The VFX industry is still in the formative stage of a revolutionary transformation, driven by rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and its tech cousins VR, Virtual Production, AR, Immersive and others. As we begin 2025, AI promises to redefine both the creative and technical workflows within this dynamic field. To explore the potential impacts and necessary preparations, a roundtable of leading experts from diverse corners of the global VFX industry brings insights from their experiences and visions for the future, addressing the critical questions.

Q: VFX VOICE

How do you foresee AI transforming the creative and technical workflows in the visual effects industry by 2025, and what steps should professionals in the industry take today to prepare for these changes? Are we entering AI and Film 3.0, the phase where filmmakers are figuring out workflows that put together a string of specialized AI tools to serially generate an actual project? Still, lots of fear (era 1.0) and cautious experimentation (era 2.0), but most forward-looking are figuring out actual production processes.

A: Christopher Nichols, Director, Special Projects at Chaos Innovation Lab

Machine learning has been transforming the industry for years, so it’s nothing new to VFX artists. Especially when it comes to digital humans, rotoscoping, fluid sims and analyzing data/camera tracking information. AI will continue to take on a bigger piece of the workflow and replace a lot of traditional VFX techniques in time. The industry will just continue to adapt.

Creating high-level content is going to become much more accessible, though. Soon, independent filmmakers will create shots that would have been the sole domain of high-end VFX houses. This will free the latter to experiment with more ambitious work. Currently, Chaos is trying to help artists get to LED screens faster via Project Arena and NVIDIA AI technology; you’ll likely see AI solutions become commonplace in the years ahead. You’ll also probably see fewer artists per project and more projects in general, too, as AI makes things more affordable. So instead of 10 movies a year with 1,000 VFX artists on each movie, it’ll be more like 1,000 films with 100 names per project.

The elephant in the room is generative AI. However, the big movie studios are reluctant to use it due to copyright issues. Right now, the matter of where the data is coming from is being worked out through the court system, and those decisions will influence what happens next. That said, I don’t think an artist will be replaced by a prompt engineer anytime soon. The best work you see coming out of the generative AI world is being done by artists who add it to their toolsets. You still must know what to feed these tools and artists know that better than anyone.

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