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Sony AI

Sony Pictures Will Use AI To Cut Film Costs, Says CEO Tony Vinciquerra (indiewire.com) 80

Posted by msmash from the up-next dept.
The next "Spider-Verse" film may have a new animation style: AI. From a report: Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) CEO Tony Vinciquerra does not mince words when it comes to AI. He likes the tech -- or at the very least, he likes the economics. "We are very focused on AI. The biggest problem with making films today is the expense," Vinciquerra said at Sony's Thursday (Friday in Japan) investor event. "We will be looking at ways to...produce both films for theaters and television in a more efficient way, using AI primarily." That's about the strongest support for AI we've heard from a film studio head.

"We had an 8-month strike over AI last year," Vinciquerra began his response to the first analyst question (from Nomura Securities) during his Q&A portion of the annual event. He also acknowledged that ongoing IATSE talks and the forthcoming Teamsters negotiations are "both over AI again." The sum total of those discussions between Hollywood's workers and its studios will inform just how far Vinciquerra and others can go. "The agreements that came out of last year's strikes and the agreements that come out of the IATSE and Teamsters [negotiations] will define roughly what we can do with AI," Vinciquerra said.
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Sony Pictures Will Use AI To Cut Film Costs, Says CEO Tony Vinciquerra More

Sony Pictures Will Use AI To Cut Film Costs, Says CEO Tony Vinciquerra

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  • Great! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @12:51PM (#64520355)

    And they'll pass that cost savings along to the consumer in the form of cheaper ticket prices! Right, Mr. Vinciquerra?

    Right?

    ...Aren't you going to say something, Mr. Vinciquerra?

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @12:56PM (#64520371)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • I'd like to watch new movies but most simply don't interest me, especially comic book movies. Dune is supposedly good and I have watched the 80s version but this new one has zero appeal. I'll watch Furiosa of course because George Miller has yet to ever let me down. I Saw The Tv Glow is supposed to be good but I'm not sitting in a theater with everyone else playing games on their phones while the movie is on.

        Are there even any good comedies like Eurotrip, Hot Tub Time Machine, or Harold and Kumar? Those are

        • You watched the old Dune movie and didn't find it a massive disappointment? The new Dune is far from perfect, but much better than that one.

          • I think the main problems with the 1980s Dune flick were

            1) The massively cut middle section of the book. Paul meets the Fremen, rides a Shai-Hulud and then...it's "Long live the fighters!" and off they charge to the final battle!

            2) Obviously, without even primitive CGI, the effects and the world are somewhat lacking compared to what can be achieved today. Heck, it is hopelessly primitive and dated compared to what was achieved already in the 1980s, let alone in the 1990s. But that said, I found the sandworm

      • Re:Great! (Score:4, Interesting)

        by magzteel ( 5013587 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @01:06PM (#64520417)

        The biggest problem with making films today is the expense

        Have they considered going back to telling STORIES instead of doubling down on sweeping "cinematic universes" that require expensive SFX and a literal city sized production crew to produce? Seriously, watch the credits for one of these movies, there are THOUSANDS of names. Then watch the credits for one of these:

        Hidden Figures, budget: $25,000,000 | box office: $236,000,000

        Little Miss Sunshine, budget: $8,000,000 | box office: $101,000,000

        Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, budget: $14.3 million | box office $143 million, and got lots of awards too

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          You can do big action films on a smaller budget too.

          Godzilla Minus One
          Budget $10-12M, box office $116M.

          There is room for big budget movies too, they just need to be good. Everyone wants to start a cinematic universe of endless sequels and spin-offs, but the foundation has to be really solid. And they have to know when to end it too, e.g. Avengers Endgame.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by bjwest ( 14070 )

        The biggest problem with making films today is the expense

        Have they considered going back to telling STORIES instead of doubling down on sweeping "cinematic universes" that require expensive SFX and a literal city sized production crew to produce?

        The viewers of today don't want storyline, they want action shot after action shot. Take a look at the blockbusters of the past decade or so, there's literally zero story or plot to them. They jump from one action scene to the next with little to nothing in between explaining what the hell is going on.

        • Re:Great! (Score:4, Interesting)

          by cayenne8 ( 626475 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @01:24PM (#64520487) Homepage Journal

          The viewers of today don't want storyline, they want action shot after action shot. Take a look at the blockbusters of the past decade or so, there's literally zero story or plot to them. They jump from one action scene to the next with little to nothing in between explaining what the hell is going on.

