makers - Real insight Into Global Production #12

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REAL INSIGHT INTO GLOBAL PRODUCTION

FOCUS 2023

#12

AI AND THE CREATIVE ARTS Delay the inevitable or get with the programme?

YOUNG DIRECTORS SHOWCASE

Cannes Lions winners talk about their breakthrough success

01−12−2023−12

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NEOM MEDIA INDUSTRIES

40%++ C A SH INCENTIVE

ON ALL PRODUCTIONS

Y O U R G AT E W AY TO THE REGION

PROVEN TRACK RECORD 30+ productions including Hollywood, Bollywood and Arab films, all genres of TV and TVCs

TA L K TO U S T O D AY

WORLD-CLASS FACILITIES 4 sound stages with full production support and expansive backlots, plus 6 more stages under construction CREW DEPTH International production team able to support multiple productions of any genre, budget and scale

NEOM.COM

STUNNING LOCATIONS Sweeping deserts and dunes, mountains, pristine coastline and beaches, amazing rock formations and lush valleys

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here is an existential threat to the livelihood of anyone involved in the creative industries – and it is not artificial intelligence. From green studios to comprehensive guidance, on set sustainability has never been easier. Yet despite these efforts carbon emission figures from production are still dangerously high. So is the industry doing enough?

SUSTAINABILITY IS INCREASINGLY VIEWED AS POSITIVE FOR COMPANY ESG POLICIES BUT THERE’S A MISCONCEPTION ABOUT EXTORTIONATE COSTS INVOLVED IN GOING GREEN.

EDITOR Adrian Pennington CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Chris Evans LOCATIONS EDITOR Kianna Best CONTRIBUTORS Katrina Wood, Justin Hochberg ART DIRECTION & COVER IMAGE Les éditions du bois du Marquis HEAD OF PRODUCTION David Lewis INTERNATIONAL SALES MANAGERS Jo Tait, Rodrigo Carrasco COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR Clara Lé

Sustainability is increasingly viewed as positive for company ESG policies but there’s a misconception about ‘extortionate’ costs involved in going green as well as a frustrating battle to change the decisionmaking processes of senior execs who often allow ignorance to influence the entire supply chain. As one contributor tells makers on page 113, “We can’t recycle our way out of climate change. We're going to have to fundamentally change the way we operate.”

Sustainability needs to be incorporated at script stage and be accounted for every step of the way. Indeed, partnerships linking finance professionals with production creatives is currently flourishing. Chris Evans goes behind the scenes on page 76 to speak to those involved.

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Chloe Lai DATA & MARKETING EXECUTIVE Daniele Antonini FINANCE Desmond Kroats, Farhana Anjum MANAGING DIRECTOR Jean-Frédéric Garcia CONSULTANT Ben Greenish FOUNDER Murray Ashton IN MEMORY OF Sue Hayes PRINTERS Barley Print, UK

Filmmakers would like to believe they have empathy with their subject but the degree to which they actually do when committing stories to screen can be questioned. A pioneering new approach called Digital Melanin Cinema aims to persuade the industry to adopt a more nuanced approach to lighting diverse skin tones. We speak to its founders on page 72 and on page 33 we also look at the degree to which Martin Scorsese’s myth-busting American history Killers of the Flower Moon embeds the Osage Nation, depicted in the drama, in location, crew and story.

We can’t take a pass on AI however. As we go to press the screen actors’ strike has just been resolved, which together with the WGA's action and failure of studios to settle, put many individual livelihoods and businesses in the US and in Europe at risk. A key point remains about how AI should be used, and how actors and writers should be remunerated for its use. We cover some of these topics in a special report beginning on page 19 but the reality is that we are only at dawn of a brave new world.

Adrian Pennington, Editor PLEASE ADDRESS ALL ENQUIRIES TO THE PUBLISHERS The Location Guide, 124 City Road, London, EC1V 2NX, UK T (44 20) 7036 0020 E info@thelocationguide.com W www.thelocationguide.com 2023 © The Location Guide Limited.

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be copied or reproduced in any form whatsoever, by photocopying, electronic or mechanical means without prior written consent of the publisher. The publisher has taken all reasonable efforts to ensure that the information presented is accurate and correct, but cannot take responsibility for any omissions or errors, nor take any liability for any misuse of images or of the information.

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060

>FEATURES 033 How the West Was Won Examining how Killers of the Flower Moon worked with the Osage community to revisit the Reign of Terror

037 Cold Comforts Shooting in stunning icy & mountainous conditions can be hugely rewarding but requires the right expertise

060 What’s the Small Idea?

Sarah Cox, Aardman’s Executive Creative Director, discusses the development process

072 Sensitivity to Light Digital Melanin Cinema hopes the industry will adopt a more nuanced approach to lighting diverse skin tones

>NEWS

>CLOSE UP

008 News in Brief

016 Around the World

Production news from around the world

010 The World at a Glance Mapping global production trends

012 Tech & Facilities News From cameras to studios, the latest in production technology news

085 Healthy Creativity The market for health & wellness products and services has exploded

100 If At First You

Don’t Succeed Filmmakers can struggle for years making feature docs, while others are an instant hit

113 Leadership Stems

from Grass Roots From green studios to comprehensive guidance, on set sustainability has never been easier

129 Thinking Outside the

Box in the Gaming World With the launch of Entertainment Lions For Gaming, brands’ use of gameplay has been brought to the global stage

SQUIRMING EELS & WILD HORSES With supervising location manager Mandi Dillin

023 Report

FOCUS 2023 Meet the makers

026 Making of

THE KILLER The precision design of Fincher’s hit-man feature mirrors its subject

028 Making a Winner The YDA winners from this year’s Cannes Lions offer their insights

023

>AROUND THE WORLD From incentives, studios & virtual production to location highlights & recent productions, makers offers an insight into some of the world's filming hubs.

045 Bahamas Keys to the Cays

051 Baltics Making Modern History

069 France The French VP Connection

108 6

081 Kazakhstan Hidden Potential

093 Romania On the Rise

108 Saudi Arabia Terraforming a Culture

123 Scotland A Country on Top

139 Spain California of Europe

151 Switzerland Smooth Operator

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132 Pulling the Purse Strings As production activity grows, so does the need for accountants

144 Truth Should Not Be the

First Casualty of War Channel 4’s documentary Evacuation gave a rare insight into the emotional impact of war on army & airforce personnel

152 Running the Show Can the role of the TV show runner keep pace with a rapidly evolving industry?

155 Building it for

033

Themselves Women are breaking creative & cultural boundaries in immersive tech

046 Interview with

OLEH TETERIATNYK The 32 year old Ukrainian director has had his fair share of challenges

065 Profile

LIVERPOOL FILM OFFICE The 35-year old Film Office has helped the city become a film & TV powerhouse

076 Making of

ADLAM DISPLAY Two Brothers, Microsoft & McCann team up to save a language from extinction

079 Comment

MAKING MONEY OUT OF THE METAVERSE IS REAL Justin Hochberg of the Virtual Brand Group says it’s already bringing in billions in profits

089 Profile

MILK Super boutique Milk aims to become a fully-fledged production partner for VFX shows

098 Interview with

JOHN LEWIS Lewis’ varied career spans the mixed martial arts & entertainment industries

105 Report

MAKERS & SHAKERS AWARDS 2023

AI can’t be wished away. It needs to be tackled now the writers have won the first skirmish

056 Programming

a Programme The debate around AI’s presence in the writers’ room is moving as fast as the technology itself

135 Comment

TURKISH DELIGHT AT DIZI SUCCESS Katrina Wood, CEO, MediaXchange, discusses the genre’s international success

146 Making of

ONE PIECE Adapting the world’s biggest selling manga into a live action serial

149 Profile

090 AI Ads at What Cost?

019

REINVENT STUDIOS In just five years it has become the top partner for Nordic producers

INTELLIGENCE

019 An Engine for Creativity

IBC 2023

117 Profile

>ARTIFICIAL

Many questions need to be answered about the impact of AI on the creative industries.

119 Report

How can anything machine-generated, devoid of actual lived experience, captivate an audience with a brand message?

SERVICEPLAN GROUP Europe's largest independent agency network continues to grow

126 Interview with

PINAR SEYHAN DEMIRDAG It’s been said that Pinar knows more about the creative potential of AI than else anyone on the planet

160 Double Trouble The use of AI to double, de-age or even replace actors is a huge talking point, especially with the strikes

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NEWS in brief PRODUCTION NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD

ACTORS SEEK GREEN RIDER Ben Whishaw, Mark Rylance, Bella Ramsey, and David Harewood are among a group of 100 actors supporting a new Green Rider contract intended to improve the sustainability of the UK film and television industry.

The inclusion of a Green Rider is positioned as a “tool to empower artists” and provide a framework with which to negotiate better practices in film and television. The rider would be included in standard Equity contracts.

It’s being spearheaded by Equity for a Green New Deal – a network of union members fighting for climate justice in the performing arts and

SPUD GUN GETS ANIMATED The Connected Set, the prodco behind the gaming YouTube animation channel Mashed, has launched shortform animation studio, Spud Gun Studios.

The Connected Set has produced over 750 original animations and generated over 2 billion views for clients including Channel 4, BBC, Beano Studios and multiple games publishers. Spud Gun Studios has been launched to “capitalise on the growth and popularity of shortform animation for brands, broadcasters and social platforms.”

Channel 4 continues its investment in Mashed until the end of 2024. Branded and third party publisher deals are also in the works.

The label is overseen by Executive Producer Tom Jenkins, who launched Mashed on YouTube over a decade ago. Fellow exec Tom Payne said, “We have a truly unique understanding of what young audiences across the world want from shortform content, so taking all that knowledge and expertise to a wider market is such an exciting opportunity.

We’ve already got a great track record of delivering amazing results for brands, such as a video we did for Warframe.”

“This is the most significant expansion so far as Netflix ramps up investment in the South African film and television industry,” the company said.

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Specific clauses can include the artist avoiding “high impact choices” such as private air travel or fossil-fuel powered road vehicles, or the “carbon cost of additional food or comfort requests” that require runners to go off site.

Rylance called the Green Rider “a template to help all film and television artists to ask for more ecological practices. Just because we can’t do everything, doesn’t mean we can’t do anything. Let’s clean up our workplace.”

FRUITFUL ORCHARD TALENT Dan Grabiner, former Amazon Studios’ Head of UK and Northern Europe has set up prodco Orchard Studios with Nicola Hill, formerly co-CEO of The Garden and with capital secured from private investment.

ALL OF US HERE Barney Richard and Isabella Parish founded mixed media, live action and animation production company All of Us Here. The founders have experience building company brands such as Friend, Riff Raff, Partizan and 1st Avenue machine.

PLAY­DOH THE MOVIE

NETFLIX OUT OF AFRICA A new raft of South African originals from Netflix include Miseducation, a new young adult series from Burnt Onion Productions; Yoh’ Christmas produced by BBZEE Productions and season 4 of Blood & Water from writer and director Nosipho Dumisa and Gambit Films which will debut early in 2024.

Other television shows include season 2 of mystery drama Savage Beauty produced by Quizzical Pictures, due in 2024. New feature films include spy-thriller Heart of the Hunter directed by the renowned Mandla Dube (interviewed this issue) and Soweto Love Story set in the heart of Johannesburg’s famous township, coming at the start of 2024.

entertainment industry and beyond. Equity hopes to pilot the scheme with the BBC, ITV Studios and Sky Studios in upcoming productions.

Hasbro, the toy brand behind Play-Doh, launched a new division to unify the company’s film, television, animation, and digital media businesses.

Hasbro Entertainment is currently developing and producing over two dozen projects based on major IP like Dungeons & Dragons, Transformers, GI JOE, NERF, Play-Doh, Peppa Pig and My Little Pony.

Miseducation © Netflix.

WILDSCREEN SHORTS Wildscreen’s first short film fund, launched in partnership with On the Edge, aims to “catalyse new and creative projects by emerging filmmakers to bring new perspectives to the natural history filmmaking genre.”

The fund provides grants up to GBP15,000 to six emerging filmmakers, to produce “out-of-the-box shorts that resonate with GenZ and spotlight Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered (EDGE) species and zones.” The winners will be showcased at Wildscreen Festival 2024.

“Entertainment is core to Hasbro’s strategy and its mission to entertain and connect generations of fans through the wonder of storytelling and exhilaration of play,” said Tim Kilpin, president of toy licensing and entertainment for Hasbro. “Audiences can count on Hasbro to keep creating compelling and fun entertainment that brings to life our wide array of iconic brands, reaching audiences through varied platforms.”

Olivier Dumont is president of Hasbro Entertainment. Zev Foreman and Gabriel Marano are the head of film and head of television, respectively. All three joined from eOne, which Hasbro recently sold to Lionsgate.

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THE UK IS ON TRACK TO DOUBLE ITS FILM STAGE SPACE BY 2025, ACCORDING TO GOVERNMENT FIGURES.

MAKING SPACE FOR DISABLED TALENT Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine has allied with disabled-forward producer Making Space Media.

The Candle Media-backed outfit has struck a first-look deal with Making Space for unscripted content, which will “shine a light on the lived experience of the world’s largest and most overlooked and misrepresented community on

COULD IT BE MAGIC Producer Paul Trijbits and Universal executive JJ Lousberg, have launched Magical Society UK in partnership with French company Magical Society.

The company will draw on comic-book artist Joann Sfar’s array of properties (Klezmer, The Rabbi’s Cat, Aspirin, and The Little Prince) as well as original works.

Amongst the company’s first greenlit projects, and to be produced by its crime genre label Magical North, is the six-part BBC One drama Virdee, for which Cineflix Rights is worldwide distributor. Also in development at Magical Society UK is Monsters’ Shrink, a eight-part series based on Sfar’s work, written and adapted by Jeremy Dyson.

ANIMATED X FACTOR MOVIE FM Animation, Threshold Entertainment and Syco Entertainment are in pre-production on new animated feature film X Factor in the Jungle.

© Molly Pan & Edo Dream.

the planet.” Several developments are underway.

Making Space Media is run by television presenter and disability rights advocate Sophie Morgan, and entrepreneur and activist Keely Cat-Wells (both pictured above).

Disability in television has been in the spotlight of late and the likes of His Dark Materials scribe Jack Thorne have slammed the industry’s treatment of the minority over the past couple of years.

GOLD COAST GETS 300% BOOST The newly created Gold Coast Film Commission and a 300% increase in screen funding to more than USD1 million a year will boost productions filmed in the region.

The Gold Coast is the only local government in Australia that provides incentives to attract film and television productions to the city through the Screen Attraction Programme and the only local government area to be involved in the AFCI – a global non-profit that provides advocacy, connectivity and education for film commissions and screen businesses.

With more productions likely to be attracted, the Yatala screen studio development project has progressed. A tender process to determine the most suitable studio operator for the 85-hectare site is expected to be announced early 2024.

Written by Emmy Award winning writer Sean Catherine Derek (Batman animated series, Smurfs) and directed by director Kirk Wise (Beauty & The Beast, Hunchback of Notre Dame) and produced by Larry Kasanoff (200 plus movies including Dirty Dancing).

Threshold partner Jimmy Ienner will manage the music collaboration together with Syco’s Simon Cowell who said, “We all share the same vision for this fun, positive, family-friendly movie and of course I’m equally really excited for the soundtrack too. I’ve always wanted to make animated movies and I plan for this to be the first of many!”

Sphere launches with YouTube campaign

Y

ouTube premiered the first brand campaign specifically designed for the Exosphere – the fully programmable LED exterior of Sphere in Las Vegas. The campaign launched in support of NFL Sunday Ticket, a premium NFL subscription product for which YouTube is the new home.

Animations transformed the exterior of the Sphere into helmets of all 32 NFL teams.

“This activation spotlights the immense opportunity for brands on the Exosphere, which has quickly become an iconic global landmark since it illuminated earlier this summer,” said David Hopkinson, President and COO of MSG Sports.

The Exosphere consists of 1.2 million LED pucks. Each puck contains 48 individual LED diodes, with each diode capable of displaying 256 million different colours. The new Las “THE EXOSPHERE Vegas landmark displays CONSISTS OF 1.2 a wide range of artistic and branded content MILLION LED PUCKS.” daily, spanning everything from a morning ritual to impactful artist and brand campaigns, and culminating with an evening lunar display.

Sphere opened on September 29 with the first of 25 performances of U2:UV Achtung Baby Live. Darren Aronofsky’s Postcard from Earth, an original immersive production shot exclusively for Sphere has also screened.

GFM Animation Chairman, Guy Collins, said, “It’s a great opportunity for GFM Animation to work with such an iconic IP that is known literally worldwide. The budget will enable top level voice casting and music collaboration fitting for this movie.” CG animation starts 2024 for distribution in 2026. © Sphere Entertainment

UK TARGETS ONE MILLION JOBS BY 2030 The UK is on track to double its film stage space by 2025, according to government figures. There’s also a target to grow the UK creative industries by an extra GBP50 billion by 2030 and to create a million extra jobs.

Culture secretary Lucy Frazer told the Deloitte and Enders Media & Telecoms 2023 Conference, “I have no doubt that the Government can do more to support our creatives as we cannot simply rely on the formula for that past success. We face increasing global competition and we cannot afford to be complacent. By turbocharging growth and investment in sectors like video games, VFX, music,

fashion, film and television and more… we can retain our status as a creative industries superpower for decades to come.”

She said government support cannot be at the expense of London or detract from those places that are already thriving. “It needs to build on what we have already seen across the country. Whether that’s video games in Dundee and Leamington Spa, or television in Birmingham and Leeds. And thirdly, targeting specific support at different sub sectors, to unlock growth across the UK and delivering a Creative careers promise that builds a pipeline of talent into our creative industries.”

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The world

at a glance REPUBLIC OF IRELAND 9

12 GERMANY

FRANCE 4

13 OKLAHOMA

1

CZECH REPUBLIC

ITALY 3

14 CALIFORNIA 10 MEXICO

SAUDI ARABIA 5

KENYA 6

2 FRENCH POLYNESIA SOUTH AFRICA 11

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1

CZECH REPUBLIC Season 2 of Netflix historical drama The Empress shot in Berlin and Prague. Locations included Prague Castle, parts of the Royal Route and Ke Hradu street.

2

FRENCH POLYNESIA Pulsar Content secured international rights on Pacific Fear, a Nolita produced French survival horror directed by Jacques Kluger which filmed in French Polynesia.

3

ITALY French Italian feature O Sole Mio starring Catherine Deneuve filmed eight weeks in Rome and Paris. It is produced by Les Films Pelléas and directed by Christophe Honoré.

4

FRANCE A biopic of fashion icon Christian Dior is being developed by French actress and producer Elsa Zylberstein, written by Julien Teisseire, and set in post-World War II Paris.

5

SAUDI ARABIA Historic drama Antara, from Con-Air director Simon West, is scheduled to spend three months at Bajdah Studios from early 2024, film on the Red Sea coast and tap Neom’s 40% cash rebate.

INDIA

SINGAPORE 8

6

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NETFLIX

WHERE’S WANDA?

KENYA Kenya and China’s respective film administrations have partnered to develop the film industry and deepen ties between Nairobi and Beijing.

A joint film festival is one of the initiatives.

INDIA Sky Force starring Bollywood superstar Akshay Kumar shot in the UK and Uttar Pradesh.

Kumar plays an officer of the Indian Air Force in this historical drama for director Abhishek Kapur.

SINGAPORE Lucasfilm’s ILM closed its Singapore VFX and animation studio after nearly two decades, potentially leading to around 300 layoffs.

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REPUBLIC OF IRELAND Ishana Shyamalan’s debut feature The Watchers starring Dakota Fanning and produced by father M. Night wrapped production in County Wicklow and Galway.

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MEXICO Belgium-based Guatemalan filmmaker César Díaz filmed his second feature Mexico 86 in Mexico. His debut film Our Mothers won Cannes' Caméra d'or.

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SOUTH AFRICA South African filmmaker and Videovision chief executive Anant Singh is advancing plans to develop a USD400 million film studio on Durban’s beachfront.

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GERMANY Apple TV+’s first Germanlanguage series is eight-episode dark comedy Where’s Wanda? produced by Fremantle company UFA Fiction starring Heike Makatsch and Axel Stein.

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OKLAHOMA Buffalo Roam Studios is to transform the First Christian Church of Bartelsville, Oklahoma into a film studio with soundstages and postproduction services.

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CALIFORNIA Quentin Tarantino is going to make his self-declared tenth and final film in his hometown of LA and will receive USD20 million in tax incentives from the California Film Commission.

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QUENTIN TARANTINO

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NEWS tech & facilities FROM CAMERAS TO STUDIOS, THE LATEST IN PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY NEWS

JAPAN EXPANDS LOCATION PRODUCTION SCHEME Japan hopes to attract more film and television shoots by offering a reimbursement of up to 50% of qualifying spend in the island nation, with an upper limit of JPY1 billion (USD6.4 million) on the disbursement.

Japan; promote the location where the filming took place; help the global appeal of Japanese works.

Projects must have either minimum direct production spending in Japan of USD3.2 million or, in the case of projects distributed in ten or more countries, have Japanese production spend higher than USD1.1 million.

The scheme expands an initiative introduced in 2019 and may entice producers cognisant of the Yen’s five year low against the US dollar.

Additionally, all projects must fulfil four other criteria: benefit to the Japanese content industry through employment or use of studios; shoot in

Private equity firm Blackstone and real estate company Hudson Pacific Properties are backing Manhattan’s first purpose-built studios.

SONY’S LATEST CINE CAMERA Sony has released a new digital cinema-style camera featuring an 8.6K full-frame sensor that matches the colour science of Sony Venice cameras.

The Sunset Pier 94 Studios (pictured above) project has been in the works for several years for a proposed location a mile north of Chelsea Piers, a long-established TV production hub and a few blocks west of the Broadway theatre district.

The Burano has been designed for single-camera operators and small crews and features a PL-Mount and in-body image stabilisation. Sony are targeting the EUR25,000 camera for both scripted and unscripted work including wildlife, documentary and extreme sports productions.

The 266,000 sqft development will have six soundstages with open riverfront areas and other community amenities when completed by 2025.

Several stages will be equipped with technological infrastructure capable of handling virtual production.

Chris Schmid, freelance DP and National Geographic Explorer shot test footage (pictured opposite) and said, “When you zoom the aperture changes and with one button you can switch in the ND filter to compensate, it’s so useful to me.

When you look at the footage the dynamic range is very nice, you can recover the details from the shade of the trees while keeping the highlights, it’s not burnt and it’s amazing how the forest comes to life.”

DOCS GET ELEVATED Documentary specialist The Cutting Room has introduced an Elevated Finishing Service, with specially assembled teams to provide anything from a focused fine-tuning pass to a complete overhaul.

The service integrates the talents of in-house edit consultants including Anna Price BFE, senior editors including Zeb Achonu BFE, assistant editors, and management to collectively enhance the quality of individual films or series and get them across the finish line.

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Significantly, the guidelines make no reference to the eligibility of post-production or visual effects work conducted in Japan. Nor do they explain the treatment of salaries paid to foreign talent.

Japan is also among the largest SVOD markets in Asia. Netflix has announced plans to increase its spend on local content. The streamers have also underlined the exportability of certain genres of Japanese content, notably game shows and anime.

SONY’S LATEST CINE CAMERA Media Composer and Pro Tools maker, Avid, has been sold to private equity company STG for USD1.4 billion and is no longer traded on Nasdaq.

William Chisholm, Managing Partner of STG said, “We look forward to leveraging our experience as software investors to accelerate Avid’s growth with a deep focus on technological innovation and by delivering enhanced value for Avid’s customers.”

MD Jen Lane said, “Clients have been asking for an integrated model that encompasses both ‘fingers on keyboards’ editing and the added value and experience of consulting. It satisfies the need for extra hands and fresh eyes to deliver to commissioner expectations.”

Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland edited by Anna Price with William Grayburn.

Founder Ferg McGrath said, “There are a myriad of reasons a documentary may need our services: changes in access or archive materials, a new editorial direction, shifting schedules or the ever-present talent gap. This is a new way to address those age-old challenges.”

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THE RATE OF GROWTH WAS NEARLY THREE TIMES THAT

BlueBolt VFX for The Last Kingdom

EXPERIENCED BY THE UK AS A WHOLE, ACCORDING TO BFI STATISTICS.

DALLAS GETS STUDIO UPLIFT Talon Entertainment Finance is giving South Side Studios in Dallas (pictured below) a multi-million-dollar upgrade including five soundstages from 8000 sqft to 25,000 sqft. The studio will also house a post-production facility, production offices, a mill and prop house, camera packages, and feature two new virtual production studios with 270-degree wall, ceiling setup, tracking and robotic camera kit.

“Developing a large-scale soundstage is vital for any community to be truly competitive in the entertainment industry. It’s a credit to the film potential in Dallas that Talon recognised this and was willing to quickly commit to support this project,” said Tony Armer, Commissioner for the Dallas Film and Creative Industries Office.

South Side Studios is located less than 2 miles from downtown. Portions of the studio will be open during renovations with a full opening by May 2024.

The feature-length final chapter of The Last Kingdom (pictured below), contained a massive battle scene with VFX provided by BlueBolt. It was part of more than 3,500 VFX shots over eight years and five seasons the facility has delivered for Carnival Films/Netflix' historical drama.

SCOTLAND THRIVES ON INVESTMENT Scotland registered a 110% increase in inward film and high-end television production spend from GBP165.3 million in 2019 to GBP347.4 million in 2021. The latest figures available from Screen Scotland estimate that overall GBP617.4 million was spent on content in the country in 2021, up 55% from 2019.

VFX supervisor Richard Frazer, explained, “The opposing sides were crushed together in various shieldwall formations, so we used our in-house motion capture suits for bespoke body tracking of

The rate of growth was nearly three times that experienced by the UK as a whole, according to BFI statistics. Full time employment in the sector also rose by 39% to over 7000 jobs.

Significant skills development work and the opening of studio facilities were cited as contributory factors. Edinburgh’s FirstStage Studios hosted Prime Video’s The Rig and Anansi Boys; The Pyramids in West Lothian, hosted Good Omens 2 (pictured above).

ANNA VALLEY OPENS STUDIO Anna Valley’s new multi-purpose studio complex in West London (pictured below) includes five studio spaces. The stages provide a “budget-friendly but fit-for-purpose” location for corporate clients to produce virtual events and high-end presentation videos or for production teams to conduct camera,

AI FOR ROTOSCOPING Electric Sheep, an AI tech startup, is using USD500,000 in fresh funds to build and enhance Spotlight, an automated rotoscoping tool “capable of the detail needed for Hollywood.” Spotlight is designed to output an editable layer that allows VFX artists to make key adjustments.

Rotoscoping is one of the most tedious and labour intensive post-production tasks. Currently, the only way to deliver the detail needed is to manually cut around foregrounds frame-by-frame – a process that takes six hours per second of footage and costs the industry over USD1.5 billion per year. Electric Sheep claim its tech can process one second of footage in less than a minute.

lighting or virtual production tests, film pilots and programme segments. The facility provides all supporting infrastructure: dressing rooms, green rooms, a dining area and spaces that can be set up as galleries and control rooms or production offices.

“Flawless background removal negates the need for onset green screens, empowering creatives to capture the energy of the scene without compromising the final image,” said CEO Gary Palmer.

“Our aim is to provide media and entertainment, commercial and event clients access to professional studio space that can be customised to suit their purpose and budget,” says MD, Pete Jones.

their actions, which stretched the capabilities of our crowd simulation software. Our library of CG assets is now so lifelike and our libraries of motion capture data so extensive that we used them right alongside our real actors.”

BlueBolt also created and choreographed CG horses; historically accurate ships, and elaborate environments including turning Budapest into ancient Britain; recreating Northumberland’s Bebbanburg Castle and bringing to life scenes from Valhalla.

PHYGITAL FX OPENS IN US Great Point Studios has partnered with Spain’s Mediapro to create Phygital FX, offering production services and led by Mediapro veteran Mario Sousa.

The joint venture, initially a US project, plans to expand globally, providing full production services to the industry from stage and studio rentals; rental equipment; postproduction; graphics; and virtual production services.

Phygital has committed more than USD50 million to acquire lighting and grip equipment, and set aside 200,000 sqft of space to store it in across Great Point’s roster of studio locations including at Lionsgate Studio Yonkers. Great Point has 63 film stages open or under construction at locations in Yonkers, Atlanta, Buffalo, Newark and Wales (UK).

Mediapro is an anchor tenant at Yonkers. The European media powerhouse produces more than 12,000 live events each year, plus scripted and unscripted content, and has a major global equipment and technology business.

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ALICANTE, LAND OF CINEMA CIUDAD DE LA LUZ IS ONE OF THE MOST MODERN FILM STUDIOS IN EUROPE: A COMPLEX WITH ADVANCED AUDIOVISUAL PRODUCTION SERVICES AND ALL THE MEANS AND FACILITIES FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF PROJECTS.

A recent image from the spectacular water tank, the jewel of the film studios.

CIUDAD DE LA LUZ FILM STUDIOS LAND OF CINEMA

Ciudad de la Luz is one of the biggest film studios in Europe. Located in Alicante (Spain), it is owned by the Government of Valencia and has a complete and modern audiovisual production service, and incorporates a wide variety of facilities.

The Ciudad de la Luz facilities are prepared to host any type of filming.

Created for all types of audiovisual projects, Ciudad de la Luz has an area of nearly 3.5 million sqft with incredible sets, workshops, warehouses, large outdoor filming areas, production buildings with direct access to the sets and three tanks for underwater filming.

FACILITIES & TECHNICAL FEATURES

• Six sound stages – With a total of 120,000 sqft, the sound stage buildings are independent, soundproofed and air-conditioned.

The water areas are one of the differentiating elements of the complex compared to other production centres in the world.

• Three production support buildings – Includes the dressing rooms, hairdressing and make-up rooms, wardrobe, decoration and props storage rooms, meeting rooms, toilets and showers.

• One mill and workshop building – The building totals 120,550 sqft divided into several areas for the construction of sets.

• Two backlots – Outdoor filming areas of 1,805 acres and 193 acres with a natural horizon.

BROUGHT TO YOU BY

• Backlot tank – Located in one of the backlots with dimensions of 32,808 ft x 26,247 ft, in addition to a blue screen on one of the sides.

• Water areas – This is one of the differentiating elements of the complex compared to other production centres in the world. Outdoors it has a complex of 36,5 acres with natural horizons.

There is a 328.08 ft x 262.47 ft tank. Indoors there are two covered tanks. One is 32 ft x 32 ft and the other is 98.43 ft x 98.43 ft.

NEXT PROJECTS

Ciudad de la Luz has hosted the filming of Sharks in Paris, a Franco-Belgian co-production for Netflix directed by Xavier Gens in 2023. This December, the filming of La Mala Influencia will take place here, and in February 2024, Alejandro Amenábar will shoot his next project, Cautivo, focused on the captivity of the writer Miguel de Cervantes in Algiers.

TAX INCENTIVES

Spain is positioned as a very competitive and profitable shooting destination for the international industry. Investments in foreign cinematographic and audiovisual productions entitle the producer to a tax deduction of 30% of the first EUR1 million “THE RENOWNED of the deduction base and 25% if it exceeds FILMMAKER that amount, with a ALEJANDRO maximum of EUR10 AMENÁBAR WILL million per production.

SHOOT HIS NEXT PROJECT, CAUTIVO, IN CIUDAD DE LA LUZ IN FEBRUARY 2024.”

The Region of Valencia has a subsidy of 25% of the costs incurred during the production of the audiovisual work in the valencian territory. It is required that the global cost of production be at least 4 million and that the minimum local expenditure in this territory be at least 2 million. The maximum amount of aid is 1.5 million and it is compatible with other public aid taking into account the maximum intensities of 50% or 60% in the case of coproductions.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT

Marta Bellod (+34) 639 643 269 / info@sptcv.net www.sptcv.net/ciudad­de­la­luz

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Around the world Squirming eels and wild horses SIX LOCATIONS CHOSEN BY SUPERVISING LOCATION MANAGER MANDI DILLIN 2 I love this photo because of the orange and blue lights but also because of the tile work on the building and retro architecture. To me it’s not what people envision when they think of Singapore.

CALIFORNIA I can’t overlook the state that has been my home for over 20 years. I’ve scouted so many different places but these photos have stayed with me over time.

3 LA Downtown and Freeways. This was for a movie that was never made but I spent months scouting freeways at dawn and dusk. The city looks so still, as if it’s being cradled by the mountains and freeway. The morning rush hour in the foreground is muted by the city.

4 A complete fluke while scouting for Iron Man (2008). I was on a ranch just outside of the Los Angeles County line and a herd of wild horses blazed past us, getting freakishly close. I shot as fast as I could and was thrilled to see this photo during editing.

KOREA I spent a good amount of time in Korea in 2016 scouting for Black Panther. We ended up using the Jagalchi Fish Market in Busan for one of the action

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M

andi Dillin has worked in the film industry for more than two decades.

She moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as an Assistant Director before finding her home in the Location Department. Her career has included work in several countries, including Spain, Morocco, Korea and Singapore, as well as almost every corner of the United States and North America.

Her personal travels have taken her further and she’s eager to share the joy of travel with her husband and twin toddlers. When she’s not scouting or managing projects for HBO or Apple she’s in the kitchen experimenting with new recipes for her kids, hiking the abundance of trails with her dog, or plotting her next adult escape with her husband.

SINGAPORE We spent a lot of time in Singapore filming Westworld season 3. It was a fantastic experience. We covered everything – the old, the modern and the rustic.

1 I stumbled on the Atlas Bar during the Westworld director scout. They have a huge statue outside that is very Ayn Rand (several figures are holding up the Globe) which I found interesting. We wandered inside and fell in love with the nouveau-Deco design. It became one of the main filming locations for our Singapore unit. You can order a cocktail made with vintage gin from your decade of choice, dating back to 1910… but it will cost you!

sequences. I’ll never forget the look on Ryan Coogler’s face when he saw the buckets of squirming eels. The people are incredibly friendly and accommodating and the food is some of the best I’ve had on the planet. I keep on trying to get back to Korea for work and plan on showing it off to my family someday.

5 Most of my scouting for Black Panther was at night. This was taken on a very hot and steamy night in Busan, around midnight. The air was sweet and tangy from the BBQ chicken restaurant on the pier which added more heft to the already balmy air.

6 Restaurant in Seoul. This is Korea to me – a friendly face smiling at you from the bar, welcoming you to sit down and share a meal.

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An Engine for Creativity AI CAN’T BE WISHED AWAY. IT NEEDS TO BE TACKLED NOW THE WRITERS HAVE WON THE FIRST SKIRMISH.

Generated with AI.

As we published makers 11 in early June the WGA had already been on strike for a month. When resolved after 148 days with a pay rise wrestled from studios and new terms on AI, questions remain about the impact of automation across the wider creative industry.

B

oth sides have acknowledged GenAI can be a worthwhile tool in many aspects of filmmaking, including script writing. The writers have got a deal that states that AI cannot be a credited writer. AI cannot write or rewrite literary material and AI-generated writing cannot be source material. Yet the contract leaves wriggle room based on a rapidly changing legal landscape and there are no prohibitions on studios using scripts they own to train AI systems. “They spent months trying to craft words to protect writers from AI, and they ended up with a paragraph that protected nothing from no one,” media mogul Barry Diller told CNBC.

What everyone agrees on is that this was just the first of many AI labour disputes as all corners of the creative industries continuing to experiment with AI. Indeed, the technology is likely to dominate discussion for decades. With the journey barely begun on the road with human+machine we’re going to continually revisit questions that speak to the heart of industry economics and the nature of art. Which is why we’ve devoted a significant section of makers 12 to AI, gathering a status report on its impact on writers, actors and the advertising industry.

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“Generative AI is changing the world of marketing at incredible speed,” insisted WPP CEO Mark Read in a release. “This new technology will transform the way that brands create content for commercial use, and cements WPP’s position as the industry leader in the creative application of AI for the world’s top brands.”

Generated with AI.

As noted, the deal between screenwriters and studios doesn't prohibit all uses of artificial intelligence, rather it ensures that if AI is going to be used then there will need to be humans working alongside it. The deal states that writers can use AI if the company consents. But a company cannot require a writer to use AI software. It’s a model likely to be applied to other content creation industries.

THIS NEW TECHNOLOGY WILL TRANSFORM THE WAY THAT BRANDS CREATE CONTENT FOR COMMERCIAL USE.

Actors are experiencing the twin edges of the AI sword. Tom Hanks is the latest actor to be de-aged

by AI software for new film Here (in which Robin Wright’s character also undergoes the treatment).

Early in the year Hanks talked of the opportunities the tech afforded, and warned of its misuse.

“Anybody can now recreate themselves at any age they are by way of deep fake technology,” he told the Adam Buxton podcast. “I could be hit by a bus tomorrow and that's it, but [my] performances can go on and on and on and on. Outside the understanding of AI and deep fake, there’ll be nothing to tell you that it's not me and me alone. And it's going to have some degree of lifelike quality. That’s certainly an artistic challenge but it's also a legal one.”

A few months later and Hanks was calling out a deepfake likeness of his younger self in a dental advert.

All creative industries, including the USD700 billion digital advertising industry, are racing to realise the benefits of AI. WPP, the world’s largest marketing services organisation, teamed with computer processor giant Nvidia to make brand advertising content such as images, videos and experiences more personalised and at scale. They are building a content engine “responsibly trained” on datasets Adobe and Getty Images so its designers and clients can create varied, high-fidelity images from text prompts.

In addition to speed and efficiency, the new engine is said to outperform current methods, which require creatives to “manually create hundreds of thousands of pieces of content using disparate data coming from disconnected tools and systems”.

CONTRACTS ADVERTISING

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DEEPFAKE

The world of business and art seems to be moving into an accommodation with AI. Could it be any other way? It’s the theme of sci-fi action film The Creator, set in 2065, when one half the world (sardonically the US) wants to destroy AI technology while in Asia the humanoid machines are part of the family and are actually mourned in death.

A similar companionship “WITH THE JOURNEY is being used to create BARELY BEGUN ON art that arguably could THE ROAD WITH not have been made HUMAN+MACHINE without either human WE’RE GOING TO nor machine. King Size CONTINUALLY REVISIT is a piece of AI powered QUESTIONS THAT art conflating the SPEAK TO THE HEART excess of Elvis Presley’s last days, with the OF INDUSTRY phantasmagoria of Las ECONOMICS AND THE Vegas, with that of AI’s NATURE OF ART.” overwhelming power.

Video artist Marco Brambilla created it to launch new entertainment complex The Sphere in concert with U2. He found that AI was a huge help in speeding up the process of ideation but it did less well in outputting content that was really specific to his intent.

Pointedly he told interviewers, “AI is a blunt instrument that helps you get references and inspirations, but it doesn’t really create intention.

That’s still [the artist’s] department.

“For now.”

FOR MORE MAKERS AI CONTENT Page 56 Writers programming the programme.

Page 90 AI ads but at what cost?

Page 126 Interview with Pinar Seyhan Demirdag.

Page 160 Double trouble for actors.

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FOCUS 2023 meet the makers THE MEETING PLACE FOR THE INTERNATIONAL PRODUCTION COMMUNITY RETURNS WITH GUSTO

FOCUS is a vibrant two-day programme of conference sessions, networking events, facilitated meetings and exhibition zones and remains the only UK screen trade event where attendees can meet with content makers and facilitators from over 100 countries.

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We are really looking forward to this year’s event, which will be bigger than ever,” said Jean-Frédéric Garcia, Managing Director at FOCUS. “This year has been an exceptionally challenging one for the industry, and we hope our conferences and networking events will bring new opportunities and inspiration to our guests for the year ahead.”

“

ON THE SHOW FLOOR

Over 250 companies are exhibiting at the Business Design Centre this year, with an A-Z of stands from Acorn right through to the Zagreb Film Office. For the first time both Film USA and AFCI will be exhibiting at FOCUS. Film USA serves as an umbrella for US based film commissions and will bring a delegation from Louisiana, Baton Rouge, Dallas Film Commission, FLICS (Film Liaisons in California Statewide), Houston and Oklahoma.

Other new exhibitors include United Airlines, Western Australia and Kazakhstan.

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APPLICATION

BORDER/EDGE EXAMPLE

BRAND NEW FOR 2023, A DEDICATED GALLERY SPACE WILL OFFER A RANGE OF FREE PRODUCER SURGERIES, COVERING FINANCIAL AND REGULATORY ISSUES, ACCOUNTANCY, TAX AND BUSINESS STRATEGY.

Brand new for 2023, a dedicated gallery space will offer a range of Free Producer Surgeries, covering financial and regulatory issues, accountancy, tax and business strategy. Delegates will be able to access bespoke 1-2-1 meetings with leading industry advisers Saffery, Coutts and Triple Exposure, a collaboration of three film industry experts – accountancy practice Alliotts, Performance Film & Media Insurance, and specialist law firm Reviewed and Cleared.

Key sessions include: DE­RISKING FINANCE IN THE YEAR OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY

While Studio-Streamers battle with challenging budgets and business models, the independent sales and distribution sector is being squeezed each and every way. The panel will explore the critical pressure points and highlight risk management strategies to cope with these challenges.

NETWORKING

In association with MediaXchange. Speakers: FOCUS offers a range of informal networking Fredrik af Malmborg – Co-Founder, Eccho Rights opportunities, including a busy schedule of Steve Clark-Hall – Producer receptions and Happy Hours taking place Serena Cullen – Producer/Founder, throughout this year’s event, including the FOCUS Serena Cullen Productions Welcome Drinks sponsored by Entertainment Angus Finney – Film and Entertainment Business Partners and FLB Accountants; Producers’ Brunch Specialist/Author/Executive in banners to illustrate pages or to with Variety & PACT sponsored by CCS Rights Management; PGGB Lunch, sponsored by United CAN’T BUY MY SILENCE counter, other architectural elements.

WITH ZELDA PERKINS Airlines and TheorPolish Film Institute; Location Managers’ Xmas Drinks with LMGI, sponsored by For the Sue Hayes Lecture, we are delighted that Supply 2 Location; FOCUS Producers’ Opening Zelda Perkins will talk about her groundbreaking Mixer, sponsored by Romanian Advertising and work. Zelda was the first woman to break an NDA Media Association. There will be many places to in 2017, signed decades earlier, with Harvey meet during FOCUS such as the Film Hawai’i Weinstein and has been campaigning for legislative and regulatory reform in the UK since then.

Aloha Coffee Bar and the 2 in Tents Bar.

CONFERENCE PROGRAMME

One of the centrepieces of FOCUS is its conference programme, presented in association with media partner Variety. It is developed in consultation with a Content Advisory Board featuring representatives from leading industry bodies including Pact, The Production Guild, BFI, BFC, UK Screen Alliance, ScreenSkills, Directors UK and Advertising Producers Association.

The conference programme at FOCUS will reflect key industry talking points of 2023, from the challenges of financing projects in turbulent times, navigating new technology, creating content sustainably and nurturing new talent.

This year, there will be a specific strand focusing on the hot topic of AI with sessions including: THE WRITE APPROACH: HOW CAN AI & HUMANS HOLD HANDS AI: WHO WATCHES THE WATCHMEN? THE LEGAL & ETHICAL ISSUES REVOLUTIONISING THE ART OF IMAGINATION: AI IN VFX & ANIMATION.

She launched the global campaign Can’t Buy My Silence with Canadian Co-Founder, Professor Julie Macfarlane in September 2021. They “THE CONFERENCE are working with the PROGRAMME AT Governments in the UK, FOCUS WILL REFLECT the Republic of Ireland, KEY INDUSTRY Canada and Australia to TALKING POINTS change legislation and OF 2023.” regulation around the misuse of NDA’s.

CROSS­BORDER COLLABORATIONS: A NAPOLEON CASE STUDY

In association with the British Film Commission, an insightful masterclass on Ridley Scott’s forthcoming Apple TV+ epic movie Napoleon.

Speakers: Mark Huffam – Producer Samantha Perahia MBE – Head of Production UK – British Film Commission Johann Grech – Film Commissioner – Malta Film Commission Einar Hanson Tomasson – President – Iceland Film Commission

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HOW DO WE MEASURE SUCCESS? FESTIVAL WINS? BOX OFFICE RETURNS? A­LIST NETWORK? CELEBRITY STATUS? BANKABILITY? SUSTAINABILITY?

CO­PRODUCTION IN THE CURRENT WORLD MARKET

TACKLING THE CURRENT FINANCIAL ISSUES IN ADVERTISING

In a challenging economic climate, we take a look at how to put together a cross-border co-production, exploring the development process, financing, distribution arrangements, rights ownership and key commercial terms.

Does the decline in client budgets mean that creativity has suffered? Can producers better balance smaller budgets with creativity and if so how?

In association with MediaXchange. Speakers: Kate Bennetts – Managing Director, Ringside Studios Gub Neal – Founder/Creative Director, Ringside Studios Leona Connell – Chief Commercial Officer, Newen Connect Jeremy Gawade – Consultant, Film & TV, Lee & Thompson Lee Stone – Partner, Film & TV, Lee & Thompson THE INDIE JOURNEY: SECRETS TO SUCCESS

How do we measure success? Festival wins? Box office returns? A-list network? Celebrity status?

Bankability? Sustainability? Has the time finally come to speak openly about what we mean by success and how we perceive failure?

With Producers Ameenah Ayub Allen, Yaw Basoah, Olivier Kaempfer, Tracy O'Riordan and Helen Simmons.

ANIMATED UK: STORIES, TALENT AND INNOVATION

In the rapidly evolving landscape of animation, recent years have witnessed a remarkable surge in animated film production, with a tally of over 20+ new animated features coming to life. We showcase recent successes and anticipate the impact of the new Audio Visual Expenditure Credits from January 2024.

In Association with UK Screen Alliance & Animation UK. Speakers: Sean Clarke – Managing Director, Aardman Camilla Deakin, Joint MD – Lupus Films Ralph Kamp – Chairman/CEO, Timeless Films Julie Lockhart – Co-founder/President of Production, Locksmith Animation MEET THE PRODUCER PODCAST: JASON SOLOMONS WITH ALEX BODEN

The Production Guild of Great Britain's podcast series, hosted by film critic, presenter and film producer Jason Solomons, talks to inspirational producers of film and television to find out the many ways to do this most mysterious and most rewarding of jobs. With Alex Boden (Tokyo Vice, Sense8, Cursed, Cloud Atlas).

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Speakers: Mark Eaves – Founder, Gravity Road Will Harrison – Group Brand Director, The AA David Prys-Owen – Founder, Focus on Film Larissa Vince – CEO TBWA\London FROM REVOLUTION TO EVOLUTION: WHAT THE STREAMERS ARE LOOKING FOR

This Stage 32 professional panel will demystify where the streamers are at today, what they are looking for and how you can work with them moving forward.

Speakers: Stacey Carr – Entertainment Consultant, Stacey Carr Consulting Elizabeth Kormanova – Head of Business & Legal Affairs, Rocket Science Industries Tom Sherry – Managing Director, Headline Pictures Sam Sokolow – Executive Producer/Director of Education NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK

Speakers: Bianca Gavin – Chair, The Production Guild of Great Britain Sara Putt – Managing Director, Sara Putt Associates Barry Ryan – Head of Production/Chair of HETV Skills Fund, Ink Factory Films/ScreenSkills Claire Tavernier – Chair of Trustees, Film & TV Charity TAKE ONLY FOOTAGE, LEAVE ONLY FOOTPRINTS

How to manage the challenges and unintended consequences of working in the natural world and how productions can preserve our landscapes and support nature recovery.

