personal touch. While AI algorithms can generate new stories and make accurate predictions, they may lack the unique perspective and emotional depth that comes from human creativity. This could lead to a homogenization of storytelling and a decrease in the overall quality of films.

For years, the idea that computers and data could play a role in filmmaking was considered anathema in Hollywood, where personal taste, charisma and talent were viewed as key to success.

In recent years, film industry skepticism about AI has lessened, suggests Largo.ai founder Sami Arpa, in part because streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon have thrived by using technology to guide decision making. Both use complex, jealously guarded algorithms to recommend content for their audiences, and analyze audience data to underpin their commissioning and acquisition decisions.

Make no mistake: AI is set to change the film industry in profound ways, from data analysis to virtual production.

While there are concerns about the impact of AI on the industry, it is clear that AI is here to stay, and it will continue to transform the way films are produced, distributed and consumed by moviegoers.

Those who are willing to embrace AI and learn to work with it will be at the forefront of this transformation, shaping the future of the film industry.

#ArtsFriday | The Digital Revolution in Filmmaking

Arts Friday, Cinema, Essay, Media, Netflix, Web & Tech, , , , , ,

Human history, since time immemorial, has been undeniably marked by a series of revolutions that helped shape us as modern individuals.

Our whole concept of civilization is determined by a succession of consecutive turning points.

From the early Neolithic Revolution, 12,000 years ago, through the Industrial Revolution of the 18th century and the Jet Age of the 1950s and 1960s, our species has evolved enormously.

In the current age, the Digital Revolution — also known as the Third Industrial Revolution — is the continuous evolution from the previous models of analog, mechanical and electronic technologies to the transformative digital technology with which we have all become familiar in recent years (think: streaming).

In 1993, digital technology revolutionized cinema.

The highest-grossing movie that year was Jurassic Park, whose dinosaurs ironically represented an evolutionary leap. Audiences were wowed by those hyper-realistic digital effects — all six minutes of them.

Leading up to its release, the 2009 movie Avatar promised to be a record-shattering hit.

In order to capitalize on the blockbuster to the fullest extent, movie theatres around the world got rid of their creaky old film projectors and purchased sleek digital replacements.

While projection technology had been available for a decade, it took the promise of a digital smash hit to convince theatres to adopt it at a large scale.

Before long, digital filmmaking and digital projection had become the industry standard. While it was an expensive investment for theatres, it allowed them to be more nimble in what they screened.

“It’s not a surprise that this transition took place: physical film was particularly inefficient. It’s heavy and it’s expensive,” says University of California, Berkeley marketing professor Eric Anderson. “What was more surprising was how this affected the assortments [of movies] offered to consumers.”

“With digital,” Professor Anderson continues, “it’s easier to have time for niche films, because one employee can manage all the screens in a theatre, and can effortlessly switch between one movie and another with the push of a digital button. Digital technology also gives the theatres more flexibility to stream big blockbusters even more. In a study conducted recently, it was interesting that we found these two effects together.”

The very first fully digital film, Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace, was screened in Los Angeles in 1999. But it took time for theatres to switch over, in part because the new equipment was so expensive.

A single digital projector could cost as much as $150,000 — an eye-popping sum for a theatre with eight screens to convert.

As a result, Anderson says, theatres “fought the change as much as they could until it was shown to them very clearly that the economics made sense.”

Initially, there was little urgency.

From 1999 until the early 2000s, relatively few films were released in a digital format — mostly big-budget offerings, such as Star Wars and Toy Story 2.

Converting came with a host of benefits: the film era required the creation of costly physical copies of movies. The number of times per day a theatre could screen a hit movie was limited by the number of copies they had.

Film also posed logistical challenges: each movie required several reels that were heavy and hard to manipulate, and the process of switching between movies on a projector was time-consuming.

As a result, theatres tended to show only one movie per screen each day. Digitization changed all that, making it effortless to offer more movie variety to consumers.

Still and all, the financial crisis of 2008 continued to slow the transition to digital by making it difficult for theatres to borrow the capital they needed to upgrade their equipment.

But Avatar “acted as a rallying point to get the industry to transition, which James Cameron pushed very hard for,” Anderson explains.

As the highest grossing movie of all time, Avatar was also the first 100% digitally photographed “film” to win an Academy Award for Best Cinematography.

Not since George Lucas’ Attack of the Clones had a director tried to fundamentally change the cinema-going experience and, love him or hate him, James Cameron meant to do just that.

Cameron immersed audiences in the alien world of Pandora by incorporating ground-breaking 3D along with the digital Fusion Camera System to capture his vision, ushering in the final shift towards digital cinema for the majority of movie productions.

From that point on, the conversion process picked up momentum; 90% of movie screens worldwide had gone digital by 2015.

The true effects of the digital transformation became apparent and overall movie variety increased. Smaller theatres with four or fewer screens saw the most noticeable increases,  about 11%. In larger theaters, the percentage of screens devoted to blockbusters increased during weekend hours, but decreased on the weekdays, resulting in greater variety during these less-popular times.

In other words, theatres prioritized blockbusters during peak periods and “offered slightly more variety or more niche films during off-peak periods,” Anderson observes. “It’s a more efficient use of their screen space, given the ebb and flow of consumer demand.”

As filmmaker John Boorman noted in a 2023 article in The Guardian, “Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans was the only Best Picture Oscar nominee this year shot on celluloid.”