          That being the case...they I'd say a whole "AI" production company could churn out the Drabble you mention.

          Have ChatGPT write it...then use Stable Diffusion or whatever is the latest for video to generate the video, sound, etc.

          Someone could form a company outside of the SAAG/Hollywood union thing....make their own studio. Since they'd not be using real actors or voice actors....they could readily bypass all the contracts and agreements that have happened lately because they are outside the system.

          Could this not be set up and the "indie" production company simply sell to regular movie companies to distribute them, or whatever?

          I'm sure there has to be a way to get around all the contracts and strikes, since said new indie place isn't using anyone in those unions, etc. Hell, set it up in a right to work state and there you go, no?

          A new place didn't sign any agreements.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by aergern ( 127031 )

            I guess humans don't matter. Maybe when the AI and robots take your job, you'll be as supportive.

            • I guess humans don't matter. Maybe when the AI and robots take your job, you'll be as supportive.

              Hey, just spitballing ideas....

              And c'mon, if I happen to stumble across a working alternative....someone that KNOWS the business and is motivated to do so will really go forward with it.

              I'm hoping I am able to cross the retirement finish line JUST in time before the AI robots take my job.....[fingers crossed].

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by bn-7bc ( 909819 )
              Look movies (unless theey are biopics) are 100% entertainment, if what's made today does not entertain cayenne8 thet person is well within tjeir rights to sugest an alternative way of creating movies that they fin entertaining. No one says a mega crew is the only way to create such a product, if ai + renderfarms can do the job as well, why not use it and see if it appeals to more people. yes it's sad for the people who might lose their jobs. But hey we produce other stuff way more efficiently yuan we did a

          • Won't that run into copyright issues since nothing created by AI is authentic, but rather just other copyrighted works mashed together?

            • Won't that run into copyright issues since nothing created by AI is authentic, but rather just other copyrighted works mashed together?

              Well, while I would agree that there is likely a good bit of "interesting" litigation to come....I'm also a bit puzzled that so far, there is relatively little enacted to date.

              I suppose one argument might be, that as humans, we rarely ourselves do anything original, in that we soak up all sorts of media and sensual input and from that we make our output.

              I mean, over the a

      • It always boggles my mind the many, many SFX artists I see in the credits. Makes me wonder how much actual 'savings' they have for having so many people involved to create a 90% CGI movie.
        • Comment removed based on user account deletion
          • yep, my point exactly, I saw both back then and frankly, twister lost me when the cow was mooing as the tornado sucked it up, they twisted it so that it looked like it should be dead already. Sure, one needs a certain level of suspension of belief but... well, for me that was a bridge too far, whilst with Star Trek, I have dreamt about living in that universe for decades, so whilst it may be a lot more far-fetched, I already had the mental experiences down and was happy to go into the movie accepting it.

        • Think about how much it costs to crash a car. Now think about how many people you could hire to do less than a month of work for that same price.

          • I have no idea how much SFX artists cost per hour. I do know that a great many of the famous SFX studios are headquartered in California around LA, hence in one of the most expensive places in the USA. Sure, at $15/hour I could probably hire a bunch of people, but at $150/hour I could hire a bunch fewer people.

            How much does crashing your car cost? $3,000? $17,000?

            I am sure you could cherry-pick a set of costs that would make your argument sound reasonable, and of course you would predicate your argumen

      • To be fair here, in the past they would only list a fraction of people who worked on films, whereas these days they include almost everyone in the office, and offices of partners. Animations are the worst in this aspect, but at least they try to make the credits interesting. And yet, the credits are not required; the HR staff won't sue if their names aren't t there. They could list just the catering company but not all the members of it.

        Went to a premeire of a Dreamworks movie shown to the studio's staff

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mjwx ( 966435 )

        The biggest problem with making films today is the expense

        Have they considered going back to telling STORIES instead of doubling down on sweeping "cinematic universes" that require expensive SFX and a literal city sized production crew to produce? Seriously, watch the credits for one of these movies, there are THOUSANDS of names. Then watch the credits for one of these:

        I'm almost certain they're going to be using ChatGPT to write the stories.

    • Yep... They want the billion-dollar blockbusters but only have to pay the workers $1,000,000. If there wasn't a union, theyd have already screwed over the workers.