In association with BAFTA albert. Speakers: Harriet Lawrence – Supervising Location Manager, The Key Location Chantelle Lindsay – Presenter/Coordinator, Nature in Mind, London Wildlife Trust Kirstie Shirra – Campaigns consultant/Chair, Biodiversity Working Group HOW TO FINANCE AND RELEASE YOUR DOCUMENTARY Leading documentary filmmakers and commissioners will discuss which types of films are working, why and how in a crowded marketplace. With documentary producers Kat Mansoor, Al Morrow and Lisa Marie Russo and Sheffield Doc Fest's Annabel Grundy.

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Making of the killer

THE PRECISION DESIGN OF FINCHER’S HIT-MAN FEATURE MIRRORS ITS SUBJECT

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D

avid Fincher’s The Killer opens in an empty office space overlooking a Parisian square, opposite a plush apartment. The production team scouted the location in summer 2021, spending time in quarantine before exploring the city. They found the perfect square for the stakeout but the complex sequence required multiple points of view, in addition to practical implications to wielding weapons within the city.

“The French government wants to know where you’re going with that sniper rifle with a foot-long silencer on it,” says Fincher, “Even if it’s a fake one.”

The office where the assassin’s mesmerising routine could be staged and re-staged was built on a stage in New Orleans. “David had the idea, ‘Let’s make it a WeWork office that’s under construction,’” says production designer Donald Burt. The director imagined it as a co-op work space that was yet to open. “That was hard to pull off: wanting to get some scale, as well as wanting it to feel French.”

The target apartment was built in an old mill in New Orleans – offering a space big enough to provide the distance needed for the camera’s perspective: through the telescopic sight of the killer’s rifle. The

buildings were recreated in the style of mid-19th century Haussmann Parisian architecture. “I was lucky in New Orleans that one of the art directors was from France,” says Burt. “That helped us with small things that may or may not ever be noticed – the boxes for the nails and the glues were all French-labelled products.”

The feature also shot in the Dominican Republic and Chicago and St. Charles, Illinois (which doubled for upstate New York).

Images of The Killer © Netflix 2023.

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Making a Winner

14 in February

From Iranian women resistance to a tumultuous French road trip, makers speaks to some of the Young Director Award (YDA) winners from this year’s Cannes Lions International Festival to get their insights on the topics, challenges and journeys of their short film projects.

VICTORIA SINGH-THOMPSON: 14 IN FEBRUARY (AUSTRALIA)

Singh-Thompson’s Lolita-esque narrative from the perspective of a deaf private girls’ school student captivated audiences at the YDA. The Australian director, with the help of DOP Sam Chiplin, juxtaposed beautiful imagery with a gut-wrenching subject matter for 14 in February.

Singh-Thompson went through a number of drafts of the script before receiving much-needed financing from the New South Wales Screenability Film Fund and assistance from local production company Revolver to get it off the ground.

Once underway, it was key for the director to cast a deaf leading actress to take on the sensitive role and turned to deaf dancer Amelia Kroehnert. “I wanted to capture authentic and intimate details from a perspective outside of the dominant culture,” says Singh-Thompson.

“I want to break ceilings continuously for all deaf, POC (person of colour) and queer filmmakers.”

Sing-Thompson is hard of hearing herself, so very much connected with the subject matter and the importance of representation in her project. They utilised sound techniques to not only place the audience in the body of her main character, but also to create the shared sense of isolation.

“It was a challenging pre-production due to the need to cast a young deaf lead actor and secure a school location that would be supportive of the content, but we managed to achieve both and the results were great,” concludes Singh-Thompson.

“My career goal is to tell stories both in the long form and commercial space that push our understanding of what a story can be and who for – in ways that both behind and in front of the camera are revolutionary,” adds Singh-Thompson boldly.

Victoria Singh-Thompson

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Bandits

SET AMIDST THE UK’S COST OF LIVING CRISIS, THE FILM SEES THE YOUNG, SINGLE MOTHER TAKE DRASTIC ACTION AT A PETROL STATION TO CHANGE THE COURSE OF HER SON’S FUTURE.

EMMA BRANDERHORST: MA MERE ET MOI (NETHERLANDS)

Amsterdam-born Branderhorst is no stranger to the YDA having also won last year with her short, Spotless, about a 15 year old girl’s struggle with her period and the cost of menstrual products, for which she was awarded EUR50,000 from the Netherlands Film Fund.

She decided to return and impressively won gold with Ma Mere et Moi about the tumultuous relationship between a mother and daughter as they embark on a road trip across France.

“Last year when I won Gold for Spotless I was a little bit nervous,” says Branderhorst. “Then we had the film submitted to the Oscars, so it was like this crazy race we were in. With Ma Mere et Moi it's an even more intimate, personal subject, while Spotless was more society driven. So I was like, okay, let's see if I can also win something with this short and hope the first time wasn’t just luck.”

Branderhorst appreciated it was quite a shift in subject matter from one film to the other, but she was keen to make a film inspired by her relationship with her own mum.

To help her with the process she enlisted the help of more experienced writer Nena van Driel to bring the narrative to life.

“I try to take one little moment in the life of my main characters,” Branderhorst explains. “That moment is mostly very, very small and maybe some people don't even see it, but that's why I like to pick it out.”

Much like her subject matter and directorial style, Branderhorst maintained an intimate crew base for the shoot, travelling with just 12 people for about two weeks – originally intended to be six weeks – to bring the project to fruition.

Emma Branderhorst

It was filmed in a documentary style with car scenes shot in Marseille to deliver the authentic feel, while interior shots were accomplished in her home country of the Netherlands.

NICK ALEXANDER: BANDITS (UK)

British director Alexander’s graduation project Bandits tells the intimate story between a mother and son through the lens of a high-octane Western.

The YDA Gold project proved to be a challenge for Alexander and his dedicated, diverse team, including cinematographer Toby Lloyd, production designer Nivitha Muralikrishna and editor Billy Morley, but was boosted by the financial support of the director’s alma mater, the NFTS. Set amidst the UK’s cost of living crisis, the film sees the young, single mother take drastic action at a petrol station to change the course of her son’s future.

“Filming at the petrol station was difficult,” Alexander recalls. “We were able to shut the station completely for the day which was helpful, but the road behind was still active, so it was a case of being very careful, especially as we were shooting with a child, whilst moving fast to get the day.

“We also had a battle with the light. Initially the station was in a sun trap, which meant trying to keep the light consistent across the day was a struggle. But then because the sunshine was so strong, the heat slowed us down massively (it got up to about 30 degrees) and so come the end of the day, when we were shooting inside the petrol station itself, we’d lost the light completely. Toby ended up having to mimic daylight artificially which involved a pretty big rig at short notice. All in all, it was a tough day!”

Filmed in and around Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, the shoot was stressfully crammed into seven days across 10 locations. Stretching their capabilities, Alexander remarked on the difficulties faced along the way, working with younger actors for the first time in his career and maintaining the aesthetic that bring the narrative together. But he is happy with the result.

She has her fingers crossed for more festival and awards success.

Ma Mere et Moi

Nick Alexander

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Iran-E-Man

OUR MOTIVATION WAS SIMPLE – TO STAND IN SOLIDARITY AND MAKE A POSITIVE IMPACT THROUGH OUR CRAFT.

NAGHMEH POUR: IRAN-E MAN (DENMARK)

For Pour, entering her work into the YDA and winning was as much a career achievement as it was a personal one.

The film sheds light on a very important subject – the Woman Life Freedom project. It is a collaboration between the movement and Iranian-Italian fashion brand Pairi Daeza featuring twelve scarves designed by Iranian artists.

“The project started with a sense of powerlessness while watching Iranians struggle for the freedom that we sometimes take for granted,” says Pour. “After the terrible killing of Mahsa Amini, we saw Iranians abroad turning to art, music, and poetry to express their pain and show their support. This motivated us to use our creative skills to bring a glimpse of hope to their fight and shine a light on the situation.”

Pour’s journey to directing the film has taken many twists and turns. “Initially, I studied scriptwriting at university, leading me to work as a runner in Copenhagen to understand filmmaking and the dynamics of the film-set better. Quickly, I became an assistant to the MD at Scandinavian production company New-land, initially making coffee, but soon I was going into a producing role.

“After two years, I realised it wasn't my path. I was more drawn to what the creative department was doing, so I decided to try as a director’s assistant instead [which led to directing Iran-e Man].”

Naghmeh Pour

Iran-e Man was filmed over two days in Morocco.

It was a tight turnaround with the project only receiving the green light one week before it started.

She also had the challenge of working with a relatively new brand in Pairi Deaza, but it proved a success and they managed to cast brand model Valentine in the lead role.

ARNE HAIN: THE LAST BAR (GERMANY)

Taking a step away from live-action, German director Arne Hain took on the world of stop motion for his film The Last Bar. Set in a small bar on a cliff edge, the project was a team effort in the writer’s room between producers Louis Wick and Svenja Weber and writers Theresa Worm and Torben Hensel.

“We were lucky since it was the graduation film from several team members and we got funding from two departments and won a financial fund through the Caligari Prize beforehand,” says Hain. “So we were able to finance the whole project without further external money. Still it was a big challenge and very ambitious for a student film.”

Taking two years to complete and inspired by a friend of Hain’s own experiences, the short film centres around the main character whose obsessive thoughts take him to The Last Bar, filled with eclectic characters.

Hain deliberately chose animation as his medium to make the narrative more digestible for audiences, but was keen to still maintain a serious tone for the story.

“Even in film school half of the battle is politics, convincing the teachers and finding students that want to work on the project,” says Hain. “In total, the production took us two years, animated on two sets parallel for 22 weeks with many talented people involved.

“Half of the production fell into Covid-19 times and I feel we had more time than other students in the previous years. It is always a big strategical puzzle to pull a film off, but we were very lucky because we had the support of Animationsinstitut and Filmakademie-Baden Württemberg.”

“Our motivation was simple – to stand in solidarity and make a positive impact through our craft,” concludes Pour.

Arne Hain

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The Last Bar

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How The West Was Won

The producers of Killers of the Flower Moon claim that ‘no film company had ever taken steps to engage so completely with the descendants of the very people whose tragic story it was about to tell.’ makers examines how the awards contender worked with the Osage community to revisit the Reign of Terror.

artin Scorsese always wanted to make a Western, arguably the defining American art form. With Killers of the Flower Moon, he got his chance to chronicle the way the country was moulded by violence and prejudice.

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Funded by Apple Studios with a budget of USD200 million, a key decision was to shoot the film on location in Oklahoma on the Osage reservation, in the very towns and communities where the events happened.

“I loved many of the westerns I saw when I was growing up and I still do love them,” the director explains in the production notes. “I responded to the pictures built around the traditional myths of the western, more than the psychological westerns.

Those films nourished me as a filmmaker, but they also inspired me to go deeper into the real history.”

The production also enlisted the cooperation of the Osage Nation to make the film. The team travelled to the Osage reservation in spring 2019 to scout locations and to meet the Osage community.

Based on the 2017 non-fiction book by David Grann and written for the screen by Scorsese and Eric Roth, the drama is set in 1920s Oklahoma and centres on the murders of members of the Osage Nation, the midwestern Native American tribe that became wealthy after the discovery of oil on their land at the end of the 19th century.

The series of brutal crimes, revealed by the then fledgling FBI to have been a conspiracy by several local white residents led by William Hale (played by Robert De Niro), became known as the Reign of Terror.

Geoffrey Standing Bear, the Osage Nation’s Principal Chief, told Scorsese of his concerns: “I didn’t want the Osage shown as just a bunch of bodies lying around. We were hoping the history and culture would be accurately represented in his movie. Mr Scorsese pointed out some of the movies he had made, in particular Silence, in which the cultures of Christian missionaries and 17th-century Japan were presented in a serious and respectful manner, and that was so encouraging.”

Executive producer Marianne Bower became the point person between Scorsese, his creative and production teams, and the Osage. This paved the way for a dialogue on research, cultural and historical matters that continued throughout production.

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Locations were being scouted, sets were under construction and casting was moving forward when COVID struck and filming suspended. It was during this enforced hiatus that Scorsese fine-tuned the story of Ernest and Mollie (Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone) and reworked sections of the script.

Work resumed in spring 2021 with a new principle.

Whenever possible, Osage characters would be played by an Osage actor, and if that were not feasible (as in the case of Gladstone), every Osage role would be filled by a Native American.

I DIDN’T WANT THE OSAGE SHOWN AS JUST A BUNCH OF BODIES LYING AROUND. WE WERE HOPING THE HISTORY AND CULTURE WOULD BE ACCURATELY REPRESENTED IN THIS MOVIE.

The casting team held an open call throughout Oklahoma with the result that several Osage actors landed key roles: Yancey Red Corn makes his film debut as the Osage Chief Bonnicastle; Everett Waller plays Paul Red Eagle and Talee Redcorn is the Osage leader. In all, more than 44 roles were filled

by Osage, not including the hundreds who worked as background players.

In pre-production Scorsese talked with representative Osage Elders about the film’s structure, which would feature a prologue based on the opening section of A Pipe for February, a novel by the Osage writer Charles H Red Corn that depicts a sacred ritual.

This sequence is intercut with newsreel footage showing how white culture viewed the Osage at the time when its oil wealth skyrocketed. Scorsese stressed that the film would make it clear that there was a much wider system of killing Osage for their money and property than the one Hale had orchestrated.

Efforts to include the Osage people in the filmmaking process didn’t end there. Working with the state’s Film and Television Commission, the production began hiring Osage artisans and craftspeople to work in various departments.

The artist Addie Roanhorse was brought on to assist with production design, and Osage cultural consultant Julie O’Keefe assisted the wardrobe department. Osage elder John Williams became the film’s cultural consultant. Vann Bighorse, director of the Osage Nation Language programme, oversaw the translation and use of the native tongue spoken throughout the drama.

The challenge for production designer Jack Fisk was to tell the story on Osage land, either by repurposing existing structures or building them from scratch. So much of Fairfax, the original town, had been modernised or run down. A 1920s period piece would require vast open expanses, capturing the lushness of Osage territory.

“The Osage Nation had recently bought a square mile of land just off Main Street in Pawhuska, where the old freight station stood,” Fisk recalls. “They were going to clear it out and turn the space into a parks and recreation area. We asked them to delay their plans. We saw that the expanse worked perfectly for our purposes, so we obtained permission to build our train station there, bringing in twelve hundred feet of track and a real locomotive.”

Fisk found locations for Osage homes and marketplaces. Nearby Pawhuska served as Fairfax.

“The final touch to the Kihekah Avenue reconstruction was to cover the street with dirt,” Fisk says. “That unified the set, made it more “MORE THAN 44 western and somehow ROLES WERE FILLED brought it to life.”

BY OSAGE ACTORS, NOT INCLUDING THE

To depict the period’s HUNDREDS WHO mix of Old West and WORKED AS BACKmore modern cultures, GROUND PLAYERS.” the production needed horses and a wrangler but also a fleet of 100 vintage vehicles, with four mechanics to maintain them. Scorsese’s choice to shoot on film meant that footage had to be sent to a lab in LA each night.

With all the effort involved, it was reasonable to ask, why not film in Fairfax itself, a half hour away? Fisk explains, “Fairfax has been decimated over the years, a case of natural destruction, tornadoes, a faltering economy, the passage of time. Lots of the buildings were condemned. The roofs were rotten. There were very few storefronts that we could work in safely, as opposed to those in Pawhuska.”

“This film is Marty’s western,” Fisk adds. “It’s a true story about our early existence. We were still forming as a nation. It’s a film about greed and love. You’re going over a period of time, and you’re seeing characters change and develop. I think it will transport people into another world that is really a part of all of us.”

Stills & behind the scenes images © Apple Studios.

NATIVE AMERICAN PRODUCTION DESIGN

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LOCATION SHOOTING

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Cold Comforts

Image © Polar X.

Shooting in stunning icy and mountainous conditions can be hugely rewarding, but requires the right equipment, permits, transport, weather and most of all expertise. makers speaks to filmmakers and experts used to the conditions to provide their insights.

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rom the French Alps and Scandinavian glaciers to the Andes in South America and national parks of North America, pretty much anything is doable in these conditions, but preparation and planning is key.

“We have miles and miles of mountain ranges in British Columbia, Canada that are great for filming.

But even when you’re scouting with your location manager, you’re still relying on a helicopter pilot and a mountain guide, who need to be brought into the conversation from the start,” insists production and location manager Hans Dayal.

MOUNTAIN LOGISTICS

“For the bigger projects like Man of Steel, which shot at Fortress Mountain [a former ski resort in Alberta), you’re taking multiple helicopter runs, dropping gear three days prior to the shoot, and setting up permanent, robust tent structures because when the weather is bad you can’t just fly off and need to be protected.”

The same was done for Christopher Nolan’s Inception, which also shot at Fortress Mountain.

“We built the set in dry conditions and then waited for the snow to arrive,” says location manager Patrick Subarsky, who worked as a production assistant on that film.

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Image © La Casa Films.

BUT SOME PROJECTS WANT TO BE MORE AMBITIOUS AND SHOOT IN FAR­FLUNG LOCATIONS. DRONES PROVE USEFUL IN THESE CASES FOR SCALE PLATE SHOTS, BUT NOT SO GOOD FOR STATIC FOOTAGE.

Once you have your structure in place, there’s the logistics of bringing crew and kit in for a shoot. Snow mobiles are often used in case of bad weather. “They can get you through sketchy situations where a helicopter clearly couldn’t fly,” says Subarsky.

In the Alps, English is widely spoken, and all the filmmakers and experts makers spoke to said there are plenty of film commissions and service providers in France, Italy and Switzerland, that everything is well organised, and it’s generally easy to get permits.

It’s also important to consider that there will be production crew drafted daily, like hair and make-up for the cast, compared with those who are hunkered down more permanently like the mountain safety guys and grips, and potentially the special FX team.

Ideally a production will shoot in a part of the mountains that is easily accessible. “That’s one of the benefits of Fortress Mountain, it’s a provincial park where permitting is already done before filming and you can easily drive around,” says Dayal.

But some projects want to be more ambitious and shoot in far-flung locations. Drones prove useful in these cases for scale plate shots, but not so good for static footage.

“It also depends on the “SOME PRODUCTIONS size of the drone,” warns EDIT TOGETHER DRONE Subarsky. “The larger FOOTAGE WITH THE ones don’t necessarily fit in the snowcats, EASIER, PARKING LOT and they’re sensitive MOUNTAIN FILMING, equipment so you can’t TRICKING THE carry them exposed.”

New Netflix movie, The Mother, filmed in Smithers, British Columbia, where the crew were able to drive right up to the face of the glacier. The filmmakers still made it look remote (with the help of drones shooting backwards away from the road).

“Some productions edit together drone footage with the easier, parking lot mountain filming, tricking the audience into thinking it’s completely isolated,” reveals Dayal.

In Norway it’s a similar story. “Filmmakers can fly into Oslo and within three hours by car they’re in the most mountainous region,” enthuses Joachim Lyng, managing partner at Film In Norway. “There’s good snow coverage from November through April, plenty of great hotels for crew, permits are free via the national parks, hospitals nearby, and we have great 5G coverage [almost] everywhere, which surprises people.”

In Canada’s Yukon there are plenty of unique, wilderness locations, including Canada’s tallest mountain. Several projects have ventured here, but with the support of locals, location managers and fixers to help source their cold weather needs, including clothing selection, equipment rentals, logistical needs, and health and safety considerations,” says Neil Macdonald, manager, Yukon Media Development.

And still filmmakers can make these popular, accessible locations look remote, “like you’re in the Himalayas, far from anyone, when actually you’re a few minutes’ walk from a cappuccino,” says Lyng.

Don’t forget the smaller things on set, like toilet facilities for the crew. “This could range from a bucket to fancy portable washrooms or heated units, but then you’ve got to consider transporting them to the site,” says Subarsky. “And there’s food to manage, basic sandwiches or larger offerings and a lunch room to retreat to. These need to be thought through.”

Filmmakers can even shoot in snow in the summer in Norway, including on the glaciers. “But we tend to find a place that has good facilities support, like the ski resorts,” says Jarle Tangen, service producer at Loop Film.

AUDIENCE INTO THINKING IT’S COMPLETELY ISOLATED.”

EXTREME ALTITUDE

In the Andes of South America, filmmakers also need to factor in the extreme altitude, with peaks as high as 23,000 feet. “Crew will need time to acclimatise and efficiency levels might drop due to Image © Patrick Subarsky, LMGI.

ARCTIC

LOGISTICS

MOUNTAINS

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Image © Loop Film.

PRODUCTIONS NEED A GOOD SAFETY TEAM TO GET CREW ON AND OFF THE MOUNTAINS, AND USUALLY A BASE CAMP AND EMERGENCY SLEEPING ARRANGEMENTS FOR PILOTS.

lack of oxygen the higher you go,” advises Jason Roberts, head of Polar X, based in Svalbard, Norway, who supports productions worldwide.

Most choose to shoot closer to cities at lower altitudes like Santiago, Chile where the weather is better. Axel Brinck of Santiago-based production service La Casa Films, says Patagonia is increasingly popular. “As long as you know the right places [as we do] and have your network of local support, and factor in the variable weather conditions.”

He cites a recent example of a shoot for clothing brand Moncler. “The mountains in Patagonia are smaller, but when you get above the tree line they look giant. So it looked like we were flying 7,000 meters over the Himalayas when in fact we’re at 1,500 meters. This makes it easier to get to a great filming spot too.”

It’s rare to have road access to snow conditions with helicopters and snow mobiles required to get to a filming location. “Productions need a good safety team to get crew on and off the mountains, and usually a base camp and emergency sleeping arrangements for pilots,” he says.

Filmmakers need to be aware of the limited light in the mountains. “It’s difficult for the DoP because the days are shorter and if you’re shooting in a valley there are only a few hours of sunlight,” admits Dayal.

Hazards like avalanches and adverse weather conditions need to be considered. “A huge part of Norway is coastal weather, so you can have squalls, high winds, fog etc,” says Lyng. “I never guarantee blue skies and sunshine.”

He says a South Korean film team wanted to shoot in early November (to fit with the star’s schedule) and needed snow coverage. “I told them it would be better end of November or early December. But they insisted. Although snow did fall at the time of the shoot, a weather front of wind and rain blew it away, so we had to bring snow in on big trucks and have the crew spread it out with tractors – which is more costly.”

DRONES

It’s the same unpredictability in Iceland. “Producers need to be prepared for sudden changes, including heavy snowfall in the winter, strong winds, and low temperatures,” says Bui Baldvinsson, owner of Hero Productions who are experienced in managing these challenges.

Global warming has added to this unpredictability.

Nicholas Sando, line producer and MD of Norway’s Filmbin, says. “We were shooting a project last year in Norway for five weeks at the end of November for the snow, but it was still completely green, so we “YOU NEED THE had to transport snow FILMING AREA TO from higher up in the BE PROPERLY mountains by truck.”

ASSESSED BY THE

This is where local EXPERTS FOR SNOW expertise is key. “You CONDITION, CREVICE need the filming area to OR AVALANCHE be properly assessed by RISKS, AND HAVE the experts for snow THEM ON YOUR condition, crevice or avalanche risks, and CREW TO ADVISE have them on your crew ON CHANGING to advise on changing CONDITIONS DAILY conditions daily and AND SAFETY safety recommendations,” RECOMMENDATIONS.” insists Subarsky. He supported the Syfy channel’s Resident Alien series, which partly filmed in Powder Mountain and the Pemberton ice cap where they had to be flexible with a smaller crew because of the changing weather.

ICE ADVENTURES

Local knowledge is particularly important in the tricky and remote polar regions. “Shooting in the Arctic and Antarctic is not only a different experience compared to other cold regions, but also between the two regions,” says Roberts of Polar X. “In the Antarctic you can only really shoot in the summer, and it’s hard to access and time consuming.”