“For more than 100 years, films have been made of film,” Boorman observes. “Now, instead of a magazine being loaded on to the camera, a card is inserted that electronically records whatever the camera sees.”

“Today, most ‘films’ are made electronically,” says Boorman. “No film is used in the making of them — not the shooting, editing or projection. So they can’t — or shouldn’t — be called films.”

Change, as most of us know, is constant, and inevitable, if in the eyes of cinema purists, “regrettable.”

Perhaps the time has come to change the language we employ to describe what we see at the cinema, or on our screens at home.

Unless a new picture is actually made of film, it should not be called a film.

Perhaps, going forward, we should refer to it as a …

Music Sundays | Nine Chill Songs to Quieten Your COVID Week

Diversions, Media, Music, Pop Culture

A chill VanRamblings' Spotify PlaylistStarting on the top left: The Cinematic Orchestra, Brooke Fraser, Azure Ray, Love, Allison Moorer (in the middle), Andy Gibb, Bebel Gilberto, Crash Test Dummies, and Billie Eilish.

Today on Music Sunday, a chill 9-song Spotify playlist of some of my favourite laid-back songs, spanning the years from 1967 (that’d be the American group Love’s Alone Again Or, written by band member Bryan MacLean) right up until present day, with Billie Eilish’s, I Love You.
The various artists span the globe, from New Zealand singer-songwriter Brooke Fraser — with whom I became acquainted one autumn day in 1997 when walking into a neighbourhood consignment clothing store — where, of course, I purchased a great new sweater, the young woman behind the counter a recent Kiwi emigré, who was more than happy to share her love of Ms. Fraser’s music with me; Brazil’s Bebel Gilberto, singing a song originally recorded by her then 24-year-old step-mother Astrud, in 1965; plus a lo-fi jazz song from Britain’s The Cinematic Orchestra, featuring Québéçois singer-songwriter Patrick Watson on vocals; a song by Australia’s Andy Gibb; and music from Alison Moorer, raised in the southern U.S., which is where Azure Ray’s Orenda Fink and Maria Taylor hail from; and, from Canada, the Winnipeg-based Crash Test Dummies, Brad Roberts on vocals; and last but not least, the incomparable chanteuse, Billie Eilish.

Podcast Friday | Pandemic History | COVID | U.S. Politics | Oscars

Media, Politics

Podcasts Raymond Tomlin listens to

Today on VanRamblings four easy to access, and readily available podcasts I listen to regularly and religiously, two weekly and two daily, must-not-miss podcasts that offer a thought-provoking reflection on the times in which we live, produced and hosted by welcoming and informed voices.
Something to listen to while driving in your car, or while you’re on the bus, doing a wash or ironing, tidying up, or when you’re out for a walk or run.
Easy to listen to, even if the subject matter is sometimes emotionally challenging — the content of the 4 podcasts below are always intellectually challenging, tho, which serves to keep your mind active, and you engaged.
CBC Ideas | ‘Civilization is a very thin veneer’: What the plague of Athens can teach us about dealing with COVID-19

athens-plague-ideas.jpgThe painting by artist Michael Sweerts, circa 1652, represents the plague of Athens. The plague struck Athens in 430 BC, killing by some estimates up to half its population. Thucydides was on hand to document the grim events and aftermath.

Back in 430 BC, a plague gripped Athens, killing by some estimates up to half the Greek city’s population. The chronicler Thucydides meticulously recorded the physical symptoms of the gruesome disease in a few pages of his tome about the Peloponnesian War fought in ancient Greece between Athens and Sparta. His vivid account holds enduring lessons for those of us living through the coronavirus pandemic today. More, in the podcast below.

NY Times’ The Daily | When the Pandemic Came to Rural Wisconsin

Rural Wisconsin in the winter

As the coronavirus spread unchecked throughout the mid-western state of Wisconsin, and most particularly in the rural areas of the state, Patty Schachtner, a nurse and until recently an elected state official, tried her best to remain several steps ahead of the spread of COVID-19, preparing for the worst — an approach which was met with resistance from many of those who live in the conservative community where her family resides.
Now the worst-case scenario has arrived — cases and deaths are on the rise across the state, and most particularly in the state’s rural areas. Over the course of the pandemic, Patty spoke with The New York Times, who charted her journey over the months since March, and what happened when the pandemic reached her family.

Political Gabfest | Making Sense of What’s Going on in the U.S.
Slate’s Political Gabfest, where sharp political analysis meets informal and irreverent discussion. Co-hosted by David Plotz, CEO of City Cast, Emily Bazelon, a staff writer at the New York Times Magazine, and author of Charged and Sticks and Stones, and John Dickerson, a 60 Minutes correspondent, host of the Whistlestop podcast, and author of On Her Trail. Plus, there’s a special treat at the end of this week’s podcast, a must-hear interview with journalist & author, the incomparable Ta-Nehisi Paul Coates.

IndieWire’s Screen Talk | The State of the Pandemic Oscar Race

screen-talk.jpg

To end on a lighter note …
For months, it has been clear that Oscar season would take an unusual shape. While most of the big contenders are qualifying before the end of the year, the season will continue through the first two months of 2021 — which means there’s a ways to go before films or performances solidify as true frontrunners. In the meantime, the international and documentary contenders are starting to take shape, and in some cases, overlap.
In Episode 310 of IndieWire’s Screen Talk, chief film critic Eric Kohn and film writing’s eminence gris, Anne Thompson weigh in on Oscar season.