      • Yep... They want the billion-dollar blockbusters but only have to pay the workers $1,000,000. If there wasn't a union, theyd have already screwed over the workers.

        See my post above...what's to stop a brand new, indie company that didn't sign any contracts and doesn't involve the SAAG and other Hollywood unions...and does everything, fully generated via AI and computers?

        No actors at all, no writers, no voice talent...no sound...etc.

        A new company, maybe in a heavy duty right to work state without strong un

        • You don't need to speculate on "What if someone invents youtube?"

        • nothing. Hop right on it. Though, I have read many paragraphs of crap that have, ostensibly, been written by different 'AI's', and I would hope they got a good one to be successful. I think that is exactly where hollywood wants to go, so that way the exec's can pay themselves millions and not have to pay anyone else. You, being the CEO, would probably elect to pay yourself $100,000,000, wouldn't that be nice, one movie and you are so set for life it is ridiculous.

          I'll see your movie.

        • You could do the same thing with all people as well. Movie making isn't exclusively the domain of Hollywood.

          Your bigger challenge would be getting platforms to show your movie.

          • I'd argue the biggest challenge is making a movie that's good / interesting enough so people would actually want to see it.

            The reason (in my opinion) we see so much crap coming out of Hollywood is... making good movies is hard and requires particular talents and skills which aren't common.

            • We're on a very small nerdy website. I don't think we really represent remotely what "normal" people want, especially not "normal" children, who are probably the number one movie going crowd.

              This is a tangent from this point on, but it reminds me of when it dawned on me that I was getting old. When the world stops advertising to you, it's because they (advertisers) realize trying to get a dollar out of someone older is much harder then trying to get that same dollar out of a kid. The kid lacks real world ex

        • The start up cost, and the quality of the AI, and anyone with studio connections being afraid of being blacklisted basically. AI isn't currently good enough today to do all of what you propose. They can use it to replace a lot of people current studios use, however. And thats what you see Sony doing here. Maybe they could go a little further if there weren't restrictions, but not 100% AI today.

    • Re:Great! (Score:4, Insightful)

      by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @01:13PM (#64520439)

      And they'll pass that cost savings along to the consumer in the form of cheaper ticket prices!

      Of course not. Capitalism doesn't work that way. Prices are set to maximize profit, not to be "fair".

      Costs are only incidental when setting prices, as they set a floor for a target price at the beginning of a project. But once a movie is released to theaters, those sunk costs are irrelevant.

      If gas prices go down and it costs you less to commute to work, do you ask your boss to cut your salary?

      • This is also why it won't get cheaper for Sony to produce films. Being able to make 'bigger' films than indies is Sony's competitive advantage. When indie films catch up to the last Bond film in special effects - which is something AI can likely accomplish - then Sony will need to figure out how to keep spending more than the indies in some other manner that makes their films recognizably 'better.' If not, they'll go the way of music publishers. Distributing music became easy and inexpensive and the ind

      • If gas prices go down and it costs you less to commute to work, do you ask your boss to cut your salary?

        Of course not because they are not equivalent. What would be equivalent is:

        If you used your personal car for work purposes and were reimbursed for gas, would you get paid less if the gas prices went down? *BLINK* *BLINK*

    • It is inevitable that actors will be replaced with computer graphics.

  • Biggest problem is expense? Puulease (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Morpeth ( 577066 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @12:55PM (#64520363)

    "The biggest problem with making films today is the expense". LMAO

    No, the biggest problem is shitty scripts, recycled and derivative storylines, focus on effects over story, and milking the crap out of 'franchises' to the point they become a complete joke. To beancounters and execs it's the expense, to most of us, it's quality.

    Our current AI tools and models and also derivative by their nature -- they only 'know' what you feed them, esp LLM, so guess what, they will only give you variations on a them that's already been done a dozen times over. Some AI tools might be helpful for editing, effects etc, but definitely not dialog or story -- it will just spit out more drivel.

    • and, for some reason, it seems like Hollywood is all over never buying licensing for any literature that has come out in the last 20 years. just selling us the same slop in a different bowl each couple of years.

      Ya want a really classic scifi story ? How about, "Stranger in a Strange Land?", or, "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress?"

      Neither of those require $100,000 for CGI work.