Instead, feature film and television projects set in Antarctica tends to shoot in the northern hemisphere. “The smart thing to do is shoot it on Svalbard [the Norwegian archipelago between

ANTARCTIC

SNOW MOBILES

Image © Polar X.

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mainland Norway and the North Pole, known for its rugged, remote terrain of frozen glaciers and tundra],” adds Roberts. Paramount’s Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two and BBC mini-series The North Water shot there.

Not all productions are great at planning though.

“The guys in charge of some projects tend to struggle to make decisions and are concerned about costs,” warns Roberts. “The wise thing to do if you have a large crew heading to the region is set up fuel depots well in advance. But they tend to leave it to the last minute and fly things over by helicopter, costing a lot more money.”

Image © La Casa Films.

THE WISE THING TO DO IF YOU HAVE A LARGE CREW HEADING TO THE REGION IS SET UP FUEL DEPOTS WELL IN ADVANCE.

Tempering expectations of filmmakers is another common problem. Roberts says some have come to him with photos from the internet showing the northern lights, snow and a dark winter, saying they’d like to shoot all those over eight days. The reality is they’d need all four seasons.

The Arctic in the summer will exhibit less snow and more bare rock. “If they give a storyboard image and mood feeling, then I can tell them the season they’re after, and how to get crew in,” Roberts says. “For instance, where the runway is for the plane and where they can stay, which might be on boats or ships.

“Sometimes they’ll be factoring in things like chauffeurs, stopping traffic and police fees to their budget, as if they’re filming in London. I have to change their mindset to think more about things like getting a ship in and the crew onboard efficiently because it’ll be your unit base, factoring in comfort as well as things like power.”

Filming on the glaciers can also vary depending on place and time of year. “In Iceland, for example, with the glaciers close to the coastline it’s a steeper track up the mountains to the edge of the glacier, which can be tricky in winter time. So we choose inland glaciers for that season,” says Thor Kjartanson, a location manager with Scandinavia-based outfit Truenorth. “Some glaciers are flatter than others, or have more mountain rain, and views of the ocean.

Then there’s different elements like ice caves, glacier tongues, frozen glacier lagoons.

“For some of the projects we’ve worked on [including Midnight Sky with George Clooney], we’ve had to split the glaciers into sections for main unit, second unit and VFX. We have to explain that even though we can film on the glacier, it doesn’t mean we can take the main unit to the furthest location.

“On The Tomorrow War film, we also had to transport equipment to and from set in the dark (early morning and at night) because of the limited light in October/November during the day.”

Weather conditions are also important. “These can change super quickly,” adds Kjartanson. “You have to prepare to get everyone off at short notice safely,

GLACIERS

Image © Polar X.

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BLIZZARDS

STORYBOARDING

HANDLING CAMERA EQUIPMENT IN EXTREME CONDITIONS

“You can’t just move the cameras from extreme cold to warm conditions and back again, otherwise you get condensation. Cameras need to always be cold. It’s advisable to build special bags to keep the batteries warm though while on set.”

Joachim Lyng, managing partner, Film in Norway.

“You need a place to hide and stash your gear.

Not necessarily four walls, but three so you can shoot relatively wide and cheap, but still get different angles and looks. Or just have a small team with a couple of snowmobiles.”

Patrick Subarsky, location manager, Canada.

“On the glaciers, we bring in monster glacier trucks, which we modify into our equipment storage. The crew can work on the ice for a few hours and then retreat to the truck to fix and dry things and change lenses.”

Thor Kjartanson, location manager, Truenorth.

potentially in blizzard conditions, with the right navigation systems and vehicles [like glacier trucks).”

Back on the mainland in Norway, the ice has been used by many projects, including for Eon’s No Time To Die. The work involved to shoot the opening sequence of the last Bond on the Langevann ice lake in Nittedal was extensive.

“We had to build the lodge on columns through the ice,” explains Thomas Orderud of Design Ice. “Then we had to work late at night or early morning to smooth the surface outside the cabin so it looked like it would at the beginning of wintertime, a black ice with white spots from the first snow.

This was difficult because we were filming at the end of winter.”

Orderud also assisted with the underwater filming scene. “The intention was to shave the ice to get greater clarity, but the radiation from the sun started to turn the ice grey, soft, and dangerous to walk on.

We harvested a section of the ice and added fresh clear ice. We also persuaded the crew to cover the ice for protection when not shooting (using a special frame and insulation, and a cooling system with dry ice).”

Ultimately, if filmmakers choose to shoot on the ice and snow they need to be realistic about what’s feasible, consult with the experts who know best, plan carefully and factor in risks while shooting. If done properly, the rewards on screen can be stunning.

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BAHAMAS keys to the cays The secluded coasts and palm fringed white sand beaches can be reached in a mere half hour flight from Florida. With a cluster of islands to discover, the archipelago offers a variety of different locations within a short boat ride.

Other features to have shot there include Splash, Pirates of The Caribbean II and III; Jaws: The Revenge; Fool's Gold; The Silence of the Lambs; Pink Panther II; Duplicity and Children of God.

© Andre Musgrove.

Filmmakers entering in the Bahamas will have their first point of contact with the Bahamas Film Commission which is the hub for all information needed for filming on the islands.

The commission also provides the necessary permits for location scouting, equipment rental and crew hire.

From idyllic waterscapes found in Paradise and Andros Island, to the colourfully dressed buildings of its towns, the Bahamas is a tropical fantasy with high­class production facilities to suit various production needs.

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here is much more than meets the eye when dipping into the crystal clear waters of the Bahamas. One of those equipped with the experience to explore its depths is underwater cinematographer and photographer Andre Musgrove (above). With an impressive roster of projects, including multiple returns to Discovery’s Shark Week, Musgrove (who also works for National Geographic and the BBC) captures the extensive biodiversity of Bahamian sea life.

“For variety it’s just about getting new angles and new perspectives on things that happen in the ocean,” he says. “Because there are a lot more people filming underwater now with Go-Pros, I try to stay up to “THE ISLANDS ARE date with the content I put out HOME TO SOME OF there, making sure it’s at the THE WORLD'S MOST highest quality.”

BEAUTIFUL BEACHES INCLUDING PINK SANDS BEACH ON HARBOUR ISLAND AND THE FAMOUS CABLE BEACH IN NASSAU.”

Probably the main reason filmmakers choose the Bahamas is its stunning natural beauty and favorable weather conditions. The islands are home to some of the world's most beautiful beaches, including Pink Sands Beach on Harbour Island and the famous Cable Beach in Nassau. More than an idyllic holiday destination, the turquoise waters are perfect for water-based scenes and the islands’ lush green landscapes provide a luxurious backdrop.

It's a combination that provided a signature location to serial James Bond movies. From Thunderball in 1965 to Casino Royale in 2006 eight in the franchise have shot scenes on the islands.

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

Exuma is a district of the Bahamas consisting of 365 cays and islands each surrounded by emerald waters and harboured by pristine beaches looking inland to lush tropical vegetation.

While the majority of filming for the 2018 release Aquaman took place in Australia, the DC blockbuster could not resist the depths of the ocean for its underwater scenes.

Compass Cay and Staniel Cay offered stunning coral reefs and a wealth of marine life to enhance the authenticity of the film’s acquatic paradise.

Most famously known for their swimming pigs found at Big Major Cay, Exuma welcomes visitors from all over the world. With a responsibility to the wildlife on the islands, the region is home to a 176 square mile protected Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, where tourists can discover turtles, rays and a variety of colourful fish either by boat, diving or snorkelling.

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interview Oleh with Teteriatnyk T

he 32 year old Ukrainian director has had his fair share of challenges, including being forced to move to London due to the ongoing war in his homeland.

MAKERS MAG

How did you get your start as a director?

OLEH TETERIATNYK

Everything started when a miniDV camera fell into my hands when I was 12. I started to shoot everything around me and edited on an old computer with Windows MovieMaker. I read a lot and practiced a lot, mostly with Vimeo as my teacher.

After being confident enough to call up some television channels, and even get some work on air, I knew this was for me. Three years into my directing degree, I opted for the self-education route, hopping on the launch of The Voice Ukraine, connecting with other directors and working on some local content.

What is your relationship with the industry in Ukraine?

The Ukrainian local market and I had a rocky relationship during 2013. Unfortunately, with the budgets available from local companies, there was no possibility to create anything compared to the top-notch creations I followed in the media.

To me, the local market felt too conservative and seemed to have a delay with trends. I would rather decline a job I was not into and wait for the right opportunity. But over the years it has changed with a bunch of independent young agencies entering the market. I have close friends who work at Radioaktive Film and a few running Shelter.Film so I’m sure Ukraine will be a trendsetter even for global clients, and after the war it will become the best growing and innovative market.

What was the transition like moving from Ukraine to London in 2022?

It was my very first time in the UK and during my first few months in London I was depressed, broken-hearted and scared to spend any of my funds, set on finding a 9 to 5 job. I donated a lot to help finish this war swiftly, so my savings quickly melted away. I was sure that having a few major jobs in my pocket would help me to get some branded content to work on and have money for a living, but everyone told me that I should wait a bit and start to work on my level.

On the one hand, I’m lucky that I am in the UK but on the other hand, I haven’t seen my family for a year. I live between the news

coming from Ukraine and being an emerging talent in London, building myself to make my first major UK credit.

How valuable is your network to your work life?

It’s sometimes more valuable to have global connections than just having an excellent reel. I’ve met some of the best people in the industry and they all started from working for the pure passions of the job to securing some of the biggest gigs. I watch my friends who are at the top in London, and whilst they’re leading the industry, it feels like we are all in the same playground. That’s the kind of professional I aspire to become.

What is a memorable project for you?

Right before the war, I did my most extensive project for Mastercard in Ukraine, in Kyiv, and I am very proud of it. My friends Albert Zurashvili and Marina Karmolit from shelter.film connected all the dots and helped pull everything together. I did the concept and script for this job, starring famous Ukrainian fashion designer Svitlana Bevza and architect genius Slava Balbek.

The Mastercard team was so impressed that they invested in the project far beyond their initial budget. I created this spot, directed

it, and edited it. It felt like my gateway to the global market.

The campaign launched on national media and took over video billboards across Ukraine two weeks before the war. By chance, I was working with Alex Gregory from No8 London on this project and a few months later he became my sponsor to live and work in the UK. You have your hand in much more than directing.

How do you balance your creative endeavours?

My primary roles are directing and production, but I think I do well across the creative industries because each of my hobbies has become my job. I’m just following my interests. Zetetics, this Ukrainian English speaking band allows me to use my skills simultaneously.

Epiphany Sound on the other hand is a small sound boutique where we do sound design and music for commercials and movies, just three of us. I also run a tiny agency called Perfectionist with whom I’ve done a lot of brands and strategies in Kyiv for the best fashion and retail businesses in Ukraine. I naturally balance these jobs depending on the situation, but directing and music first.

Image courtesy of Kate Kondratieva.

UKRAINE

GLOBAL CONNECTIONS

UNITED KINGDOM

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THE BALTICS

Image: Paradise © Andrej Vasilenko/Netflix 2023.

making modern history

Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are all drawing international projects in, especially European dramas, thanks to their stunning historical and modern locations and enticing incentives.

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he Baltic States have been growing in popularity in recent years, attracting a number of projects including high-profile ones like Netflix series Stranger Things and Christopher Nolan’s Tenet.

The region’s production incentives worth between 20 and 30% certainly help, as does the experience and quality of the local crew, but it is the striking and varied landscapes and architecture that are the key drawcards.

HISTORIC AND MODERN SITES

In August, leading location managers from the US, Canada, Germany and the UK descended on the Baltic States to check out several of these exciting locations across the three countries, including the popular Lithuanian cities of Vilnius, Kaunas, Palanga and Trakai.

“THEY ARE ATTRACTED NOT ONLY BY THE PROFESSIONALS WORKING HERE AND VARIOUS TAX BENEFITS BUT ALSO

BY VERSATILE LOCATIONS.”

One of those in attendance was John Rakich, president of the Location Managers Guild International (LMGI). He says: “Vilnius is architecturally very diverse and has great potential. I understand why foreign film crews choose Lithuania: they are attracted not only by the professionals working here and various tax benefits but also by versatile locations.

Many different architectural styles can be found in Vilnius: from older historical elements to modernism or futuristic styles.”

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

Liepaja, Latvia This port city boasts pristine white sand beaches surrounding a city centre of pretty turn-of-the-20th century wooden buildings dating from when Liepaja was a major naval hub of the Russian empire. There’s also an intriguing area in the north ideal for filming called Karosta, which used to be a secret Soviet military town.

The city is at the northern end of lake Liepaja and just one hour from another increasingly popular filming location, Palanga, in neighbouring Lithuania.

Korean spy thriller Harbin, directed by Woo Min-ho and lensed by Hong Kyung-pyo (Parasite), shot in Liepaja recently, doubling the city for Korea in the early 20th century.

The production was serviced by Latvian outfit Film Angels Studio and accessed the local film incentive.

Last year, Netflix shot futuristic film Paradise, a co-production between Germany’s Neuesuper and Lithuania’s Ahil, in the Lithuanian capital city (and the cities of Klaipeda and Palanga). Stand-out

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Q&A NELE PAVES FILM COMMISSIONER

Estonian Film Institute

locations in Vilnius included the former government guest house in the Zverynas neighbourhood, Antakalnis cemetery (where a huge sculpture was specially built) and the neighbourhood of Fabijoniskes with its stark multi-storey concrete jungle, playgrounds, courtyards and sprawling streets.

© Gabriela Urm.

The film’s German production team were clearly impressed. “Vilnius has always been a production friendly city and you can always trust that the process will run smoothly here,” says line producer Stephan Barth.

Q: Can you tell us about international

projects shooting in Estonia?

A: We’ve had a lot recently. The US horror film, Azrael, filmed in our forests in 2022 (when it was cold, damp and dark, so I felt sorry for the crew, but they got what they needed). This year we’ve hosted the SwedishNorwegian-Finnish-Estonian period drama The Swedish Torpedo; the French-SwedenEstonia-Greek film, Apathy; Finish-Estonian drama Never Alone; Finish film Missile and the Finnish-Estonian film Orenda. Plus, plenty of television series, especially from Finland, who we co-operate with a lot.

We get interest from Hollywood, especially since Tenet, which solidified our status as a trusted, super-modern and hard-working country.

Q: Have you had international productions

asking about safety because of the war?

A: Yes, especially the US studios, but we assure them it’s safe. We had a group of LMGI members here recently who went to the south and east of Estonia and briefly to Tallinn, which most people are familiar with. We are quite a small country and not many know about all that we offer, but they were really impressed, especially with the Idu-Viru region in the north east.

Q: Tell us more about the region.

A: Idu-Viru is right next to Russia. There’s a lot of unused soviet buildings that are architecturally magnificent and appealing to foreign productions, especially from the US. The LMGI loved these and the natural scenery – forests, rugged coastline, long sandy beaches and the hills in the south.

The Viru Film Fund is also a factor. Planning is underway for a 21,500 sqft soundstage due to open in 2025.

Q: What’s the latest with the

Local supervising location manager Jonas Spokas, adds: “The German team found many interesting and alternative angles of our city. Vilnius can have many faces. The Fabijoniskes district, for example, a few years ago was filmed as the Soviet Union in the 1980s, then it became current day Malmo and for Paradise it features in a futuristic story.”

The city recently doubled for 19th century Austria in the popular RTL+ historical drama series Sisi about Empress Elizabeth. Shooting took place at Vilnius university, the Lithuanian Writers Union, and the Lithuanian Philharmonic Society building, which impressively doubled for the Hofburg Palace.

The production team had to do a good job of hiding the trappings of modern life, including covering windows and a nearby cash machine and temporarily closing the nearby outdoor cafes.

“There were two reasons why we made a decision to shoot the series in Vilnius,” says series director Sven Bohse. “One was film funding but also the very experienced production companies and crews, stunning old buildings, and… horses. Everything that you need for shooting historic movies.”

The Vilnius Film Office works with filmmakers, helping to organise shoots in public spaces and institutions and issuing permits. The Lithuanian Film Centre administers a 30% rebate. The city is so popular that there might be a problem with productions competing for space in the coming months. “We have conversations between location managers to see which days we’re filming, so we’re not treading on each other’s toes,” says Spokas.

An increasing number shoot across both Lithuania and Latvia, as was the case with Sisi, taking advantage of locations and incentives. Capital city Riga with its wooden buildings, art nouveau architecture and medieval old town is proving particularly popular, while interest in the port city of Liepaja is growing (see location highlight).

“It’s only a four-hour drive from Vilnius to Riga, so it’s easy to travel from one to the other,” says Spokas.

The one thing lacking is studio space, he concedes.

Tallinn Film Wonderland complex?

A: They are finalising the signing the contracts

for the land and the funding. We hope to have the first phase ready by end of 2024. When complete it will be a full-service complex with costume, warehouses, catering, everything.

Most producers come for the locations, but this will give us the complete package in terms of attracting and hosting productions here.

The Baltic Film & Creative Tech Cluster, which supports over 80 local companies, supplies production services and kit rental, offers studio space, including a 1,100 sqm soundstage and 350 sqm green screen. Kino Studios, where HBO’s Chernobyl filmed, is also a viable option. But the local industry is calling for more.

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“The Vilnius city municipalities are looking into it, and there are some private initiatives ongoing.

Hopefully we’ll have more studio space soon,” adds Sparkas.

POST TENET

Image: Tenet © 2020 Warner Bros.

ESSENTIAL FACTS TAX INCENTIVES

30%

Lithuania offers a 30% incentive – at least 80% of eligible production costs must be incurred in the country and minimum spend there is EUR43,000.

Latvia has a cash rebate (co-financing programme) of 20-30% dependent on criteria – open to fiction features/animations with a budget of at least EUR711,000 and documentaries (EUR142,287). This can be combined with the Riga Film Fund worth 20-25% on eligible production costs. The delegate producer for both funds must have at least 50% of funding in place at time of application.

Estonia offers a 30% incentive to feature films with a budget over EUR1 million and minimum spend EUR200,000 in Estonia, television series with a budget over EUR300,000 (EUR70,000 minimum spend), as well as animations, documentaries and post production work. Plus the regional funds.

There’s been a lot of interest in Estonia following the arrival of Tenet in 2019 and the announcement that a major new studio campus and soundstage complex, Tallinn Film Wonderland, is being built.

The first phase, set for completion in 2024, will see three soundstages of 14,000 sqft, 8,900 sqft and 5,400 sqft, and the renovation of three other buildings representing more rental space. Further big studios of around 27,000 sqft are planned for the second phase, 2027 to 2030.

Meanwhile, international producers are taking advantage of Estonia’s locations, including islands, Soviet-era architecture, medieval castles and manors, beaches and forests, and the enticing national 30% cash rebate. These include the German-UK film Last Sentinel, Finnish series All the Sins, Icelandic feature Driving Mum, and UK feature Burial.

There are also appealing regional funds available – the Viru Film Fund in the Idu-Viru region in the north-east, which is a cash rebate of up to 40% of local spend, up to a EUR200,000 maximum; the Tartu Film Fund, also a cash rebate, worth 30% (in the southern city of Tartu); the Film Fund of Estonian Islands, with a budget of EUR27,705 for 2023 (which is yet to be used by international productions), and a brand new fund for the west region as well. Plus, Estonia’s first private film fund – Tallifornia Film Fund.

“Producers are cleverly combining the funds on projects because everyone is scrambling for budgets,” says Nele Paves, film commissioner, Estonian Film Institute. “They can combine the minority co-production money from the institute, the national rebate and the regional funding and so get a big chunk of money from a small country if these locations match their scripts.”

SOMETHING ELSE

Energy security is extremely important for the governments of the three Baltic States. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led to all three states cutting energy imports from Russia.

Fortunately, the 2022/23 winter proved milder than expected and high heating costs depressed domestic energy demand, so natural reserves have remained high. But the states are also rapidly moving ahead with plans to diversify energy supply.

All three governments are encouraging domestic households to produce solar energy with Lithuania aiming for one third of households generating their own electricity by 2030.

In August, European Energy unveiled a huge solar farm in Anyksciai, Lithuania, which will have more than 140,000 solar panels when it is connected to the grid in Q4 2023. Estonia is leading the way with 10,000 solar producers producing nearly 500 MW of energy.

The construction of new LNG facilities and investments in renewables look likely to ensure the region’s energy independence from Russia.

ATA CARNET

YES CO­PRODUCTION TREATIES

Lithuania: France. Latvia: Canada. Estonia: France, Canada, Israel & China. All three are members of the EU Convention on Cinematic Co-production.

Image: Stranger Things © Tina Rowden/Netflix.

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Programming a Programme THE DEBATE AROUND AI’S PRESENCE IN THE WRITERS’ ROOM IS MOVING AS FAST AS THE TECHNOLOGY ITSELF.

While many believe that human creativity will always prevail over AI in the script (programming) process, experts and writers are divided on how and whether the tech will be controlled.

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A

rtificial Intelligence is not a new device within the screen industry. It has been used extensively as a creative tool and co-pilot throughout elements of gaming, animation and special effects work, with software like Midjourney and RunwayGen2 opening up new possibilities.

“Almost everyone will have used AI ten times or more today without even realising it,” says Dr Alex Connock, a senior fellow and media entrepreneur at the University of Oxford’s Said Business School. “Things like predictive search,

Netflix recommendations, autocomplete and product selection on Amazon. Even taking a photo on your iPhone uses 12 layers of deep learning.”

AI has also been used as a supportive tool in the writing world without too much fuss so far. It has assisted scriptwriters in overcoming writer's block, generating fresh ideas and improving the quality of their scripts through real-time feedback.

But where it becomes a point of concern is when it is too heavily relied on or even takes over as the default for Hollywood scripts.

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IT’S GOING TO BRING A GREAT DEAL OF SAVINGS, BUT ALL I THINK IS THIS IS GOING TO BE REALLY DANGEROUS WHEN THE SO-CALLED UTILITY STARTS TO BECOME ABUSED AND WE LIMIT THE CREATIVE TALENT.

Interestingly, AI itself is not convinced of its complete influence. When posed with the question of whether it is capable of taking over the role of a screenwriter, ChatGPT responded: “Screenwriting is a highly creative and artistic endeavour that involves crafting compelling narratives, developing unique characters, and conveying emotions and themes in a way that resonates with audiences.

These are uniquely human qualities that AI, including myself, does not possess. AI can be a valuable tool to support and enhance the creative process for screenwriters, but it cannot replicate the depth and richness of human storytelling.”

Those in the industry are not so sure. “It’s going to bring a great deal of savings, but all I think is this is going to be really dangerous,” says film producer Angus Finney (Candy). “This is when the so-called utility starts to become abused and we start to limit the creative talent that we depend on so much to write and also imagine stories, universes, landscapes, and characters that we can relate to.”

Stage and screen scriptwriter and director Daniel Bailey agrees there needs to be caution with AI. “I think there is certainly some benefit to using Gen-AI, in plagiarism scenarios and legal disputes, but I expect, like with anything, for us to approach it with scepticism... until we fully understand it, I would treat it with caution. And that isn't to say we should fully reject it, but find a regulated and practical use for it.”

As platforms like ChatGPT and Google’s Bard continue to develop and be more influential, the defensive barriers from the industry have risen. This came to a head earlier this year when approximately

TECHNOLOGY

11,500 US-based writers went on strike, citing the impact of AI on the creation of scripts as one of their chief reasons.

The Writers Guild of America (WGA) was particularly concerned about the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers’ (AMPTP) initial rejection of “annual meetings to discuss advancements in technology.”

Fortunately, the two parties came to an agreement at the end of September that won concessions including on the use of artificial intelligence.

