In The Arena by TechArena - Human Creativity, AI and the Future of Film with Artefacto’s Anna Giralt Gris

Episode Date: March 12, 2024

TechArena host Allyson Klein chats with Artefacto’s Anna Giralt Gris about her views on the future of film and the impact that AI will make in re-shaping one of humanity’s most creative mediums.

Welcome to the Tech Arena, featuring authentic discussions between tech's leading innovators and our host, Alison Klein. Now, let's step into the arena. Welcome to the Tech Arena. My name is Alison Klein. Today we are coming to you from Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and I am so excited to be joined by Ana Giral-Gri, CEO of Artifacto. Welcome to the program, Ana. Thanks a lot for having me here. So Ana, why don't you just go ahead and introduce yourself and Artifacto. Okay, sure. So I'm a filmmaker and a researcher in between filmmaking and technology. I'm super interested in both fields and that's what Artifacto is all about. Artifacto, it's me and Jorge Caballero, my partner.

And we started the company around 15 years ago. We've been shaping it with technology. We started with interactive documentary like in 2011. And we were a little bit going along with the technology, with VR, AR. And in a natural way, seven years ago, we started researching the impact of AI in the cinema. So, and now we are here, really in the eye of the hurricane. I don't know if you say this.

Yeah, we do. With the AI and filmmaking, yeah. So I was so excited to talk to you. You understand everything about filmmaking, from script development to talk to you. You understand everything about filmmaking, from script development to post-production. You've looked at that entire incredibly complex work and looked at how AI would apply to that. How did you get involved in AI?

What inspired you? Well, so in a way it was natural because we were researching how technology you know was shaping narratives in any way so it was like the next step when we were doing interactivity in film it was like okay interactivity it's like all is done and ai it was it was a technology that was used for visual artists in all this generative world that was existing before LGBT, you know. So we started researching, like, okay, how we can implement this technology in our interactive projects back then.

So we started researching in cinema, and there was some things but not a lot because back then you needed to understand and know about technology and you know have equipment not like now. So we started you know from this you know scratch and we started digging and understanding that this was going to be huge and it was going to impact a lot. So we started using some models from, you know, and our own productions and trying to understand not only from the practical and creative level, but also more at artistic, sociological level,

what was going to happen. Now, filmmaking is art and it's creation. And generative AI is reflective of what has come before and it's science. When you look at the entire process of the creation of film, what are the areas that stand out for you at this point that are natural applications for AI? In the process of filmmaking you mean? Yes.

Okay, so now what it do, it's more, it has been more natural till now, it was more this analytical side of the AI, you know know since this predictive like netflix you know understanding what this was one uh based on what they watched or another companies that they were trying to understand if your script similar to yours was successful. So this pattern recognition that mostly AI is a statistical machine of pattern recognition, it's been the AI that has been implemented first in the industry a long way before all this momentum that we have now now we are talking more about generative AI how we can generate new content from that

and we are seeing that it's going really fast and the quality on video for example like last week it was no SORA presenting it was like astonishing even though we have been these models of text-to-video or video-to-video from Runway or Pika Labs or other companies. They were amazing. But, yeah, the fast piece of the quality is kind of mind-blowing. So, of course, it's going to be, you know, the next thing. It's going to keep growing. Yeah, and audio is coming here also. it's kind of mind-blowing so of course it's gonna be you know that the next thing it's gonna keep

growing yeah and audio is coming here also so the intersection between generative video content generative audio content so it's gonna explode this year for sure now you're gonna laugh at me but i need to ask this question salma Hayek starred in Black Mirror recently about artificial twins and the licensing of humans in film. If you are listening and you didn't catch this episode, definitely catch it. But it opened up a lot of questions on what is the right balance between human creation and AI assistance.

What's your view on that? Where is the line? Yeah, it's a really interesting question. And I guess the line, we as creators, we put the line. So, for example, I see a different perspective on that, depending on if you're a big player or you're not a big player for example you know like a big industry players or you are independent filmmaker you're gonna see different you are gonna use different for example us at the facto we are trying to use it not only to speed up processes

or to you know to gain more like you know revenue of course revenue. Of course we want that. But our main aim, it's like, wow, we have a technology that helps us, you know, to understand things different, to research material in other ways, to be maybe more creative, you know, also with the concerns that goes along with the technology. But we are not only looking for profit. Right. So I think this is, you this is the main difference between how more capitalist-motivated industry can look at this technology, which can, of course, do a lot of things that now take more time,

more and more people to do do or advertisement for example i think it's one industry that it's gonna impact faster than cinema because you know they work with shorter right things with a with um image also text you know so and we're seeing, like, a lot of, for example, you, Barcelona, like, it's like some months ago, I've seen the advertisement of a big bang. I'm not going to say the brand. It's Nick Journey or Dali, you know, the image. So I think it's mostly dependent on who is using the technology, not the technology in itself now.