      Frankly there's a ton of scifi and also fantasy that could be mined for movies that would draw in a bunch of people... Larry Ni

      • sorry, I left three 0's off of the cost for CGI. My Bad

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Tablizer ( 95088 )

        Intellectual sci fi usually doesn't sell well. I realize there are exceptions, by they are still exceptions. To make money, sci fi has to have action scenes and lots of explosions.

        • but, but, but I would LOVE to see someone bring The Moon is a Harsh Mistress to the silver screen! as long as they didn't deviate more than about 10-20% from the book... I mean, it's multicultural, multiracial... pure anarchic meritocracy (yes, I know what I did there, but that's kinda how it is) all the woke crowd should flock to it therefor. The Stranger in a Strange Land challenges conventional beliefs and doesn't pull punches.

          The Kzinti Wars by Larry Niven would have tons of explosions mixed in with

    • The biggest problem with making films today is the expense

      The biggest problem with existing is the expense. Who fucking knew?!

      Man, fuck this guy.

    • For what businesses are "expenses" NOT the hardest part?

      Sony is well suited to produce the Captain Obvious movie franchise because they have the proven experience. Except for the fact he'll have 11 fingers and 2 mustaches without an obvious explanation.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by narcc ( 412956 )

        For what businesses are "expenses" NOT the hardest part?

        The Boss's Nephew Consulting, LLC.

        Sugar Baby OnlyFans

        Squatter's Rights Air BNB

    • Sadly, AI could actually be used for increasing film quality as it could be used to storyboard or even create 'cuts' to test out ideas. I doubt that's how it will be used though...

    • "The problem with making films today is the expense (of scripts, stories, actors, the effort of milking, and counting of beans)"

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      No, the biggest problem is shitty scripts, recycled and derivative storylines, focus on effects over story, and milking the crap out of 'franchises' to the point they become a complete joke. To beancounters and execs it's the expense, to most of us, it's quality.

      Well, if it's so bad, don't watch it. Because the "vote with dollars" has said that the stuff you say are problems, aren't.

      And yes, expense is a problem - because actors, writers, etc., cost money. If only they could just use ChatGPT to create a new

  • It's been 7 years (Score:3)

    by jacks smirking reven ( 909048 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @01:04PM (#64520407)

    And this video never stops being relevant

    F**k You, It's January! (2017) [youtube.com]

  • ...making vast quantities of cheap prequels, sequels, reboots and remakes. They will suck, but that seems to be what the studios want
    Original work still requires human creators, but the studios don't seem to want anything original

    • Except for John Wick. All of them are great. Don't you even think about dissing. I'ma bust you up.

    • AI can be used to fix minor problems, avoid having to reshoot a scene.

      Extra in the background of a historical drama wearing a wristwatch? Have AI remove the watch in those frames.

      Actor makes a minor verbal error. Rerecord the voice, have the AI redo the lip movement to match the words. Also adjust the tone and volume of the fix to match the rest of the scene.

  • He'd be a shitty exec if he promised they were going to use AI to increase film costs. Do we really need to post the masturbatory fantasies of the C suites as news stories? Of *COURSE* they're going to milk new tools to try to cut costs. This isn't a story. It's a prayer wrapped in tech drapery.

  • CEO is most expensive, provides single function, it should be easiest to replace by AI.

  • TRANSLATION: "Sony Pictures Will Use AI To Cut Film Quality, Says CEO Tony Vinciquerra "

  • I can be barely bothered to download a movie torrent once or twice a year now.
    • Yup. Every movie that is released has to compete with our attention with every other film already released. And there are a lot of good ones I haven't seen yet. Marvel hasn't every made a movie that I wanted to watch more than once, and hasn't made one I wanted to watch even once for free very often.

  • Two identical film: One produced the older way and one with the latest human-replacing computer tools (where they're up to the job) will have the latter be more profitable than the former.

    The studios that don't try to replace humans will fail to compete with those that do, and you can't put the entire world in the union.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by primebase ( 9535 )
      You are assuming here that us humans will actually attend both movies in equal numbers. I certainly won't, and I strongly suspect others won't as well. They can "save all the money" they want with this, all the way to bankruptcy as far as I am concerned.
    • There isn't such a thing as "two identical films" , they still need good stories and talent to make the movie, AI hasn't advanced enough to replace it yet. But really even the worst movie ever made is likely far far better than the best AI only movie made yet.

