In a survey of nearly 100 studios focused on using artificial intelligence to get stories to screens, consulting firm FBRC.ai found they are increasingly focused more on the quality of stories than on gee-whiz tech.
Rachel Joy Victor, who wrote the report, emphasized how significantly the marketplace has changed over the past two years. In 2023, the evolutionary leap of ChatGPT and other new technology alarmed the entertainment industry to such an extent that the WGA and SAG-AFTRA each made AI a key area of negotiations with studios and streamers. While both unions went out on strike, crippling the business, they each wound up extracting some concessions on AI.
While many stakeholders remain unsettled by the arrival of AI, there are increasing efforts by a number of players to convey the idea that great stories and characters, the bedrock of film and television for decades, remain core goals even as technology evolves.
“This re-centering around narrative within the AI space is a welcome relief from the hype and overstatements that drove some of the conversations in the last two years,” Victor wrote. “The gleeful ‘press a button and make a whole film’ narrative that drove conversations (both positively and negatively) for much of 2023 was spearheaded by tech companies, not by the studios they hoped would implement them.”
In addition to general industry insights gathered online, Victor and her colleagues conducted what they called “in-depth” interviews with the heads of seven studios and two tooling startups working closely with them. The company roster includes Promise, Asteria, Shy Kids, Invisible Universe, Playbook, AI Hub, Pigeon Shrine, Secret Level and Mod Tech Labs.
Every major studio is experimenting with AI, and a crop of startup boutique studios have opened their doors in increasing numbers, with 64 of the 98 total AI studios tracked in the report having launched since 2022. But the novelty, Victor argues, has started to wear off as the field has grown more competitive. “For media and entertainment companies to validate financial investment in the space, AI needs to prove that it can be used in a scalable, sustainable way in productions,” she wrote.
One factor in the development of the AI sector is the range of use cases. While some studios are end-to-end AI, others provide technology that is layered on top of a more conventional process. Cost savings are also driving a lot of the new studio launches, with more than 60% of emerging outfits having just one to five employees, according to the report.
FBRC.ai, which works with studios, tech companies, startups and creators, operating a consultancy and product innovation lab, plans to publish quarterly reports after the debut one focused on studios. Future reports will cover “creators and roles,” the startup landscape, and emerging workflows.
