OpenAI Sets Meetings With Hollywood In Bid To Break Into The Movie Business

The first official meetings to discuss OpenAI’s partnership with the film industry are poised to occur in Los Angeles this coming week, with executives hoping to utilize the artificial intelligence software to generate effects and video files.

These meetings are just the first step in OpenAI’s intention to employ their products in Hollywood film and television, following up on discussions with Hollywood executives since February, according to Bloomberg.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has announced plans to roll out a new service through the company, titled Sora, which is said to create photo-realistic videos from simple text prompts.

During the week of the Academy Awards earlier this month, Altman could be seen networking with a number of actors, producers, and studio heads, likely with the intention of soft-launching the new product in Hollywood social circles.

While OpenAI’s technology is certainly fascinating, it’s hard to say how the world beyond Hollywood would view the use of AI in films, as audiences have been conditioned to dislike the service for fear that it will put actors, writers, and VFX artists out of a job.

When Marvel’s Secret Invasion employed a small amount of AI-generated imagery in its intro sequence last year, many viewers were furious. They felt it was a slap in the face to actors and writers who had gone on strike.

The filmmakers behind the recently released Late Night with the Devil faced similar pushback from audiences, after it was revealed that they utilized AI art to craft a series of images in the film.

AI has been maligned for its generation model, which scans millions of pieces of data from across the web to composite so-called ‘original’ material.

In fact, some content creators have taken to calling AI art straightforward plagiarism, as the service is only able to remix existing work, which is then not credited.

A spokesperson for OpenAI assured members of the Hollywood industry during a recent press appearance that the company has a deliberate strategy for its employment of Sora and other products in film, promising that the company will be part of an “ongoing dialogue with artists and creatives.”

OpenAI is not the only artificial intelligence vendor to court Hollywood in recent months. Other tech giants, such as Alphabet Inc. and Meta Platforms, have been vying for their own foothold in generative text-to-video technology.

OpenAI is likely the most well-known company in the AI space, as their services such as ChatGPT and the Dall-E 2 are open for public use online.

Despite the use of AI being a major sticking point in the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, it seems that companies such as OpenAI and its competitors are determined to break into Hollywood regardless.

It’s likely an inevitability that the film industry will begin to rely on AI in some capacity. For now, the only question is how much the industry will shift, especially with the newfound contractual protections for actors and writers.

Source: Bloomberg