The new rules guard against several scenarios that writers had feared, including studios being allowed to generate a full script using AI tools, and then demanding that a human writer complete “65% OF UK the writing process.

SCREENWRITERS BELIEVE THAT AI

Equally, studios cannot WILL REDUCE THEIR use AI to write or edit INCOME FROM scripts that have already WRITING, AND 61% been written by a writer.

ARE WORRIED THAT The contract also THE TECH WILL prevents studios from treating AI-generated COMPLETELY content as ‘source REPLACE THEM.” material’, like a novel or a stage play, that screenwriters could be assigned to adapt for a lower fee and less credit than a fully original script.

Companies also have to disclose whenever they give writers material to work with that has been generated

by AI. Effectively, the contact terms mean that AI is under the control of the writers, not the studios.

GENERATIVE AI

SCREEN WRITING

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But some writers on both sides of the pond are still not convinced the matter is fully resolved and concerns remain about the parameters of AI control.

“I'm not sure if I believe that at some point AI will be smarter and more sophisticated than any of us, and if there's no ceiling for it who's to say it won't convince us or itself that its experiences aren't real?,” questions Bailey. “I'm being cynical, but I do hope the human lived experience would forever separate us from any other life form. However, we have written a consciousness for inanimate objects and robots before... how do we know how they feel?”

TECHNOLOGY HAS MADE SOME INDUSTRIES MORE EFFICIENT AND IN SOME CASES SAFER AND FAIRER BUT IF WE SUDDENLY HAVE AN ALGORITHM WRITING OUR EXPERIENCES WE COULD SEE A DECLINE IN WRITERS FULL STOP.

Back in April, the Writers Guild of Great Britain (WGGB) sent a survey to its members about the impact of AI and discovered that 65% of respondents believed that AI will reduce their income from writing, and 61% were worried that the tech would completely replace them.

“There have been some incredible advancements in AI, but as with any new technology we need to weigh the risks against the benefits and ensure that the speed of development does not outpace or derail the protections that writers and the wider creative workforce rely upon to make a living,” insists WGGB deputy general secretary Lesley Gannon.

“As quite an unknown entity we will probably struggle to find who is responsible and I think that is where the grey area exists,” adds Bailey. “For now, I think writers and studios should be extra vigilant about work that resembles past workings of a writer without their knowledge.”

The likelihood is that there will be further changes to the rules and requirements on the use of AI in the coming months and years. Not only could language around copyright shift, but as more writers become more familiar and even more comfortable with AI as a tool, fears and restrictions will change.

FOR MORE MAKERS AI CONTENT Page 19 AI, an engine for creativity.

Page 90 AI ads but at what cost?

Page 126 Interview with Pinar Seyhan Demirdag.

Page 160 Double trouble for actors.

“There are so many writers who have unfinished work and potentially AI scripting tools might be able to help complete those stories. Where we might have a stumbling block or mental fatigue AI could bypass that,” commented Bailey. “AI is being used already to help formatting scripts and produce dialogue, I can only see that becoming more advanced. It could bridge the gap for adaptations but I don't want to dream too much as I'd much prefer production companies and studios employ me!”

For some, like screenwriter, producer and avid AI user Bob Schultz (Breakdown Lane), the panic may be misguided and potentially obstructing

EVOLUTION

COPYRIGHT

PROGRAMMING

58

movement with the industry. During a webinar held for industry professionals in October, Schultz delved into the WGA-AMPTP strike agreement, and what it means.

“I think a lot of the anti AI sentiment comes from a place of existential crisis; that is not my experience,” Schultz remarked. “Copyright as we know it is bound to change, so we need to be ready for that.”

Like many evolutions of technology, the need for adaptation is crucial to not being left behind. This is how Schultz views the presence of AI in the world of screenwriters. He believes producers will favour “excellent and fast over excellent and slow” submissions from screenwriters, and that the present restrictions will hardly apply to the future between writers and AI. Whilst the WGA-AMPTP agreement states: “The company can’t require the writer to use AI software (e.g. ChatGPT) when performing writing services,” the business of the screen industry will inevitably overpower in some cases, as efficiency outweighs the slower process of creativity.

“With all industries we've seen the devaluation of the human workforces that have turned to technology,” says Bailey. “It has made that industry more efficient and regulated, and in some “THERE ARE SO cases safer and fairer.

MANY WRITERS WHO But in this field, if HAVE UNFINISHED we suddenly have AI WORK AND writing our experiences POTENTIALLY AI through an algorithm we SCRIPTING TOOLS could see a decline in MIGHT BE ABLE TO writers full stop. There is a valid response of HELP COMPLETE anxiety when your THOSE STORIES.” livelihood feels like it's being threatened. If big corporations can get the work done for a significantly lower price and standardise the quality then that feels like a knock-on effect, a repercussion.”

Across the board, AI is not seen as a viable replacement for the complexities of humanity behind written content for the screen. But, whether friend or foe, or somewhere in between, there is a shared sentiment that caution should not be thrown to the wind. Lacking any real government guidelines, agreements come across as simple acts of good will.

As the business of the screen industry prevails, all means to preserve that will be at play, ultimately leaving the creatives in a fearful state.

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What’s the Small Idea?

Very Small Creatures © Aardman Animations.

Aardman’s Executive Creative Director, Sarah Cox, discusses the development process and how she protects the kernel of an original idea as it evolves from pitch to show to global brand.

A

ardman Animations has created some of the most iconic shows, films, and characters in animation history, but little is known about how they navigate the tricky yet magical world of development. How do they balance the needs of all the stakeholders, from creatives to platforms, voice talent to comedy writers, and from character designers to L&M departments? And how do they protect what’s good about a concept as it makes its way from brain to page, and screen to shelves?

In a Creative Masterclass, delivered at The Children’s Media Conference, award-winning development maestro Sarah Cox discussed her process through the lens of recent Aardman projects.

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The company’s international expansion began with Chicken Run (2000) conceived with a little drawing by Nick Park on a napkin of a chicken holding a tea spoon standing next to a wire fence.

“This encapsulated the whole idea of the film and how it would develop through production to marketing to become the best-selling stop motion feature in the world,” Cox said. “It shows that one little nugget of an idea can help inspire the crew, keeps us on track, informs every decision and then helps sell it to financiers and the audience.”

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The Adventures of Robin Robin © Aardman Animations.

ONE NUGGET OF AN IDEA CAN BE WHAT HELPS INSPIRE THE CREW, KEEPS US ON TRACK AND INFORMS EVERY DECISION AND THEN HELPS US SELL IT TO THE FINANCIERS AND THE AUDIENCE.

The trick of course is discovering and understanding what that small idea is in the first place. It is often her gut instinct rather than the bells and whistles sales pitch where the real germ of an idea is found. It was a lesson she learned in Annecy long before Aardman when Cox had her first big pitch turned down.

“Often it is off-the-cuff ideas that are the most interesting,” Cox recalled. “The commissioner invited me to have one more chance. I told her an idea based on my daughter who was desperate for a wee and that the whole family had to become superheroes to find a toilet. I’d never dare pitch it normally but I felt encouraged.”

Although it took six years, Nina Needs To Go ran for two seasons on Disney Jnr and was Cox’s first show created and developed from scratch.

Joining Aardman in 2017 she had a different task.

“A company with four Oscars and 15 Baftas means there’s no clean slate. You are trying to insert something into a 40-year legacy. Working with existing characters or new IP comes with a very high level of expectation from broadcasters and audiences alike.”

The Aardman process of development will be familiar to many animation producers and revolves around comedy, story, character and craft.

Take comedy: “We don’t just mean some funny lines we mean intrinsically funny concepts. Chicken Run is a heist movie with chickens rather than a heist movie with funny dialogue. Our style is witty, cheeky, absurd, joyful. Our audience comes with those expectations but we also want to surprise them.”

Aardman characters are often underdogs or maverick. Its stories are relatable to a global audience, usually families. It is known for stop frame but applies that level of craft to every aspect of filmmaking and into games, 2D and CG.

IDEAS

“Since stop motion takes up a lot of studio space, we plan our slate 5-7 years ahead,” she says. “This is around four strands: new IP, building on existing IP, legacy projects (such as Wallace & Gromit) and co-productions.”

THE VERY SMALL CREATURES: LEGACY IP

In the legacy category is an evolution of classic 1980s series Morph where minor (pun intended) characters were formed from pea size balls of plasticine.

The Aardman team toyed around with various iterations but nothing landed until director Lucy Izzard came on board. She came with a completely different idea that got off the ground so much faster.

“Sometimes you have the right talent but the wrong project. We eventually found the right match.”

Izzard developed the idea for toddlers including lowering the camera’s eyeline and giving each one a colour and a personality.

“ALL THOSE IDEAS AND VALUES THAT YOU SET IN DEVELOPMENT HAVE TO BE STRONG ENOUGH TO MAKE IT ALL WAY THROUGH TO MERCH AND PROMOTION.”

“We didn’t colour code them so that blue is a cold and red is emotional,” Cox says.

“They are each curious, positive and funny and we celebrate the difference. That’s the underlying theme of the show.” Sky Kids has commissioned two seasons to date.

LLOYD OF THE FLIES: NEW IP

To create an entirely new piece of IP, Aardman issued a call for ideas. Director Matthew Walker was one who responded and whose idea made it to the shortlist.

His pitch was an animated Giff of a fly plus the pun of the title which was enough for Cox to greenlight further development, which Walker did in the form of a comic strip.

CONCEPT

ANIMATION

Lloyd of the Flies © Aardman Animations.

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“Lloyd is essentially like a 10-year-old kid questioning his fate and feeling insignificant. We loved the idea internally but raising money form broadcasters was hard since there were questions about the look of the central character. People were nervous about the maggots and red eyes but Matt was keen not to anthropomorphise too much. This didn’t make it the easiest show to tell and wanted to stay true as we could to the director’s vision.”

I Am Your Mother © Aardman Animations.

Initially prepped as a 2D animation, Cox asked the CG team to make version to inform development and this made the whole show click. CITV commissioned a 52 x 11’ CG series – Aardman’s first. A 2D web spin-off The Adventures of Arachnofly followed.

I AM YOUR MOTHER: CO-PRODUCTION

PEOPLE WERE NERVOUS ABOUT THE MAGGOTS AND RED EYES BUT MATT WAS KEEN NOT TO ANTHROPOMORPHISE TOO MUCH.

The fourth strand of Aardman development is working with other producers. The trick here is to maintain the Aardman voice and weave in the unique characteristics of the partner studio.

LucasFilms were on the hunt for European animation companies for anthology series Visions which revolves around Star Wars lore. They came to Aardman as a voice from the UK. Cox issued another call out for ideas, filtered those, then sent them back to LucasFilm. They chose one from Polish writer-director Magdalena Osinska based on her own experiences of coming to film school as a young adult and feeling embarrassed about her mum being with her. That was translated onto a sci-fi planet with the daughter an aspiring fighter pilot.

“It wasn’t easy to get the tone right because we were trying to get an Aardman voice along with the voice of the director and that of LucasFilm in a 10-minute film and to align that with different writers and editors in the team.

“The way we solved it was going back to character.

When you are really stuck with script or story think about the character, who they are and what they want and how they would do things.

“For me the mother character (Kalina). She had to be embarrassing and likeable. We had to create a rift between her and her daughter, but you need to like them.

When we got the first character designs of Kalina from the story artists it was clear she was loveable but embarrassing. Most of what we do is very script driven not visual but having Kalina in mind helped us get out of a script loop. But it can sometimes take years to get it right.”

IP

DEVELOPMENT

CO-PRODUCTION Executive Creative Director Sarah Cox.

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ROBIN ROBIN: BEYOND PRODUCTION.

Writer directors Mikey Please and Dana Ojari pitched Cox an idea about a little robin who had fallen into a mousehole and was brought up by family of mice.

Now a teen, the robin is noticing her differences.

“When Mikey pitched this to me in a restaurant in Annecy he knelt on the floor and started singing like a robin. It was a musical. I immediately knew it was right for Aardman.”

Since this was already a fully formed idea, Cox questions how Aardman could creatively engage and add value.

“The seemingly simple story they pitched isn’t so simple when you break it down,” she says. “Who is Robin? What is her problem? Does she know she can fly?”

Practically, what should media would work for the story? They tried plasticene and paper but neither worked. But felt did. Concept artist Matt Forsythe created drawings that had a gentle mood and tone that they liked.

“This project used a lot of the skills our crew have in armatures and puppet building but this time with felt. We created a new animation process that worked for that story, while the directors had the support of a big studio.”

Netflix funded a 30-minute special released for Christmas 2022. Once again, there a core idea that held the show together from concept to marketing.

“We used the IP to develop a book, branded coffee, a partnership with the RSPB and promotion on the cover of the Radio Times. All those ideas and values that you set in development have to be strong enough to make it all way through to merch and promotion.

Aardman has since developed a 52 x 7’ episode CG preschool series The Adventures of Robin Robin.

“We took the thinking of stop frame and applied it to CG,” Cox says. “The series is lit and coloured as you would for stop frame and animated as if photographed on a rostrum camera. Hopefully Robin Robin will become one of those legacy IPs that we are tasked to make.”

Although these shows were began from deceptively simple acorns, Cox’s final message is to be open to working with people.

“If I had gone to Steven Spielberg with a drawing of a chicken we would not have Chicken Run. It had to be Nick Park doing that. If you’ve got good talent then support that talent by listening to their silly bonkers ideas.”

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PROFILE

Liverpool Film Office From humble beginnings Liverpool is now in a position where it’s seen as something of a powerhouse in the world of film and television thanks in no small part to its 35­year­old Film Office.

F

rom the Lumière Brothers’ first footage of the city in 1896 through to The Batman in 2022 Liverpool has been home to thousands of productions. Just this year Taylor Swift shot the promo for her latest video I Can See You in the fabulous Cunard Building, one of the iconic Three Graces on the city’s waterfront.

profile of Letter To Brezhnev (1985) and the global success of Chariots of Fire, in which a host of Merseyside locations made appearances, the City Council began fielding lots of calls from producers about potential locations.

It was at this point that the council decided to create the new post of Film Liaison Officer to deal with all these enquiries.

The 51st State (2001) starring Samuel L Jackson paved the way for more huge Hollywood productions including Sherlock Holmes (2008), and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (2010), which came to the city for a week to shoot a key scene in the Queensway tunnel. Other blockbusters followed including Captain America (2011), Fast and Furious 6 (2013), Jack Ryan (2014), Fantastic Beasts (2016).

It was however the bleak economic reality of life of a declining industrial port that was mostly reflected on film up until the end of the 1980s. This was symbolised by Boys From The Black Stuff – by local writer Alan Bleasdale, still seen as one of the most important dramas ever made in the UK. To mark its channel launch in 1982, Channel 4 commissioned new soap Brookside which was uniquely set it in a real street where all the houses were owned by the production company (Mersey Television). The show ran for 21 years and was where several writers, including Jimmy McGovern, got their first breaks.

You can trace the step change in Liverpool becoming a major force as a film city to the creation of the Liverpool Film Office in 1989. Due to the high

THE DEPOT

The Depot (pictured above) launched in 2021 and features two 20,000 sqft of purpose built shoot space for use by high-end film and television productions with the added advantage of being located closer to the city centre than any major UK site. At the same time, the Liverpool City region Production Fund was created to drive the further growth of the region’s film and television sector through investment in a range of high quality content.

The fund has already invested in successful productions such as Time, The Responder, The Ipcress File and Help.

A scene from The Batman shot at St George’s Hall © 2022 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

“This was groundbreaking move given Liverpool’s economic plight at the time and the fact that New York was probably the only other city in the world with an equivalent role,” says Lynn Saunders, Director, Liverpool Film Office and Managing Director, The Depot.

It quickly became obvious that filmmakers loved places that could stand in for London or New York because they were difficult and expensive to film in and it was also increasingly difficult to find areas of these cities that looked like they did a 100 years ago.

Liverpool was in the fortunate position that it still has immaculately preserved Georgian streets as well as a surfeit of buildings that looked grand both inside and out.

“Areas like Falkner Street, or the North Docks can, with a bit of cinematic magic, be made to look like the London or New York of 200 years ago. It’s also much easier and cheaper to close a road down in Liverpool than it is in London plus the local region features many natural assets including a stretch of coast on both sides of the Mersey.

Saunders adds, “The Liverpool Film Office has gone from strength to strength and has been absolutely integral to the city and the wider region’s success in attracting film and television productions here.”

By 2022 it was no surprise that Warner Bros. chose Liverpool as stand in for Gotham City to shoot some of the biggest set pieces for The Batman.

TV dramas have filmed here too, notably Peaky Blinders, which shot the first series entirely on location in Liverpool, although the production was based in Manchester and part financed by Screen Yorkshire.

“We are a city that has shown we can host some of the biggest, most expensive, technically accomplished films and television shows ever made,” Saunders says.

The Film Office has been central to the story of Liverpool film and from its humble beginning is now effectively acting as a screen agency which does so much more than its previous brief around scouting locations, arranging permits and closing roads.

Indeed, recent developments mean that it will now be bringing the skills remit within its brief with a BFI Skills Cluster, named Screen Alliance North, in partnership with North East Screen, Screen Manchester and Screen Yorkshire, supported by the BFI, awarding National Lottery Funding to make the screen sector more accessible and representative and to build a thriving and skilled workforce across the North of England.

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The French VP Connection

An LED sound stage at the new Dark Matters virtual production facility on the outskirts of Paris.

France is embracing the virtual production evolution with stages cropping up all over the country and the studios experimenting with new tech like XR, motion capture and robotics.

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ith the French production boom and Netflix and Amazon creating more local language content, the demand for virtual production (VP) stages “has increased considerably in the last few years in France,” says Yasuharu Nomura, head of VP technology and services for Sony Corporation, who have just opened a VP stage in Seine Saint Denis, north of Paris.

The impressive site is a joint project between Sony, local VP company Plateau Virtuel and Studios de France, consisting of a suspended 90 sqm curved Sony Crystal LED screen (so productions can slide floors underneath) combined with its Venice camera technology. There’s also an LED ceiling that allows productions to do an integration if necessary.

Fabien Pisano, sales director, media solutions, Sony Europe, says, “The project was born after filming a campaign for the European Space Agency in VP using the Venice camera. The production was good but Plateau Virtuel wanted to go even further, that’s where the discussion began. How to take VP to a higher level in terms of reproduction but also in terms of quality on set.

“The DoPs and other creatives know they’re getting high-quality with us. They can create or re-create pretty much anything and make it look good. Recently we had sand on screen and on the floor and it really looked like a desert environment,” adds Pisano.

Nomura says the big studios and streaming giants are very interested in shooting at the Paris site and across their other VP stages in China, Japan, LA and the new one at Pinewood Studios.

PUSHING BOUNDARIES

VP really exploded during Covid-19 when productions were heavily restricted in their travel movements and so this contained environment where you could recreate several locations in one place seemed ideal, and more sustainable. That sparked a mass of VP stages to be built around the world and France was no exception. But, as with the Sony stage, there is a desire to push tech boundaries, rather than just build stages for the sake of it.

For example, at the new Dark Matters VP facility just outside Paris, which offers six customisable stages (including LED walls) spread over 15,000 sqm, they have developed a number of new technologies in-house. These include better low-light LED performance and sub-pixel tracking quality and systems that are compatible with any combination of camera body and lenses. One of the stages is also a motion capture studio (the largest in France), following the success of the tech on films like Avatar and Lord of the Rings.

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“A lot of the things we’re doing are brand new, whether it’s hardware innovation, mechanical electronics or even experimenting with robots too,” says Romain Cheminade, co-founder and VP specialist at Dark Matters. “But we can also push the existing tech, so rather than always working in 3D through Unreal Engine, we have manipulated plate captures to get as much pixel as we can with the highest colour definition.”

The Next Stage has been built to accompany the regular sound stages at the famous Provence Studios.

CREATIVES KNOW THEY CAN RE­CREATE PRETTY MUCH ANYTHING. RECENTLY WE HAD SAND ON SCREEN AND ON THE FLOOR AND IT REALLY LOOKED LIKE A DESERT ENVIRONMENT.

Cheminade concedes though that it can be a tough sell sometimes to producers when filming things like a car, bus or boat, “when there’s a lot of costly gear required, and if not done right you can damage the hardware. So, we’re working on adapting that,” he says.

Dark Matters is also researching methods to lower energy consumption by up to 60%, as well as working on adding a mobile structure to its LED walls, enabling it to modify the complete geometry of the wall in record time and adapt to the needs of each production.

While at Studio 51 in Paris, they are also experimenting with the tech, offering real-time VFX facilities where the production team can put actors or television presenters in front of a green screen, have different cameras focused on them, and view the backdrop in real time.

“We can adjust the angles, lighting, get the actors/presenters to interact with the backdrop and set, and even use cranes to get different movements and perspectives. We see what the audience sees in real time and can tinker on the spot,” says Cyrille Larrieu, VR project manager at Studio 51. “It’s a lot cheaper process than traditional green screen as there’s no longer a need for lengthy post-production.”

Leading event service company PRG has also set up a new xR (extended reality) studio within the TSF Cinema Studios in Paris, powered by disguise, which can be adapted to virtual production. It offers lighting effects, camera tracked objects or performers in a 3D environment, and interaction with augmented reality graphics or even a holographic duplex. It is also possible to use a photogrammetric scan, a technique that consists of taking a multitude of pictures of real objects to recreate a digital copy that is faithful in every detail.

“We capture pre-recorded and live content from projects ranging from a live-streamed corporate presentation to a dynamic music video featuring an immersive virtual set,” says Laurent Boillot, production director PRG France.

VARIETY OF SIZES AND LOCATIONS

But it’s not just the north of France taking on and adapting the tech though. In the south at the famous Provence Studios, a new xR studio, The Next Stage, has been built to accompany the regular sound stages.

They are also experimenting with new tech at Studio 51 in Paris.

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“Our new virtual stage is actually a U shape, rather than circular, and we’ve been working on a variety of projects, including horror film The Nun II [not a genre you’d normally associate with VP) where our

controlled environment was used for dramatic stunts and special effects, including car scenes,” says Morgann Brun, project manager at La Planete Rouge, owners of The Next Stage. “There was even an emotional scene that was supposed to be shot outside the studios in winter, but they decided to do it in our stage instead.”

These new French VP stages aren’t massive either.

They are mostly medium size, but can still accommodate a variety of projects and content, from corporates and commercials to documentaries and television shows.

“We are hosting a diverse selection of projects at our stage in Paris, which is about 90 sqm. For the bigger projects, they can be selective about what and how they shoot in the VP stage, depending on what makes sense,” says Pisano. “Where I actually think we’re lacking is in the small stages, which can be less expensive in terms of hardware and location, and can deliver on smaller work and budgets in “THERE WILL BE terms of size and MORE MOBILE LED timescale. Half the SET UPS WHICH CAN advertising world could BE TRANSPORTED sit in these. We’re going DIRECT TO AND to see a generation of WRAPPED AROUND studios that will have the THE SETS.” capacity to scale up.”

Cheminade agrees: “I think the stages and systems will shrink to fit the minimum required to achieve what you need at a more cost effective level. Plus, there’ll be more mobile LED set ups which can be transported direct to and wrapped around the sets.”

GOVERNMENT SUPPORT

This VP tech and stage drive and capacity to scale up or down has been partly fuelled and supported

by France 2030, an ambitious, government-backed funding scheme to transform the local infrastructure and skill levels. In the film and TV sector this manifests as a EUR350 million public fund investment (combined with about EUR1.5 billion of private money) in sound stages, digital studios and training the next generation of talent.

“This investment in the sound stages and infrastructure, combined with our stunning locations, is helping encourage a lot of the projects to shoot all over France for several weeks and seasons, not just doing most of the filming in the UK or Eastern Europe then just shooting say the Eiffel Tower or Provence,” says Vincent Florant, digital director, CNC (France’s National Cinema Centre).