      But it would be interesting to create a single film twice, once with maximum AI, the other with zero AI and release them both at the same time. See which one generates more revenue or audiences prefer. I have no idea what the outcome would be, because

  • They never go into details how exactly "AI" will lead cheaper films.

    • Short term, synthetic actors are the only thing I can come up with. No more worrying about needing long running contracts with actor for sequels, just replace face and voice for an off the shelf standin.

      Maybe soon you can create special effects by prompted inpainting (with a shit ton of iterative masking/prompting every few frames, it will be more like animation than rendering) but the tools aren't there yet.

  • In George Orwell's 1984, the proles listen to music generated by what is basically an AI. The "versificator" produces music, books, etc. It is designed to be simple and mind-numbing, so that the proles remain distracted and do not question The Party.

  • Gonna happen (Score:4, Interesting)

    by MBGMorden ( 803437 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @02:19PM (#64520671)

    Realistically, this is going to happen regardless.

    There was a time early in the days of broadcast television when actors were strongly against recorded performances. In their mind all shows on TV should be performed live so that the actors would have to do the performance every time and hence get paid every time it was shown.

    That seems like a preposterous waste of resources today. I'd wager the same is true of AI. If we can produce the same types of content for significantly cheaper, then I wouldn't waste the money.

    Granted, there will likely be some things that AI isn't great for and somethings that it is, and eventually the consumer market will gravitate towards the ones that do make sense, but overall as a technology you can't put the genie back in the bottle.

    • Yes but there's a difference: there's no creativity in exactly re-enacting a performance (sure there can be interesting variation though). Generative AI displaces creativity rather than execution. Execution can be mindless, creativity is definitely not. Genie's not going back in but let's not pretend it's not going to screw over all creatives who actually like ... being creative, you know.
    • Yeah you can't tell me that a formulaic MCU movie can't be written with AI in five years time. You could basically go to any dumb fan site and take a prompt and turn out a script just as good as any one created by a human. There are a lot of things right now where people in the business of film , art, and music have hyper refined tastes and decide on small imperfections as indications of quality or lack there of, while the people that pay for the media can not tell the difference. The value is else where in
  • It's certainly the budget at issue, not the lack of any compelling story. Throw AI at it. Will the AI write it too? Maybe we can just have the AI watch these trash-ass movies too.

  • I have no quarrel whatsoever with generating much of the content of movies using AI. The quality of the artificial video improves by leaps and bounds, soon it will be completely realistic and at low cost. This is a bonus to movie consumers if for no other reason than that the sheer quantity of available product will massively increase. Creative people with little funding will be able write and produce quality films on low budgets. Huge sound stages and filming at expensive locales will no longer be necessar

  • One man's expense... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jenningsthecat ( 1525947 ) on Monday June 03, 2024 @05:08PM (#64521085)

    ...is another man's bread.

    "We are very focused on AI. The biggest problem with making films today is the expense," Vinciquerra said...

    So, to go the 'reductio ad absurdum' route: what happens to these companies' income streams when so many people lose their jobs to AI that nobody will be able to afford the things which AI has produced? Oh, wait, I get it now! AI will buy its own products! /sarc

    Seriously though, I don't think the companies salivating at the prospect of axing all those jobs have really thought the matter through. For people who think of themselves as visionaries, they strike me as awfully fucking short-sighted.

  • The biggest problem with making films today is the expense

    I can't imagine why. [youtu.be]

  • How is AI going to save them money? Are they only going to generate key frames and then use AI to interpolate the in-between frames (the results of which frequently have artifacts)? Ai is used now for film restoration to replace missing or damaged frames, but it still requires expert intervention in many cases to clean up afterward. AI may save them money in the same way that having computers at all saves them money, but it won't replace all that much of the workforce if they still want to stay in busi
  • I like the quaint idea that some half ass haphazard last minute complaining is going to stop this wave. Nobody is going to employ you if your job can be done in seconds for free.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by JustNiz ( 692889 )

      Look beyond the immediate. Animators are only one of a long line of previously safe creative jobs that AI will easily replace. The writing is on the wall for us all.

      I naively used to think that as a software developer, my work would always be safe and in demand. Luckily I'm old enough to be close enough to retirement to be safe no matter what, but I feel bad for those that need another 10+ years work from of the investment they've already made to have a software dev career.

      Head up people. You can mock but A

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