Now, just to reflect on how fast this area of the industry is moving, from the time that we talked about doing this interview to now, the folks at OpenAI announced their new video creation, which is mind-blowing. Where do you think we're going to be at the end of the year in terms of what we're seeing in video? And how does that open up the door to new creativity? Yeah. So it's difficult to predict because it's really going faster than,

I think, even the people in the industry believe. So I'm sure that by the end of the year we are gonna see as I said before all these models connected in a really high quality standards. You know probably we're gonna see more larger videos, more larger content with more quality that it was it will be every time more difficult to distinguish from reality as we say so yeah I think this is gonna happen and also I think filmmakers are gonna adopt this technology because now it's not that it's massively adult password makers. It's some people that are starting using that. But since this huge quality standard that they are going to arrive,

I'm sure we're going to see a lot more generated content. That's for sure. Now, Artefacto runs many programs related to AI, including OpenDocs. Can you talk about those? Yeah, so OpenDocs is a great initiative that we started alongside with Runway, one of the leading startups in generative AI. And we started this program because we felt

that we as filmmakers and documentary filmmakers wanted to understand how filmmakers, and mostly from the documentary field and non-fiction and creative documentary which is like you know it has a tradition of hybridation with other genres we are not talking only about journalistic documentaries it's not more kind of films that work with reality but in a creative way. How it was supernatural to understand how these filmmakers that aren't even far away from this technology could, you know,

start thinking, helping us to think and shape what will be the use cases of this kind of filmmaking. So that's why we decided to start this initiative. And now we are going to announce the winners of the first round shortly. Oh, nice. So we are super excited

that we are going to start producing the first films. And also along with that, we want to host some presentations and we are writing some user case to understand how these filmmakers are using and these creative users that, you know, opens all this new technology. For example, you know, you can recreate things that didn't happen that still now, for example, creative documentaries use fiction or animation.

Right. You know, so it's, or when you want to portray your feelings or some things that you cannot see in a easy way, you know. So it's really interesting to see how people are thinking or the users. I can't wait to see what the awards come out with. And what time frame are you thinking about announcing that? So I guess in about a week we're going to announce it. I'm going to definitely cover that.

What is your end vision for the future of cinema? How do you think it will define the art form holistically in the future? Will there be filmmakers? Or will films be born from a chat-tbt interface? Well, I guess both will combine. And also because I think it's not only depending on what the industry wants or is choosing, also what the audience wants as well.

And also what we as creators want, you know? Like, I mean, it's difficult to artists that they disappear right like people wants to create they it will continue existing and will combine i think one of the things like now for example we can see books that are written by chad gpt and of course there is still uh out there it's not going to disappear I hope but not really and also

I think that's for sure it's going to happen and also one of the other things that will happen probably or maybe I want this to happen is if we are really in front of a new medium, a new whole medium that we need to name

and then we need to name it. You know, like when the camera was invented, you know, photography was born, then cinema was born. So it's so powerful, this technology, that I think we will see the rise of a new medium that now we don't have a name for. Right, exactly.

That would be so exciting. So I can't wait to hear more from you, Ana, and see what's happening with Artefacto. I'm sure people who are listening online are thinking the same thing. How can they connect with you? So, yeah, we have a website, artefactofscenes.com, and we are in social media, so they can contact us through any channel

and yeah we are there thinking projects and we love to collaborate with different people and from different disciplines that's one of the things that we try to do as well but then we collaborate with filmmakers also you know with a technologist engineer so we think this aggregation of different disciplines is so powerful. Thank you so much for being on the show today. It was a real pleasure. Thanks a lot for having me. It was a pleasure. Thanks for joining The Tech Arena. Subscribe and engage at our website, thetecharena.net. All content is copyright by The Tech Arena.