So far the plan is working with a greater number of long term shoots and stages being used, while innovation with the tech is only likely to get better.

The big challenge is training and nurturing the talent and competency of the next generation to work with the tech. “I think filmmakers and technicians will only get better with using this tech, realising the potential as well as the limits, as they collaborate and experiment more and more. These are exciting times!” concludes Pisano.

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Sensitivity to Light

Moonlight, Barry Jenkins’ 2016 Oscar hit photographed by James Loxton ASC © Spirit Entertainment.

Filmmakers would like to believe they have empathy with their subject but the degree to which they actually do when committing stories to screen is being questioned. makers spoke with cinematographers about a pioneering new approach called Digital Melanin Cinema which aims for the industry to adopt a more nuanced approach to lighting diverse skin tones.

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rom the roots of its invention the fabric of cinema has inherent bias. Stemming from a deliberate decision to prioritise the aesthetic qualities of Caucasian skin over darker skin tones in the chemical composition of colour film stocks, the accuracy of how non-white people look on screen has largely gone unchecked. The same bias is ingrained in digital cinema systems perpetuating the false assumption that darker skin tones require more light or are harder to film.

A group of South African filmmakers and scientists are attempting to change the narrative by promoting a new universally accepted standard to filming, photographing and processing melanin rich skin.

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“The film industry been around for more than 100 years during which people have oriented around a body of knowledge,” says Mandla Dube, director and cinematographer (Silverton Siege) who has pioneered Digital Melanin Cinematography (DMC) with fellow filmmaker Ndumiso Mnguni.

“Non-Caucasians were not active in producing film stock. Film was expensive and not easily accessible, limiting representation and how we could portray ourselves in our own stories. When the industry migrated to digital the status quo continued.”

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I May Destroy You © BBC, Various Artists Ltd, Falkna & Natalie Seery.

IT WOULD BE A DISSERVICE TO ARTISTRY IN GENERAL TO DICTATE ANY PARTICULAR STYLE. IT ALWAYS COMES DOWN TO EMPATHY. DOES THIS LIGHTING WORK FOR THE CHARACTER IN THE STORY AND FOR THE HUMAN ACTOR?

DMC, they explain, is a study of how the appearance of skin from the people of the African and Indian diaspora is affected in media. They have partnered with South Africa’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CISR) to devise a tool that cinematographers can use to more accurately calibrate a digital sensor to photograph skin tones of all hues.

“Understanding how pigment is created and perceived through the human experience gives the study of melanin cinematography a foundation before translating into something that sensors can understand and reproduce accurately and beautifully,” says Dube. “We are building a colour chart that can sample skin tones to assist the cinematographer in rendering a wide variety of skin tones.”

Just as important for Dube and Mnguni is to provoke dialogue among filmmakers in the hope of establishing best practices for the curation of images that respect all skin tones.

“We’re not saying that African skin has never been rendered beautifully through cinema history,” says Dube, “but we are saying there’s a lack of consistency of standards and that we have a framework that will yield the best results. Digital Melanin is a chance to interject new information into the curation of the digital negative and become part of the growing body of knowledge in film.”

The filmmakers hope SMPTE and The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will take notice. Discussions are also important within cinematographer guilds. Reference monitors would also need calibrating to the same standard in order for cinematographers and colourists to see the results of their work. Ideally, all display panels from televisions to smartphones would also be built to take account of digital melanin’s skin tone accuracy.

LIGHTING

“Clearly, this is not going to happen overnight,” said Dube. “We will need the collaboration of engineers, filmmakers and studios globally if we are going to be intentional about changing the rendering of all skin tones.”

Their work has already made an impact. Sony Pictures’ The Woman King was shot in 2021 in South Africa by Polly Morgan ASC BSC with Digital Melanin’s guidance.

Netflix is also supporting the initiative. The streamer has invested USD160 million in African originals since 2016 including commissioning Dube’s Silverton Siege.

“Netflix is talking to us about how to integrate our ethos into work shot for Netflix Africa,” said Dube. “Naturally, a lot of content shot here now mostly features African skin tones in front of camera.”

“UNDERSTANDING HOW PIGMENT IS CREATED AND PERCEIVED THROUGH THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE GIVES THE STUDY OF MELANIN CINEMATOGRAPHY A FOUNDATION BEFORE TRANSLATING INTO SOMETHING THAT SENSORS CAN REPRODUCE.”

Google made improvements to the auto white balance on its Pixel smartphone to better capture darker skin tones. Announcing the development in 2021, Google said it would focus on making images of people of colour “more beautiful and more accurate.”

The Digital Melanin approach doesn’t just concern lighting but encompasses a production-wide embrace of wanting to see people correctly on screen. Skin is the largest organ of our bodies, something all of us are highly conscious of, and it

MELANIN

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Mangrove © BBC, McQueen Limited, Kieron McCarron & Des Willie.

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provides us with important non-verbal information such as perceived ideas of age, health, and cultural background.

Rye Lane’s cinematographer, Olan Collardy, on set.

HOW SOMEONE LOOKS AESTHETICALLY ON CAMERA CAN HAVE A HUGE IMPACT ON HOW THEY PERCEIVE THEIR SENSE OF SELF­WORTH.

“How people are portrayed in cinema has a profound effect on how people see themselves,” said Dube. “Growing up I was watching Caucasian people rendered in a way that looked beautiful and larger than life. That has an effect on your self-esteem. How someone looks aesthetically on camera can have a huge impact on how they perceive their sense of self-worth. This is gradually starting to change and we want to show how we can part of moving that further upstream. This is the philosophy of DMC.” SENSITIVITY TO LIGHT IS NOT JUST FOR THE SENSOR For cinematographer Olan Collardy (Rye Lane) the approach is less about tools and technology and more a mindset.

“Anyone should be able to tell a story about characters from a different culture to them but the onus is on the filmmaker to do due diligence in ensuring they empathise with the culture whose story they are telling,” says Collardy.

Empathy means listening to people when they say ‘this is how I like my skin tone to look on camera’.

That might mean working with make-up artists to tone a skin tone down or apply more oil to the skin to make it more reflective.

“As a black person I know how another black person on set must feel. Everyone has vulnerabilities and insecurities and the last thing an actor needs is for a producer or director to say ‘so and so is looking a bit dark, Can we can put some light on them?’.

It’s a misconception that when you light a darker skinned person you need more light. Collardy says, “It is okay to embrace shadows with dark skin as long as there is information and shape in the image.

You need more shape to ensure that you’re not losing the contour of faces. That’s what makes any face look good. The last thing you do is bring a light and just blast it into actor’s faces because then the image will look washed out.”

“It would be a disservice to artistry in general to dictate any particular style,” he insists. “For example, when shooting dark skin tones there is no mandate to use warm light. That is one person’s philosophy.

It always comes down to empathy. Does this lighting work for the character in the story and for the human actor? Am I doing them justice by keeping the shape of their face?”

FILM

Insecures © 2018 Home Box Office, Inc.

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DIGITAL

SKIN TONES

Collardy says he tends to get asked to shoot black stories. He says the script treatment will often call for a visual style for skin tones to either look like Moonlight, Barry Jenkins’ 2016 Oscar hit photographed by James Loxton ASC, or to look like HBO comedy drama Insecure.

“There’s a danger in putting a particular way of shooting something on a pedestal,” he says. “When Moonlight and Insecure came out everyone tried to regurgitate that look.”

One technique used on Insecure was to shape the actor’s faces using rotating polarisers which angle the light in such a way as to reduce reflections.

“It was a new and fresh look we’d not seen on TV that made black people look delicious. Then every DP started using polarisers which homogenised the process.

“There are many films shot by white DoPs and white directors where black people look amazing.

All I’m saying is that the process should be about doing research and ensuring you have integrity in your work and that you are not shoehorning some process you have heard about somewhere into your process. It still has to be authentic.”

INHERENT BIAS Historically the industry standard for capturing images was centred around Shirley cards which were used to calibrate skin-tones and light.

They only featured Caucasian people up until the 1970s where photographers shooting commercials raised concerns over not being able to capture the ranges and variations of colour found in wood and chocolate.

Shirley cards were distributed by Eastman Kodak to photo labs and featured photos of “similar-looking alabastrine, brunette white women,” according to Kaitlyn McNab writing for Allure.

“Shirley became the standard for colour correction, the yardstick used for processing by technicians, and now, a symbol of the skin colour bias deeply rooted within the world of photography,” she writes.

While FujiFilm began to alter its colour stocks to better reproduce Asian skin tones, the R&D from Kodak the world’s dominant film stock manufacturer persisted in the transition to digital.

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Making of ADLaM Display

TWO BROTHERS, MICROSOFT AND MCCANN TEAM UP TO SAVE A LANGUAGE FROM EXTINCTION

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A

DLaM Display, a project digitising and evolving the West African Pulaar alphabet

by McCann New York and Microsoft was awarded the Grand Prix design award at Cannes Lions.

Pulaar is the language spoken by the Fulani people in West Africa, but had been at risk of being lost as people were “forced to use the language of their colonisers – Latin and Arabic,” the team explains.

Previously without an alphabet, two brothers from Guinea, Ibrahima and Abdoulaye Barry created ADLaM for the Pulaar language.

Existing in handwritten form and incompatible with digital formats, this project created a digital version allowing the Fulani people to communicate digitally and preserve their culture. McCann New York partnered with the brothers and collaborated with a group of expert typeface designers to create a revised version of the alphabet that was easier to read and write.

Importantly, the new typeface was updated to include new letter forms that take into account how the alphabet has naturally evolved within the Fulani

community. To fight illiteracy, a key goal of the project, McCann and the brothers created educational materials for Guinean schools, including a children’s book designed to teach the ADLaM alphabet and elements of the Fulani culture.

The new digital version of ADLaM is now integrated across Microsoft’s global platforms including in the Microsoft 365 suite of programmes.

The chief creative officer was Shayne Millington working with Kathleen Hall of Microsoft.

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Making money out of the metaverse is real THE BIGGEST MYTH ABOUT THE METAVERSE IS THAT IT'S JUST HYPE, SAYS JUSTIN HOCHBERG, CEO OF THE VIRTUAL BRAND GROUP. TODAY IT ALREADY BRINGS BILLIONS IN PROFITS FOR BRANDS INCLUDING TELEVISION PRODUCERS.

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he metaverse is not a prediction, it is a profit opportunity here and now.

Historically, it has always been difficult for 99% of people to understand what the 1% are doing, until they put it to practical use. Think of the PC, the internet, social media… the sceptics have always outnumbered the believers.

Developing a successful activation is all about iteration. Regardless of the platform (Decentraland, Sandbox, Roblox) you can try something, look at the data, and adjust it. You can’t do that with a television show once the programme airs. It’s one reason why the metaverse is redefining how entertainment can be consumed on a 365 days a year basis.

At Virtual Brand Group (VBG), we know the metaverse isn't just hype because we’ve proved the market. VBG made international fashion company Forever 21 the number one retailer on Roblox in less than six months, and we're selling millions of products in the first month. We also launched Barbie's first metaverse clothing line with the #TwinWithYourAvatar campaign, which went viral, driving millions in earned media while converting virtual consumers into real-life shoppers in Forever 21 stores.

VBG is also at the forefront of creating a physical and virtual (aka phygital) retail environment that delivers new products and more revenue faster than ever. The first NFT merchandise drop on the pop-up The Voice event sold out in three hours.

In partnership with ITV Studios we designed and launched The Voice Studios as a permanent global hub for the massive international television format The Voice. This followed a highly successful activation of a pop-up The Voice experience during the Decentraland Metaverse Music Festival. We saw users spend an average of 49 minutes per session – generating 13 times more engagement than on social media platforms.

We see the metaverse as a tremendous untapped business opportunity. At VBG, we work with brands to help them connect with youth culture and find ways that are not being serviced by existing television, print or social media.

Broadcasters and programme brands have historically found it hard to meet their audience but this is where the metaverse opportunity lies. Now they can meet even when the show isn’t on television through a global hub that gives fans ways to interact and build things.

At The Voice Studios, fans can buy and wear virtual clothing. For first time in the history of any television show we have official merchandise that mirrors what the coaches give out on the show itself. Fans will flock to metaverse experiences like this because it is more like real life.

Interactions between celebrities and fans and among communities are the biggest difference between metaverse platforms and traditional social media like TikTok or Facebook. Social media is not actually very social. For example, if a celebrity posts something, you might write back a comment and or you might post a picture or a hashtag but your comments will get lost amid the noise of thousands of people doing the same thing. There’s very little way for me to connect with you. It’s a limited experience.

What makes virtual worlds so sticky is that they are social experiences. Virtual worlds are like going to a party, a festival or to the park – places where we are around people and we can have a more personal conversation. This is why visitors are likely to spend multiple hours a day playing in virtual worlds rather than the 10 minute average visiting a physical retail store.

Yes, The Voice Studios is experimental but virtual worlds are not speculative.

Three decades ago, the first widely available web browser, Mosaic, was released with 10,000 academics exchanging papers about it.

Today, with virtual worlds, we have 600 million people as the starting point. We all have a smartphone to access the metaverse. It doesn’t require another piece of hardware or special technical knowledge. The adoption rate will be significantly faster.

It took people a while to realise that the Internet was more than just a visual brochure – it was a way to conduct e-commerce. Our perspective is why not start from the onset with that perspective?

Our proof is real. Every partner that we consult with is all about how quickly we can convert your metaverse business to be USD20 to USD50 million.

Over the past 25 years, Justin Hochberg has combined technology, content creation and brands to build intellectual property into innovative consumer businesses resulting in over USD500 million revenue. He is a former Microsoft executive, and former producer of the American version of The Apprentice. As co-founder and CEO of the VBG, Hochberg analyses the opportunities that the metaverse creates for brands and the conditions for exploiting its potential.

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KAZAKHSTAN

hidden potential

Kazakhstan is building its profile as a filming location with rarely screened scenery, an attractive 30% rebate and a recently launched Eurasian Film market. makers uncovers what the country has to offer.

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he Central Asian country of Kazakhstan is putting itself on the filming map with a recently set up National Cinema Centre working hard to draw productions in following the arrival of Netflix’s Marco Polo series a few years ago.

Indeed, Netflix recently returned to Kazakhstan to shoot the movie Tamerlan, directed by Jacob Schwartz, about the Timurid Empire founder. Local stunt company Nomad supported the film.

“This is a significant project for us. We have participated in projects for Netflix before [including Marco Polo], but our team will be fully responsible for all the action,” said Nomad founder Zhaidarbek Kunguzhinov in a recent interview.

Kazakhstan is also attracting several commercial productions. Local service providers The Martini Shot, for example, recently worked “WE ARE ALWAYS on Beeline for a local telecoms PROMOTING THE company, and Smile Stories for COUNTRY TO NEW the Colgate-Palmolive company.

The former was shot over two MARKETS TO BRING days, including at the Charyn INTERNATIONAL JOBS Canyon (see box-out) and IN AND FURTHER ITS Bartogoy Lake, while the latter DEVELOPMENT.” filmed at a Kazakh school.

“We have strong filming experience in Kazakhstan,” says Lyuda Salashchenko, head of production at The Martini Shot. “We are always promoting the country to new markets to bring international jobs in and further its development.”

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

The Charyn Canyon Located in the Charyn National Park in southeastern Kazakhstan and stretching over 80 kilometers, the dramatic Charyn Canyon boasts towering, red-rock formations sculpted over millions of years, which give it an otherworldly appearance.

Referred to as the mini Grand Canyon and split into five canyons – the Valley of Castles, the Temirlik Canyon, the Yellow Canyon, the Red Canyon and the Bestamak Canyon – the striking location is about 215km from Almaty with roads along the bottom and signs in English.

Charyn Canyon has been used as a backdrop for many music videos, commercials and films and TV series, including the popular Netflix show Marco Polo.

One country to take a particular interest in Kazakhstan is India, according to Gulnara Sarsenova, founder of local production service providers Eurasia Production House and Eurasia Film Production, whose projects include the Oscarnominated film Mongol and Tulpan.

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“The two countries are connected by a convenient direct flight from Almaty to Delhi,” explains Sarsenova. We have conducted several location scouts in the Almaty region for production companies from Mumbai because it has very diverse nature, including mountains, canyons, steppes, waterfalls, and even deserts!”

MORE INCENTIVES

The variety of scenery is undoubtedly a draw. From the majestic Altai Mountains in the east to the vast steppes in the west, Kazakhstan offers terrain that can represent everything from harsh deserts to lush forests.

In Almaty there are five natural zones offering mountain peaks, glaciers, forests, rivers and endless steppes, and the Almaty Film Commission can assist with locations, equipment rental, permits, local crew and actors.

ESSENTIAL FACTS TAX INCENTIVE

30% A 30% cash rebate is available for filming in Kazakhstan.

TIME ZONE

GMT+5 Kazakhstan is the largest land-locked country in the world with the longest continual border (about 7,500km).

It is home to a staggering 120 ethnic groups and nationalities.

It is also home to Lake Balkhash, the 15th largest lake in the world, which is split by freshwater in the west and saltwater in the east ATA CARNET

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There are also financial incentives for shooting in Kazakhstan, most notably a 30% cash rebate for international productions that spend a minimum of USD850,000 in Kazakhstan, but also it’s cheaper thanks to affordable accommodation and low labour costs.

“The film production industry is well developed in Kazakhstan, and the overall costs for equipment rental, location hire, casting and filming crew fees are competitive compared with the European market,” says Salashchenko. “There are no progressive overtimes yet and no additional charges if the shooting takes place over weekends or national holidays. Combine this with incredible locations and it makes Kazakhstan very attractive for foreign productions.”

THERE ARE NO PROGRESSIVE OVERTIMES YET AND NO ADDITIONAL CHARGES IF THE SHOOTING TAKES PLACE OVER WEEKENDS OR NATIONAL HOLIDAYS.

Kazakhstan is also ideally located between Europe and Asia, so it’s easy to travel and transport crew and equipment in. To further strengthen this connection, the Eurasian Film Market was recently launched.

As an annual forum, the market aims to promote business relationships within the film sector between the two regions. The first forum took place in September in Almaty and was attended by leading outfits, including the National Cinema Centre (which promotes and supports Kazakhstan as a filming location), Sulpak Cinema and Tiger Films.

There are more than 50 production companies working in Kazakhstan in total. Many are based in Almaty and some in the capital city, Nur-Sultan, both of which boast modern infrastructure and facilities and a growing pool of skilled film professionals.

The largest state-owned facility is Kazakhfilm Studios, offering soundstages, post production facilities and workshops, which has hosted a number of productions, including Mongol and historical epic Nomad.

As the country continues to invest in its film industry and streamline the permitting process, it will become even more attractive to international producers.

SOMETHING ELSE

The Kazakhstan government is pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into rural development projects to renovate or build new roads, schools, medical facilities, sports and cultural centers, modern water and sewage systems, as well as homes and office buildings.

This is a major effort to try and prevent the mass migration of people to the cities, like Almaty and Astana, which happens every year.

It will also benefit filmmakers looking to shoot all over the country in need of good infrastructure and better logistics.

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Healthy Creativity IN TODAY'S FAST-PACED PRESSURED WORLD HEALTH AND WELLNESS HAS TAKEN CENTRE STAGE IN PEOPLE'S LIVES As individuals become increasingly conscious of their well-being, the market for health and wellness products and services has exploded. However, in this saturated marketplace, consumers are not just looking for products, they want meaning and authenticity. makers explores how agencies are trying to achieve both.

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he wellness industry is absolutely booming, worth a staggering GBP2.8 trillion worldwide, according to the Global Wellness Institute. And it is expected to grow further still with forecasts from GlobalData analytics showing the average British consumer is likely to spend GBP487 per head annually on wellness-based products and services.

However, despite the expansion, consumers are becoming more discerning, prioritising brands whose messaging aligns with a more conscious mindset, which has created a shift in the marketing.

Authenticity in health and wellness marketing goes beyond slick advertisements and empty promises. It involves building trust, delivering value, and genuinely caring about your customers’ wellbeing.

Encouraging transparency, education and customercentricity, creative agencies are imaginatively guiding brand clients into the wellness space.

“We have recently seen the healthwashing of consumer products, where mainstream Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) marketers are trying to provide a healthy benefit for their products. It’s similar to the greenwashing trend we saw a decade ago – neither particularly projects the advertising industry in a positive light,” says Rich Levy, chief creative officer of leading healthcare marketing agency Klick Health.

This is why creating quality wellness-based and health-accurate content requires “a commitment to scientific rigour, creative responsibility, and ethical considerations,” adds Laura Denham, SVP and executive creative producer at Klick Health. “We have to be mindful of the potential impact our content may have, or how it could shift perceptions.

I also believe, by rejecting myopic thinking and including more diverse voices (both creative and expert) we can better speak to a global health community.”

“As we continue to scale globally on the heels of opening offices in London, Singapore, and São Paulo, that’s something that really reinforces our commitment to ensuring our strategic thinking and creative content are representative, diverse, and accurate.”

Klick Health was awarded Gold, Silver and Bronze awards at Cannes Lions for their recent campaigns, which aim to blur the line between the multimillion pound health and wellness industry and entertainment. These included projects like the book category winner The Congregation for podHER, The Bridge for PAWS NY in the Digital Craft for Animation competition, and Pharma Lion recipient Lifesaving Radio created for NextMed Health.

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There’s also been a growing emphasis on authenticity, inclusivity, and holistic well-being, according to Denham. This was reinforced at Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity this year where the ideas that really stood out were about taking action and focused on impact and results. “The ideas that resonated were those that made a positive change in people’s lives,” she says.

Inclusiveness and accessibility were particularly key.

The health and wellness companies and initiatives have a history of failing to include communities of non-white races or the lower class, and therefore the marketing neglected a significant proportion of the market.

Lifesaving Radio is the world’s first AI powered healthcare radio station, designed to improve surgical accuracy and efficiency. With a growth in consumers wanting to take control of their own health, seeking out personalisation from the brands they interact with, marketing campaigns are diverting away from simple product placements, and are rather offering real life solutions that encourage a trustworthiness and sense of understanding of the consumer.

AUTHENTICITY IN HEALTH AND WELLNESS MARKETING GOES BEYOND SLICK ADS AND EMPTY PROMISES. IT INVOLVES BUILDING TRUST, DELIVERING VALUE, AND GENUINELY CARING ABOUT YOUR CUSTOMERS' WELLBEING.

Another company to understand this shift was Partners Life, which won the Cannes Lions’ Health and Wellness Grand Prix for highlighting the importance of life insurance.

The company’s campaign, The Last Performance, was created with Special New Zealand, Auckland, and featured the death of characters from The Brokenwood Mysteries television series. Played right before the credits rolled throughout the entire latest season, the humorous timing of the commercials shed an important light on the reality of New Zealanders being one of the most underinsured populations in the world.

On the win, jury president Mel Routhier, chief creative officer at VMLY&R Chicago, commented: “It’s a product that nobody wants to think about, much less buy. It’s an idea that uses media in a brilliantly creative and innovative way, and actually finds a way to put the words entertainment and advertising side by side. You actually want to watch that thing that so many people skip.”

“Ultimately, people want to live healthily and happily,” says Denham. “We don’t just want wellness, we need it. This is a universal desire and important to us all. We are seeing this in the stories advertisers are telling, and in the content people are interested in most.”

Levy adds: “Healthcare advertising is making huge strides to be timely and relevant. Every year, we’re seeing more and more examples of unbelievable creative work that provokes action for people to take responsibility for their health.”

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Unfortunately, in an effort to seem more socially conscious and inclusive, some brands have come across as ingenuine, often causing more harm than good. The right campaigns can potentially shape cultural shifts.

