AI vs artists

Technology has been replacing man mainly in the most repetitive tasks throughout history, making our lives easier every day and providing us with endless benefits. But how far will it be able to replace us? This is one of the big questions, and the answer seems to be changing over time. However, the average person will tell you that in terms of ingenuity, creativity, imagination and art, no technology will surpass humans. That is to say that Artificial Intelligence would not be able to create a movie, a painting, or invent something. But how true is this?

Although there is much discussion regarding the role that AIs will take in the world of cinema, we must remember that technology is and has been a great ally of the movie industry since Hitchcock’s film Vertigo (1958) in the hands of Paramount Global (NASDAQ: PARA), being this the first film with an animation made by a computer. In contrast with more recent films like Interstellar (2014) produced by Warner Bros Discovery Inc (NASDAQ: WBD), where CGI (computer generated image) was essential and without it would have been impossible to achieve the same effects and intensity. Therefore we must think carefully about what this technology can achieve and that we may be living at the beginning of a revolution in art.

Despite the fact that there is still a long way to go and a lot of development of AIs, one wonders how entertainment companies like Warner Bros Discovery Inc (NASDAQ: WBD) or Twenty-First Century Fox Inc (NASDAQ: FOXA) will react. Will they start experimenting with AI? And will any movie production company invest in artificial intelligence?

As much as I am a huge movie fan, AI applied to cinema creates many questions and fears, like the absence of soul that some classic films have, those that you see dozens of times because they invoke many feelings of happiness, sadness or thrill, making you connect with the characters in a unique way. It seems impossible, and possibly it is, that an AI can someday create movies like Titanic (1997), Psycho (1960) or Back to the Future (1985), just to name a few iconic titles.

So, even though I imagine there will come the point when there are AI-generated movies, I have a hard time thinking that it will be possible to replace the way movies are made today and throughout history. But I also don’t want to fall into the “No AI” thinking either because we must take into account the problems it can solve; similar to how green screens reduced productions costs to make a movie or series, an AI can create images or short videos for a specific segment of a film and not necessarily be used it to create an entire film.

Technology has been implemented in movie films over the years in a way that the new generation of filmmakers no longer needs the top-of-the-line camera to get the best shot or a big budget for special effects, thanks to programs like Adobe Systems Inc (NASDAQ: ADBE) After Effects or open source software easily available online.

AI, like all technology, comes to solve problems. In the art world, it will likely be used as another tool for artists to employ, similar to CGI, which initially received a lot of hate from filmmakers but nowadays, it’s utilized by almost every studio and is the go-to standard in the industry.

It won’t be long before we see artificial intelligence everywhere, as another tool in the box to aid artists in casting their thoughts and imagination in their film work but not to create entire Hollywood movies, or at least that’s what I want to imagine. And indeed, as it was with CGI in its beginnings, we will find it visually unpleasing or weird to watch, and it will age even worse as it happens when we look back to the visual effects created in the ’80s, as is the case of TRON from 1982 which was the first movie with more than 15 min of CGI.

Eventually, we will find it hard to tell the difference between the real thing and the one created by an AI. But will these creations have any soul and will they be considered art?