“Oftentimes, ads and “AS A GLOBAL campaigns mirror culture COMMUNITY WE back to us,” argues NEED TO SEE IT Denham. “Great ads are TO BELIEVE IT, AND influenced by culture, WHEN WELLNESS but this impact isn’t IS DISTORTED, OR unidirectional, as ads can also influence COMPLETELY MISSING culture. This is why FROM ADVERTISING, representation matters IT IMPACTS CULTURE and why seeing a MASSIVELY.” healthy and strong version of wellness in advertising is so important. As a global community we need to see it to believe it, and when wellness is distorted, or completely missing from advertising, it impacts culture massively. This can change the way communities do (or don’t) take care of themselves and prioritise wellness.”

In an interview with AdAge on the launch of Welltertainment earlier this year, Andre Gray commented: “[The industry] continues to try to treat people like they're media metrics – that we can just buy a billboard.”

Combining wellness and entertainment, the aptly named Welltertainment is a product of Havas creative agency, led by Eric Weisberg, global chief creative officer of Havas Health and You, and Andre Gray, chief creative officer of Annex88. They are signing clients that focus on important areas like diabetes, obesity, mental health, paediatric asthma and sexual wellness, and prioritises the positive storytelling of these conditions, erasing stigma and allowing marketing initiatives to educate consumers approachably.

As more companies in the health and wellness sector choose to take this path, putting the consumer’s needs first, marketing will continue to shift in a positive way, bringing advertising and culture together in a meaningful way.

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PROFILE Milk Energised and expanded under new ownership, super boutique Milk aims to become a fully­ fledged production partner for VFX shows.

T

en years ago a small team of artists and producers from postproduction powerhouse The Mill set up shop to target VFX for television. The small team won three consecutive BAFTAs (Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and Doctor Who) and an Emmy for the BBC/Hartswood’s Sherlock while co-founder Sara Bennett became the first woman in twenty years to win an Oscar for VFX for Ex Machina (2016).

the owner-operator philosophy. We wanted a culture where people felt they were empowered to make decisions, not where they felt like a cog in a machine.”

Many of Milk’s employees are allocated shares in the company as part of a long term incentive plan (LTIP). To that end also, Samra says, there will be a cap on expansion.

“We are a super boutique. We do not want to be the scale of other VFX companies.”

A mammoth two-year project is a case in point. Milk is the sole vendor supplying around 2000 shots for eight-part NBC series Surviving Earth, guided by Emmy Award-winning VFX Supervisor JeanClaude Deguara. Milk is a coproduction partner “working hand in glove” with producer Loud Minds.

“Money and scale don’t always buy you success,” Samra says. “If we can continue to engage as a close production partner then relationships will become stickier. We want to be talking to production when they not bidding for a show. We want to be sharing our creative ideas outside of a bidding process.”

Subsequent credits include Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald; Kingsman: The Golden Circle; The Martian, The Woman King and BBC/Amazon’s Good Omens which earned the team a BAFTA nomination in 2020.

Having grown to 200 people in 2020 came a step change in ambition with new owners Bizet Media.

Formed by former BBC Group commercial director Bal Samra and ex-investment banker Jag Mundi, Bizet had a plan for “Milk 2.0.”

“We believe that VFX is a poor child of the production cycle,” explains Samra. “VFX sits at the very end of the process but is integral to narrative and should be a part of production development.

We could see Milk was really creative and doing some fantastic work but believed we could improve the quality bar further. We started to strategically place ourselves in that position by injecting cash into technology and people.”

One reason for the international expansion is to circumnavigate Brexit which has made it harder for talent to come to the UK. Milk also have an eye on local markets. Plus, it gives the group leverage to offer regional tax incentives to productions. Experienced executive Marianne Speight (previously at MPC and Dneg) heads up business development and bidding teams across the Group.

Its operations are connected to a shared data centre under the supervision of Steve Macpherson, the Dneg co-founder, who joined as CTO last year.

Milk founder Bal Samra.

Beginning with the acquisition of premium factual specialist Lola Post Production in 2022, Bizet added facilities in Bordeaux, Barcelona then Dublin to the Milk family.

Samra says, “We looked at where the opportunities were and concluded that we wanted to continue to be premium in terms of the work we did but not be a factory. We wanted to be talent led and hold onto

“While we are flexible with hybrid workflows, we maintain physical locations because tactile collaboration remains important,” insists Anthony Chadwick, director of strategy and special projects.

“Young talent develops faster and are more successful when they can be mentored on the job.

The experience of looking over people’s shoulders and asking questions is vital.”

Bizet’s underlying belief is that VFX should be more upstream in production. “When the VFX team is involved at a project’s conception producers are more likely to get the best creative and most efficient output,” Samra says.

BIZET MEDIA

Milk VFX is part of Bizet Media’s wider strategy. It also owns companies in production and in production solutions. The latter includes Dublin postproduction outfit High Wire acquired in June.

“Each company operates in its own right,” Samra says. “If there’s an opportunity to collaborate they do, but if not, they focus on their own business. Producers want to work with best of breed, not to have partners forced on them.”

Part of Chadwick’s remit is to explore new technologies. He views AI as a tool and not one that will replace jobs wholesale.

“Just as roles changed with the introduction of more powerful rendering farms or procedural animation software, AI is the next evolutionary step.”

Samra adds, “We engage with any technology by asking how can it enhance creativity and storytelling. We are totally focussed on that.”

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AI Ads at What Cost?

Images courtesy of The Coca-Cola Company.

With the unprecedented control and accuracy that AI provides in identifying and targeting audiences, brands can expect to see a major shift in the way they approach campaigns. But how can anything machine-generated, devoid of actual lived experience, captivate an audience with a brand message?

T

he inconvenient truth for the advertising industry is that many tasks currently performed by humans can now be accomplished more efficiently, reliably, and cost-effectively by automation. Competing against both massive consulting firms and specialist boutiques, conventional agencies with complex structures, bureaucratic processes and unnecessary overheads face a daunting task to keep pace.

“Automation changes the game for optimising promotions in real-time to ensure effective placement, messaging and targeting to maximise impact and return on investment,” says Ajaz Ahmed, CEO and founder of AKQA who says his company has a automation-first mindset.

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AI and Gen-AI tools were used in over half of submissions to the Digital Craft category of the 2023 Cannes Lions with mixed results, according to jury president Resh Sidhu (global director of Arcadia Creative Studio). While the winner, Never Stop Evolving (AKQA for Nike), used AI it did so in a manner which the jury felt “connected on a human level.”

“Using ChatGPT alone is not enough,” Sidu said.

“Often you get dazzled by the technology, but what is it actually doing? Is it good design? The use of a tool with creativity and with purpose is what is going to drive great work.”

Advertisers are committing to AI-driven marketing transformation. Coca-Cola, for example, invited anyone to play with the brand’s iconography using GPT-4 and DALL-E.

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AI IS FOUNDATIONAL TO GOOGLE ADS. FOR MANY YEARS, IT HAS BEEN QUIETLY HELPING IN THE BACKGROUND, SUPPORTING ADVERTISERS IN MAXIMISING THEIR TIME AND RETURN ON INVESTMENT.

Through Coke’s Create Real Magic platform, artists could download and submit their work for the opportunity to be featured on billboards in New York’s Time Square and London’s Piccadilly Circus.

On the one hand this is a piece of marketing by the brand that sought to get ahead of the game in which digital creators were already appropriating brand artwork (also from film and television shows) to mash up into new clips posted online.

But it is also part of a more extensive AI-based rewiring of the drink giant’s marketing output. Led by internally promoted head of Gen-AI, Patrik Thakar, Coca-Cola partnered with consultancy Bain & Company to implement OpenAI’s tools across its business operations. Coke says it wants to move quickly to test, learn and scale ideas using AI. “It’s an experiment to see where co-creation can take us,” Thakar said about Create Real Magic.

“We’re moving at the speed of culture with an innovative program that’s very tangible for the creative community.”

Google is promoting Gen-AI tools that can automatically create online advertising campaigns personalised to users' search queries. Among other things the tools compose copy on the fly to make ads more closely match searches and potentially increase click-thru rates.

“AI is foundational to Google Ads. For many years, it has been quietly helping in the background, supporting advertisers in maximising their time and return on investment,” Jerry Dischler, GM of Google Ads explained.

Advertisers need only provide a link to a landing page on their website describing their product or service, and Google's systems will do the rest – automatically producing ad content based on that input. Tools generate backgrounds for product images based on typed prompts, auto-adjust the sizing of ads to suit different apps and slash the time and money spent on human design work.

FOR MORE MAKERS AI CONTENT Page 19 AI, an engine for creativity.

Page 56 Writers programming the programme.

Page 126 Interview with Pinar Seyhan Demirdag.

Page 160 Double trouble for actors.

Google’s dominant role in online ad sales means the industry could be one of the first to broadly incorporate Gen-AI into their workflows. Meta and Amazon have similar algorithmic systems in play.

And as TV becomes ever more connected to the online ecosystem expect the longer form ad to follow suit. Research published by Ampere Analysis and sponsored by Microsoft forecast that the global addressable TV sector could be worth USD87 billion by 2027 aided by Gen-AI. Dave Osborn of Microsoft Advertising, said: “As many advertisers now see addressable television as

a core part of their media mix, their focus will shift to take full advantage of the capabilities of addressable television and innovations such as generative AI and emerging technologies.”

Serviceplan, profiled on page 149, is circling AI from every angle, looking for the advantages.

“My personal perspective is that it can be amazingly helpful, particularly in analysing data,” says Alexander Schill, Global CCO. “For me the most important thing before I read any script is to ask what the intent is. If the creative does not have the right answer for that then I don’t read “AS GLITCHES ARE the script. AI can help FIXED, THE AI PLAYING creatives understand FIELD WILL SHIFT what people think and TOWARDS VALUING feel in order to find PERSONALITY OVER the right insight that ERADICATING IT.” connects.”

AI may be great for analysis but Schill is less sure about AI’s role in campaign execution. “I can imagine that Gen-AI will probably become a visual language that we get used to.”

How can anything machine-generated, devoid of actual lived experience, captivate an audience with a brand message?

AKQA’s Ahmed thinks AI + humans can rise to the challenge. “If we accept AI is a programmed performance of ‘intelligence’ it follows that there’s only one way to escape the ‘uncanny valley’ altogether: with character. As glitches are fixed, the AI playing field will shift towards valuing personality over eradicating it.”

Perhaps the character of Teddy from Spielberg’s A.I. Artificial Intelligence the new empathetic AI-child clones in The Creator give us a clue as to things to come. Ahmed thinks so: “In a complex world that often feels chaotic and uncertain, Teddy’s nurturing spirit is portrayed as the ultimate mentor and guide: the best of what it means to be human, even if he isn’t one.”

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ROMANIA on the rise

Tim Burton on set of Wednesday © Tomasz Lazar & Netflix.

Romania’s stunning locations, enticing incentive of up to 45% and growing studio base are helping the country compete with its better­known neighbours, attracting some big projects, including Morgan Freeman and Kevin Costner co­produced The Gray House, Netflix’s Wednesday series, and The Yellow Tie, starring John Malkovich.

R

omania is very much a country on the rise with a talented crew base, reliable studios and a striking array of locations.

The vibrant capital city of Bucharest has welcomed several international productions in recent years, including drama-horror film, Watcher, thanks to its intriguing mix of historical and modern architecture.

Bucharest’s stand-out spots include the old streets, castles, palaces, medieval villages and the vast parliament building, as well as Soviet-era structures and abandoned industrial estates, which make for unusual backdrops.

Other increasingly popular filming spots include Moldavia, ideal for historical and fantasy projects, featuring tolling hills and medieval fortresses, Transylvania with its famous castles, and UNESCO World “ANOTHER MAJOR Heritage site Viscri, about DRAW IS THE three-and-a-half hours from FINANCIAL INCENTIVE Bucharest, which doubled for WORTH 35% WHEN Poland in season three of BBC PRODUCTIONS SPEND series Killing Eve. EUR100,000.”

While Universal Pictures’ film Dragonheart: Vengeance shot at the Rasnov fortress, the volcanic crater in Racos and Bran castle, commonly known as the home of Dracula.

COST EFFECTIVE

Another major draw is the financial incentive worth 35% when productions spend EUR100,000, and can rise to 45% for productions that are set specifically in Romania. Further cost savings can be made with the local production crew, who adhere to a standard 12-hour shoot day, with no extra costs for weekends, bank holidays and night shoots. There’s also no requirement for work permits for foreign crews.

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

Bran Castle Often referred to as ‘Dracula's Castle’, this imposing structure with its eerie ambiance, set amidst the mysterious Carpathian Mountains, has hosted many horror and fantasy productions over the years, including Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Originally constructed as a strategic defense fortress in the 14th century, Bran Castle has gone through various iterations since, including as a royal residence. Its imposing stone walls, red-tiled roof, and picturesque setting make it an impressive sight and perfect filming backdrop.

Inside, the rooms, corridors, and chambers showcase a mix of Gothic, Renaissance, and Baroque architectural styles.

Nearby, the medieval town of Sibiu provides a charming backdrop for historical dramas, with its well-preserved architecture.

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Watcher © 2022 In Splitter, LP.

The expanding studio base is also appealing.

Netflix’s hit show Wednesday is actually set in Jericho Vermont, but director Tim Burton decided to recreate the entire town at the vast Buftea Studios near Bucharest, which offers 19 soundstages and four indoor water tanks. The production team also filmed on location, including in the capital at Monteoru House (for the interior shots of Nevermore Academy) and the Botanical Garden of Bucharest, as well as Cantacuzino Castle in Busteni (for the exterior shots of the academy).

Paramount’s The Gray House relied heavily on local crew and utilised the facilities at Castel Studios, which offers nine soundstages and 65 acres of backlot. Set during the Civil War, the project shot in Romania from April to August this year, including during the strike. It is produced by Morgan Freeman

ESSENTIAL FACTS

and Kevin Costner through their respective production companies Revelations Entertainment and Territory Pictures, along with Big Dreams Entertainment.

“The Gray House continued our long tradition of welcoming exceptional projects,” says Castel Films’ marketing director Bogdan Moncea. “Romania has been an attractive location for international productions due to its film infrastructure with modern and welcoming studios, highly professional talents and crews, and picturesque landscapes, including diverse cities and landmarks.”

Sergiu Ioan Celibidache's biographical film The Yellow Tie starring John Malkovich as classical conductor father, Sergiu Celibidache (the father of the director) also filmed in Romania over the summer. Locations included Bucharest’s famous Sala Palatului where Malkovich recreated the Romanian composer’s infamous 1989 concert, alongside the Munich Philharmonic.

TAX INCENTIVES

45%

35-45% cash rebate available to productions with a minimum spend of EUR100,000 and a EUR10 million cap per project STUDIOS

Buftea Studios offers 21,500 sqm of studio space, 19 sound stages and four indoor water tanks. Castel Film Studio has 10 soundstages and standing sets, including a gothic church, US suburbia and a western town.

ATA CARNET

YES RECENT PRODUCTIONS

Wednesday, Django and Watcher.

TRANSPORT

Romania’s 22,298 km rail network is one of the most extensive in the world.

TIME ZONE

GMT+3 96

The project is co-produced by local outfit Oblique Media Film and UK company Celi Films with Adela Vrinceanu Celebidachi, Cristina Dobritoiu and Andrei Boncea as producers, alongside Christopher Milburn and James Olivier, and Robert W. Cort as executive producer.

There are plenty of great local service providers to assist international projects, including Alien Films, which supported Killing Eve and Sony Television’s Alex Rider, among others.

It’s also generally easy to get permits to shoot, usually arranged within 48 hours for most locations. As Lee Morris, MD of Sid Gentle and executive producer of Killing Eve pointed out recently, they had a lot of help from the authorities, particularly the mayor’s office, who smoothed the way for them in terms of parking in the centre of Bucharest, closing roads and getting permissions.

Romania also has a vibrant festival scene, with the Transilvania International Film Festival returning post-Covid. This year’s festival saw over 120,000 people flocking to the city of Cluj-Napoca, celebrating a diverse range of global talents, and nurturing the local industry through initiatives like the Full Moon Creative Lab. The country has everything producers need, with its diverse landscapes, rich history, cost-effective production options, and skilled film industry professionals.

ROMANIA HAS BEEN AN ATTRACTIVE LOCATION FOR INTERNATIONAL PRODUCTIONS DUE TO ITS FILM INFRASTRUCTURE WITH MODERN AND WELCOMING STUDIOS, HIGHLY PROFESSIONAL TALENTS AND CREWS, AND PICTURESQUE LANDSCAPES.

SOMETHING ELSE

Romania's Palace of the Parliament, known as ‘Casa Poporului’ or ‘House of the People’, is an architectural marvel and a symbol of the country's complex history. Located in the heart of Bucharest, it is one of the world's largest administrative buildings, built during the rule of Nicolae Ceausescu.

The construction of the neoclassical and totalitarian-style palace started in 1984, continuing until the end of the communist regime in 1989. Along with its 1,100 rooms, the 330,000 sqm building boasts ornate halls adorned with marble, crystal chandeliers and furnishings of wood and bronze.

It has featured in several films, including as the Vatican in the 2018 horror film The Nun.

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interview John with Lewis J

ohn Lewis’ varied career spans the mixed martial arts and entertainment industries. A champion MMA athlete and veteran of organisations such as the UFC, Battlecade Extreme Fighting, and Vale Tudo Japan, Lewis is one of the top martial arts instructors in the business and was the third American to be awarded black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

He has matched this with extensive experience as a business leader in the entertainment industry including as a film producer. He is VP of Space 11 Corp, MMA-Zero G, and Space 11 Studios Space 11 Corp, an aerospace company focused on entertainment in a microgravity environment.

MAKERS MAG

How much demand is there for film and television to shoot in orbit?

JOHN LEWIS

I remember the excitement of standing in long lines at Mann's Chinese Theater in Hollywood, eagerly waiting to be transported to distant galaxies through science fiction films like Star Wars. With the incredible advancements in VFX it's never been easier to create the illusion of space and give us a taste of what lies beyond.

While these illusions can be impressive, there's nothing quite like the thrill of real, tangible risk in practical filmmaking. It may be too early to say if there's a demand for actual film and

SPACE

television shot in orbit, but there's certainly curiosity. Imagine Tom Cruise tethered to a Starship doing a spacewalk where one misstep could send him hurtling into the abyss. That's the kind of risk and excitement that can't be replicated with a blue screen and CG effects.

In the end, it's the risk of knowing that life could be lost with one mistake that makes practical filmmaking so captivating. It keeps the tension high, and the viewer fully engaged, and that's what will ultimately draw audiences to any project shot in orbit.

What filming facilities will there be aboard the S11S? Imagine a world where you can watch your favourite band perform in zero gravity or see an epic battle scene in a movie set in outer space that was actually filmed there. That's exactly what Space 11 Corp is working towards. While the details are still hush-hush, their mission is clear: to bring all the entertainment we love on earth to space. From concerts to sporting events to filming scenes for the next blockbuster movie, Space 11 Corp is boldly going where no entertainment company has gone before.

What are the main logistical challenges?

Filming in space does have its challenges, from radiation exposure to microgravity, space debris and equipment malfunctions. But with proper training and qualified experts, these risks can be mitigated. However, the biggest obstacle to filming in space is the cost. The transportation alone is more expensive than any Marvel movie budget, making it a tough sell for studios.

Space 11 Corp has a unique business model that could be the answer to the entertainment industry's space filming dreams.

The S11S Spacestation/ Soundstage would be a one-of-a-kind facility that can be monetised in various ways, providing a controlled environment for filming, hosting concerts, sporting events, and other entertainment related products.

What considerations are there around insurance, safety & training of non-professionals?

Just like any other entertainment production, it is crucial to have completion bonds and production insurance in place.

However, given the unique nature of space filming, finding the right partners is crucial to ensure the mission's success. All astronauts involved must undergo rigorous training by qualified personnel in the aerospace industry to prepare them for the challenges of space travel. While some rockets can be

flown remotely, it is still essential to have experts in space and rocket mechanics aboard to handle emergencies.

If a private company provides the rocket, they would be responsible for determining safety protocols and limitations, which the film crew would follow to ensure a safe and successful mission. With all the necessary precautions in place, filming in space can be a thrilling and groundbreaking experience that pushes the boundaries of what is possible in the world of entertainment.

You are pioneering this space (pun intended) but what will have changed by, say, 2033?

The real game-changer will be the development of artificial gravity.

At the moment, the mystery of space is microgravity, which is wonderful to watch but challenging to film in. Once we can create a more stable environment in space, it will become easier to film movies and television shows with dimension.

As for using the moon as a shooting location or studio, why not? Once a safe environment is created on the moon, it might be easier to film there than on a rocket ship in orbit. Elon Musk is the man to keep an eye on. He’s at the forefront of all the exciting things happening in the space industry, including his goals of making us a multi-planetary species. Who knows what doors he will open as he leads SpaceX into the future?

INSURANCE

MICROGRAVITY

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If at first you don’t succeed

How a small British indie came to hold the cards on the Baywatch actress is a triumph of luck and persistence.

Pamela, A Love Story © Netflix.

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MANY FILMMAKERS STRUGGLE UNPAID FOR YEARS MAKING FEATURE DOCS, WHILE OTHERS SELL THEM FOR MILLIONS AND WIN BOTH AWARDS AND GLOBAL ATTENTION. HERE FIVE PRODUCERS SHARE THEIR EXPERIENCES OF DEVELOPING, FINANCING, PRODUCING AND LAUNCHING FEATURE DOCS INTO THE WORLD – AND THE DIFFERENT IMPACT OF THESE FACTORS WHEN THE DOC IS INDEPENDENTLY FINANCED OR COMMISSIONED. ALL THE PRODUCERS WERE SPEAKING AT SHEFFIELD DOCFEST 2023.

D

ocumentary producers are weathering a tough time as streamers have pulled from funding the more idiosyncratic or risky ideas.

“It does feel like the golden age of docs may be over,” says Kat Mansoor, CEO, Snowstorm Productions.

“Everyone is having a difficult time at the moment.

I think we have to be really committed to find audiences in development and really build that community in order to prove that the algorithm doesn’t always win.”

The commissioning gap is partly attributed to streamers stung by buying in documentaries that have failed to find an audience online.

“I refuse to believe data will control us,” she adds.

“We have to have an honest conversation about how we bring audiences in otherwise [the streamers and PSBs] will just look at data.”

COW

Mansoor herself tends to be drawn to director-led and challenging stories. “I like working with people who have crazy ideas,” she says. One of those came to her from director Andrea Arnold (Fish Tank) who wanted to make a film revolving around the life of a dairy cow. Despite the uncommercial sounding subject, Mansour says funding was easier than for other projects because of Arnold’s cachet.

Having found a farmer willing to undertake the aim of a truthful representation of life on a farm, the film was shot in 100 days over three and half years with Mansour often living on the farm while Arnold was in the US shooting American Honey.

PAMELA, A LOVE STORY

Pamela Anderson, the subject of the documentary Pamela, A Love Story seems like a sure-fire sell but at first no-one wanted to know.

“I pitched the film to a lot of people and they all passed saying it felt too ‘E! Hollywood’,” recounts Julia Nottingham, CEO, Dorothy Street Pictures.

“No-one was interested until Hulu announced their Pam and Tommy dramatic series and suddenly we were in a wild bidding war [which Netflix won].”

How a small British indie came to hold the cards on the Baywatch actress is a triumph of luck and persistence.

Nottingham explains, “I’d only started the business in 2019 and a year later we had a few staff so we needed a bigger project. We brain stormed in the office and came up with Pamela but had no expectation we could get hold of her.”

“WE HAVE TO BE REALLY COMMITTED TO FIND AUDIENCES IN DEVELOPMENT AND REALLY BUILD THAT COMMUNITY IN ORDER TO PROVE THAT THE ALGORITHM DOESN’T ALWAYS WIN. I REFUSE TO BELIEVE DATA WILL CONTROL US.”

On a whim, Nottingham emailed her publicist and got a reply saying ‘we’d like to talk.’ The timing was serendipitous. Anderson had just sacked her manager and her son had taken over. I felt that him talking on the phone with a British producer in London felt like a safe space for him. I explained that we thought his mother’s story had been misrepresented.”

“Essentially we had such a strong visionary person at the helm so I felt really safe in what we were doing,” she says. “Her trust in me was an amazing accolade. When you have an unbreakable relationship with a director I feel like we can do anything. Then you are team and you can attach other people to the project.”

Even then, it took some time to find the right director.

Eventually Anderson clicked with Ryan White.

Cow premiered at Cannes in 2021, received critical acclaim and has not only paid its financiers (including Doc Society and BBC Film) back but turned a small profit, according to Mansour.

She continues, “All of us have had a point when you think you are going to quit but keep going because you never know what lies round the next corner.”

However, if the key relationship goes south, Mansour’s advice is to cut your losses.

“I would exit if I lose trust. To avoid that, keep talking and structure in both of your visions all the time so that you are all exactly on the same page.”

“Pamela looks like it was easy and flashy but it was just a cold email I wrote,” says Nottingham. “I’m no one special but we offered a relaxed environment and then it was a question of timing.

Anderson was also paid for her participation and to licence her archive. “I think if you’re paying icons for their stories that is fine but so should other [less well known] people who are giving their life over to your film.”

SANSÓN AND ME

Rodrigo Reyes’ Sansón and Me won best film at the Sheffield Doc Fest in 2022 and is an exercise in how to make a film with nothing but a letter. No archive footage, no newsreel and limited access to the principal subject.

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It is the tale of a young immigrant’s journey from coastal Mexico to prison in California. Director Reyes was earning a living as the official interpreter at the trial in which the 19-year old was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment in 2012 for his role in a gang-related murder.

Su Kim was post supervisor and used that as a way to meet other filmmakers. At one event – a decade ago – she met Reyes. They got talking and Kim suggested the director write a letter to Sansón to explore telling his story. Reyes continued a correspondence with the young man that totalled some 900 written pages.

Cow © 2021 MUBI.

ALL OF US HAVE HAD A POINT WHEN YOU THINK YOU ARE GOING TO QUIT BUT KEEP GOING BECAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT LIES ROUND THE NEXT CORNER.

“I had a very hard time fund raising,” Kim explained.

“At that point I’d only produced one film (Hale County This Morning, This Evening) but I believed in the story so we just kept going stubbornly, stupidly even.”

They landed a USD10,000 grant from Tribeca which they used to locate Sansón’s family.

“At that point we knew we had a way to make the film. What we did not know was how to represent him. Clearly he wasn’t going to be released just so a documentary team could re-enact his life story.”

Instead, they cast the doc using members of Sansón’s family. His uncle played his father, his niece – his sister and his nephew played Sansón himself. The result blends documentary with biopic and docudrama.

When Hale County was Oscar nominated in 2019, Kim was on the map and funding finally fell into place and she and Reyes founded indie Grumpy Squared.

“I feel like my job is to encourage and challenge voices,” she says. “It is there where I think we find our inspiration for things.”

THE TERRITORY

The Territory followed the efforts of the Amazon community the Uru-eu-wau-wau to protect their land from aggressive deforestation efforts with video cameras as weapons.

Lizzie Gillet, then a producer at Passion Pictures, met director Alex Pritz and producer Will Miller, shortly after they had begun shooting.

“I saw some material and was astounded by the level of thought, care and intentionality that had gone into being a coproduction with the indigenous community at the heart of the film. They also had a social impact campaign in mind. I don’t think every film should have a social impact campaign but this was really important for them.”

The Uru-eu-wau-wau made a lot of the big creative decisions, got as much of the profit as any of the production companies and had power of veto.

When Passion boarded, the production had raised a quarter of the budget but they’d spent it a long time ago and we’re now living off credit cards. “Alex and Will were doing other work all the time to pay the bill. There was USD750,000 gap.”

Sansón and Me.

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Gillet helped work with Darren Aronofsky’s Protozoa Pictures to raise half equity and half grant money as well as devising terms of the deal.

“One of the things I admired about the filmmakers is that they didn’t want to take on any buyers or any network until it was finished because they wanted to retain co-ownership with the indigenous community. We could not have gone into that community with a commission.”

After winning both the Audience Award and a Special Jury Award for Craft at Sundance, “all those who’d been saying ‘come back when you’ve got a rough cut’ were now pitching to buy from us.

“We decided to sell it ourselves and not go with a sale agent and then decided that National Geographic was the ideal partner. We wanted a long theatrical roll out and for the film to really land in the world. National Geographic were committed to that. The foundations underpinning a project are vital. Part of what they were buying was the independence and freedom we had to make the film.”

THE PLANE CRASH

David Glover, Co-Founder, 72 Films, “My big tenet is ‘if it’s Barnum & Bailey enough – it can happen’. You want to entice audiences with a ‘Roll up, roll up’ curiosity about what’s going to happen.

Grizzly Man, Tiger King, Man on Wire all have a sort of circus stunt about them.”

Glover previously spent over a decade as Head of Specialist Factual at Channel 4 where he generated award-winning hits, such as Inside Nature’s Giants and Mummifying Alan, as well as ground breaking documentaries Gogglebox, The Plane Crash and Live From Space.

They weren’t all a success though. “At Channel 4 the mission was to balance public service and the commercial market. With The Plane Crash (2012) we rigged cameras inside a Boeing 727 and crashed it into the Mexican desert, controlled remotely, to learn what we could about the mechanics of impact.

I’d give it a 10 out of 10 for stunt but a 2 out of 10 for purpose and that’s not good enough.”

Glover’s first ideas for the channel weren’t commissioned. This included having celebrities direct their own life story in a half drama, half doc hybrid. He made a pilot with James Hewitt, Princess Diana’s lover, and filmed him casting an actress to play Diana. It would have made for compelling car crash television.

“It was extraordinary. Everyone at Channel 4 was gripped by it but the public never saw it.”

Another idea was to probe the psychology of 911 terrorists by having advertising agencies mock-up an ad campaign for membership of Al-Qaeda.

“I realised now there was a deep seriousness to that subject matter that maybe I wasn’t respecting.

I think it more about my greater glory and showing how clever I was rather than being true to the subject matter.”

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makers & shakers Awards 2023

Ahead of the fourth annual makers&shakers Awards on 6 December, we run through this year’s categories and shortlisted nominees.

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his year’s entries to the makers & shakers Awards have shown that true ambition and consciousness make a difference, not only for the industry as it stands, but for the future, with many including education and training into their strategies.

“The entries this year have gone above and beyond what we have ever seen,” said Jean-Frédéric Garcia, Events Director for makers & shakers. “The 2023 shortlist has shown the highest quality, posing a difficult challenge for our judges. Amongst the shortlist are some of the industry’s most boundary pushing, ambitious, and impact making creatives and innovators from across the globe.

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“It has been amazing to see yet another year of undeniable talent from our entrants. We cannot wait to see you again this December to share the creativity and continued dedication to the global screen sector.” makers is proud to present a selection of the shortlisted candidates with a big thank you to everyone who took the time to enter, and congratulations to the finalists. The winners will be revealed at the makers & shakers Awards ceremony at BAFTA, London on 6 December.

For more information: makersandshakersawards.com

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SUSTAINABILITY AWARD makers & shakers were looking to recognise significant achievement in enabling a shift towards creating content with a smaller carbon footprint.

Be it on the entrants' own production, or those of their customers/audience, or in helping the transition to a more sustainable model.

Earth Angel, Sustainability Award.

Entrants needed to show details of how their product, service or initiative has resulted in a reduced carbon impact in a particular area of production or the whole production. Entrants needed to provide data to quantify the carbon reductions which are being detailed wherever possible.

OUTSTANDING CREATIVE USE OF A LOCATION CATEGORY SPONSORED BY

SHORTLIST 2023 H

INITIATIVE TO GROW LOCAL INDUSTRY Awarded to a Trade Association, Member Organisation or a Private company.

Creative Zero & PixiPixel H

Earth Angel H

Film London H

Green Set (The SA Film Academy) H

Green Spark Group H

Green Voltage H

The Bottle Yard Studios

Awarded to a Location Manager or Supervising Location Manager and their team.

The makers & shakers judges were looking to award a location professional for the creative use and management of a single location in a film, TV movie, TV series, episode, advertisement or short form which has created an on-screen memorable impact while inspiring peers.

H

Yamdu

PRODUCTION TECH INNOVATION OF THE YEAR

Judges were looking for evidence of creative skills in taking a director's brief and finding a truly outstanding location as well as for the location professionals’ individual skillset in making that particular location work for the production.

SHORTLIST 2023 H

Eoin Holohan, The Banshees of Inisherin Awarded to an individual, a tech start-up or a tech company. The makers & shakers judges were looking for the creation of a game-changer in the way the industry produces using new technology applied to workflow, communication or distribution.

SHORTLIST 2023 H

H

Jad Nehmeh, Warsha H

Jason Nolan, The Last of Us H

Leann Emmert, The Fabelmans

SHORTLIST 2023 H

Coletivo Kuikuro de Cinema H

Newcastle Film Club H

Oregon Film Office H

Producers Alliance for Cinema & Television, Pact H

Resource Productions CIC H

Sudanese Filmmaking Association H

Taturana Institute H

The Church H

Usheru & Screen Ireland

H

Leigh Romero, Warrior Nun 2

BooksOffice

H

H

Magdi Omar & Sherif Hossny, The Testament

Filmustage

The makers & shakers judges were looking for a new and unique initiative from a local, regional or national organisation which was introduced to benefit the community and expand the local talent and skills pool of the creative screen industries.

H

H

Marionette

Petr Rucka, All Quiet On The Western Front

H

H

metarex.media

Piernicola Pinnola, The White Lotus

H

PentoPix H

ReadySet Studios H

SUMOLIGHT

A description for each of the shortlisted entries for the makers & shakers Awards 2023 can be found in the finalist section of makersandshakersawards.com

BooksOffice.com, Production Tech Innovation Award.

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THE MAKER AWARD CATEGORY SPONSORED BY

Awarded to Producers, Executive Producers or Co-Production Teams that go above and beyond the expectations of their role.

The Banshees of Inisherin, Outstanding Creative Use of a Location Award.

FILM COMMISSION INITIATIVE OF THE YEAR

SHAKER OF THE YEAR

The makers & shakers judges were looking to recognise a producer or executive producer that has gone above and beyond the expectations of their role.

CATEGORY SPONSORED BY

Awarded to a Film Commission, Film Office, Film Commissioner and their team, or a government organisation.

Excluding official cash or tax rebates or credit schemes, makers & shakers were looking for an initiative which has made a significant impact on their territories and created an interesting proposition for a film, television movie, television series, episode, advertisement or short form project.

SHORTLIST 2023 H

Colorado Office of Film, TV &Media H

The makers & shakers judges were looking to give this prestigious award to any professional within the creative screen industries who really made an impact, a long-lasting change to the industry.

This creativity can be applied to the processes of production, distribution, facilitation or financing and funding of a film, television movie, television series, episode, advertisement, branded content or short form.

H

Bona Orakwue, Producer H

Morgan Davidoff, Producer H H

H

SHORTLIST 2023

Paloma Mora, Producer

H

H

H

Film Paris Region

Anne Puolanne, TV freelancer & environmental specialist, Sustainability Manager at Audiovisual Producers Finland

Siobhan McDonnell, Producer

H

H

AWARDS SPONSORED BY

Portugal Film Commission

Caris Rianne, Founder Rianne Pictures

H

Miami-Dade County Film commission

H

Dawn McCarthy-Simpson, Pact H

Elaine Sturgess, CEO BooksOffice H

Paloma Mora, TV ON SL, CEO/Producer H

Sarah Leigh, Writer-director, Inclusivity Films H

Shiny Perkins, Lead Trainer/Founder Unsplice H

Takumã Kuikuro, Filmmaker/Curator, Colective Kuikuro

A description for each of the shortlisted entries for the makers & shakers Awards 2023 can be found in the finalist section of makersandshakersawards.com Paloma Mora, The Maker of the Year Award.

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SHORTLIST 2023

Neeru Khera, Producer

Film in Limerick / Innovative Limerick Film London

Nominees must have demonstrated a genuine passion for the business, inspiring those around them with their ingenuity, while championing inclusivity and diversity. They will have dramatically raised the bar for behaviour and professional conduct, contributing to and impacting the industry in a variety of meaningful ways such as the use of new technologies.

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Terraforming a Culture

Image: Kandahar © Fim AlUla.

Saudi Arabia is putting itself on the filming map with new cities and sound stages, enticing financial incentives, a growing crew base and some virgin screen landscapes, from modern skyline to remarkable desert and even snowy mountains.

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audi Arabia is pulling out all the stops, investing billions to create an enticing and sustainable media sector across the entire Kingdom, as part of its Vision 2030 plan, with the intention of attracting audiovisual productions from all over the world. These efforts are already reaping the rewards.

In the northwest, more than 30 productions have already flocked to the new and innovative USD500 billion linear city of Neom, which is being built with no roads, cars or emissions and run on 100% renewable energy. The impressive new location is surrounded by 500 km of untouched coast line on the Red Sea, snow packed mountains and traditional desert.

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At the heart of this is the huge, purpose-built Neom Media Industries facility for screen production, gaming, vocational training and infrastructure, just 30 minutes from Neom airport. It features four world-class sound stages in the Media Village across 12,000 sqm of production space, including backlots, and a further six stages are currently in progress, including a volumetric stage, which is launching in Q4 2023. There’s also a resort-style accommodation complex for 350 cast and crew, which is set to increase to 500 by the end of 2023.

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Image © Neom.

IT’S A GREAT PLACE FOR A HORROR FILM, SCI-FI, ROMANCE AND IT’S A LANDSCAPE AUDIENCES DON’T KNOW. SO AS A FILM PRODUCER CONSTANTLY TRYING TO BE ORIGINAL, THIS IS A VERY ORIGINAL PLACE TO BE.

“The final end-state media hub will sprawl across an expansive 1 million sqm within the strategic expanse of The Line. With an impressive array of 50 stages and studios, this integrated creative campus promises to redefine possibilities,” says Wayne Borg, MD of Media Industries, Entertainment and Culture at Neom.

One of the stand-out new projects to shoot in Neom is Oscar-winning screenwriter and director Terry George’s film Riverman, which is set during the war in Afghanistan and expected to begin principal photography in January 2024. Producers are Future Artists Entertainment, TMS Productions and Limelight CTL (The King’s Speech).

“The production team’s confidence in Neom is a real testament to our world-class offering of state-of-the-art facilities, great crews, the sheer breadth of diverse locations, and our globally competitive 40% production cash rebate incentive,” says Borg.

Other productions to use Neom as a backdrop include Rupert Wyatt’s Desert Warrior, starring Anthony Mackie and Sir Ben Kingsley; Dunki, directed by Rajkumar Hirani and starring Shahrukh Khan; MBC’s Exceptional, a 200-episode-a-year TV drama series; and the first regional reality television show Million Dollar Island.

Dunki director, Hirani, adds: “When I saw these mountains, I was completely stunned. Neom by itself has set up a whole media hub where they have studios, excellent places to stay, and the whole media team made our life easy by supporting the shoot.”

Rise of The Witches, the region’s biggest-ever budget television show, also filmed in Neom, including at the Badjah Studios in the desert where a complete fantasy world set in 500 BC was created.

The studios are next set to host Saudi director Abdulaziz Alshlahei’s latest feature Hobal, “ALULA IS ALSO which starts shooting GOING THROUGH A autumn 2023.

TRANSFORMATION AND ATTRACTING SEVERAL BIG PRODUCTIONS.”

While local production outfit TELFAZ11 has partnered with Neom to shoot up to nine film and television projects in the region over the next three years, and will set up an office in Neom’s media hub (adding to their existing offices in Riyadh and Dubai).

Plus, Neom is invested in developing the next generation of media industry professionals, including through partnerships with the likes of the National Film and Television School in the UK. ALULA APPEAL

“It’s a great place for a horror film, sci-fi, romance and it’s a landscape audiences don’t know. So as a film producer constantly trying to be original, this is a very original place to be. I really encourage any producers and distributors to look seriously at Neom,” says Jeremy Bolt at JB Pictures, producer of Desert Warrior. “The location is rapidly becoming a regional hub for features in the region and the ecosystem is developing, infrastructure is in place, and there is a young dynamic population of creatives eager and keen to learn all aspects of filmmaking.”

NEOM

Neom is not the only busy city in the northwest of the Kingdom though. AlUla is also going through a transformation and attracting several big productions.

Home to 200,000 years of history, including the ancient city of Hegra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, volcanic craters, oasis, untouched wilderness and vast sandstone canyones, AlUla is the ideal backdrop for a range of genres from historic epics to fantasy adventures and dramatic war movies.

FILM ALULA

INFRASTRUCTURE

Image: Cherry © Apple TV+.

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Recent projects to shoot there include Ric Roman Waugh’s action film Kandahar, starring Gerard Butler, which involved some 450 crew; Anthony and Joe Russo’s Iraq war story Cherry, starring Tom Holland; and Norah, the first Saudi feature film to be shot in the city.

“We were looking for several locations for [Kandahar] in the Middle East. When I saw the photos of AlUla, my immediate response was; ‘Yes, let’s go shoot there.’ The photos do no justice, it’s a breathtakingly beautiful place,” says Roman Waugh.

THE INCREDIBLE LANDSCAPES AND INCOMPARABLE SCENERY ARE A PERFECT BACKDROP FOR THE NARRATIVE’S PROGRESSION, AS THE STAKES BECOME HIGHER AND MORE SUSPENSEFUL.

US cryptocurrency drama series, Paper Empire, is also now set to shoot its third season in AlUla from the end of 2023. Produced by Robert Gillings Productions, Tadross Media Group and Inner Circle Films, the series boasts an impressive cast, including Kelsey Grammer, Wesley Snipes and Denise Richards.

“After visiting AlUla earlier this year, we immediately knew we had to film here. The incredible landscapes and incomparable scenery are a perfect backdrop for the narrative’s progression, as the stakes become higher and more suspenseful,” says Michael Tadross Jr, one of the series’ producers.

In a further boost for attracting productions, AlUla has just opened a new, environmentally friendly, state-of-the-art studio complex with two 26,000 sqft sound stages, workshops, hair and make-up rooms, wardrobe facilities, office space, dressing rooms and a 61,500 sqft backlot.

“Productions are also able to optimise the 40% cash rebate programme, Film Saudi, and additional support incentives through Film AlUla when using the studios,” says Charlene Deleon-Jones, executive director at Film AlUla, the film agency of the Royal Commission for AlUla, which provides support to incoming productions.

Film AlUla is also interested in developing new talent and boosting its film ecosystem by partnering with several bodies, including the UK’s industry-led Creative Media Skills Institute, and supporting filmmakers from the MENA region with financial production support and the opportunity to complete a portion of filming in AlUla. It also launched AlUla Creates to promote local talent, including female Saudi filmmakers.

STRIKING LOCATIONS

Elsewhere, there are plenty of other appealing, scenic options for filmmakers, including in the capital city Riyadh, which is often the gateway into the country, boasting stunning modern towers looming from the desert and 4WD cars populating

STUDIOS

INCENTIVES

INTERNATIONAL

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the motorways. Many of the local production companies are based here and often required to help with getting permits to shoot.

There’s also the slightly more easy-going city of Jeddah on the Red Sea coast, with its historic Al-Balad district of bustling souks and coral architecture, as well as modern buildings like the new 250-floor Jeddah Tower that is likely to appeal to location scouts and filmmakers, plus desert spots and oasis settings.

Another increasingly popular location is Taif in the Mecca Province of southwest Saudi Arabia, which is cooler than other cities as it’s at an elevation of nearly 2,000 “PRODUCTIONS ARE meters, with wide treelined streets, traditional ALSO ABLE TO architecture, bustling OPTIMISE THE 40% markets and beautiful CASH REBATE surrounding scenery.

PROGRAMME, FILM Al-Hasa in the east SAUDI, AND is also cooler in ADDITIONAL temperature with green SUPPORT INCENTIVES landscapes and is THROUGH FILM ALULA known for its oasis, WHEN USING THE including one containing three million palm trees.

STUDIOS.” Other locations of note include the Asir region; Dhee Ayn, a mountain village; Farasan islands, a picturesque marine area, and Dir’iyah, a World Heritage Site.

POLITICAL OBSTACLES

The chief concerns potentially holding back the Kingdom in attracting a great number of major productions are the political and cultural challenges, particularly the fact that homosexuality is perceived as a crime and the abaya is still the norm for women.

But officials and local industry figures are working hard to transform the image of the Kingdom and make it an open place where productions from all over the world can shoot in stunning locations and take advantage of modern infrastructure and facilities.

The Saudi Film Commission, set up in 2020, says it is doing all it can to assist with this. Its list of responsibilities includes: develop and organise the film sector; raise the level of production; market Saudi films; encourage finance and investment; develop film content; support and empower talent; define the laws and regulations; and represent the Kingdom in regional and international forums for films. That’s a pretty challenging list, but one the Commission feels ready to achieve.

International filmmakers should keep a watchful eye as new investments continue to shift and transform the region, hopefully for the better.

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Leadership Stems from Grass Roots From green studios to comprehensive guidance, on set sustainability has never been easier. And yet despite efforts from some productions, carbon emission figures are still dangerously high, so is the industry doing enough?

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he Sustainablity in Production Alliance revealed that the average tentpole production generates 3,370 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide across the timeline of a production. Of this, 48% is generated as a result of fuel usage and a reliance on non-renewable resources. Although productions are aware of the alternative options, and some are even being put into action, there is still a roadblock in establishing these practices as the norm.

GREEN DON’T COST A THING

One of the key reasons for this is the concern (or misconception) about extortionate costs involved in going green.

“People often assume that sustainable initiatives cost more money,” says Amelia Price, head of the Sustainable Film consultancy, which is one of the leading proponents of change. “However, whilst there might be more of an upfront cost, often they are cheaper in the long run. We need to get out of the habit of thinking short term and take an approach that benefits multiple productions over a longer period of time.”

Price and Sustainable Film co-founder Jimmy Keeping provide productions with step-by-step guidance to a more sustainable future. But it’s proving to be a difficult battle to change the decision-making processes of the people who have the power to change as they tend to stick to the status quo, often

allowing ignorance to influence the entire supply chain.

Sustainable Film’s Roots carbon calculator is proving to be a good starting point as it assists productions in understanding the carbon footprint of each department. The company also recently launched a survey opening up communication around sustainability, so that the industry gets talking and hopefully implementing changes.

“By having a sustainability team on a production you are opening up possibilities for cost reduction and efficiencies as well as reducing the impact the production has,” says Keeping. “For instance, by setting up a thorough waste management plan you are reducing waste costs as it’s cheaper to recycle than it is to send things to general waste.”

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Even just going paperless can make a difference, including taking advantage of cloud infrastructure to save on waste. There are also digital tools like previsualisation studios that allow producers and directors to test concepts before shooting and “results in fewer unnecessary set builds, requires less contingency planning, and reduces time, material use and costs,” according to the Production Guild.

“We’re still operating in a world where decisions around script and schedule are being made very late in the day,” adds Price. “The trickle-down effect means that crews are often fire-fighting and have to go for the simplest solution that’s already in front of them. If we just take a minute to pause and think a situation through, often we’ll have a better, more sustainable solution, that will also save money.”

PLAN AHEAD

WE CAN'T RECYCLE OUR WAY OUT OF CLIMATE CHANGE. WE'RE GOING TO HAVE TO FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGE THE WAY WE OPERATE AND HOW WE POWER OUR SETS.

Sustainable certifications are certainly helping the cause. Productions are required to meet certain green standards to get the stamp of approval, and in some countries are even receiving additional funding as a result of meeting the certification criteria.

Leading certificates include Bafta’s Albert and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), which are revered by the industry. But it is vital that these green requirements are integrated into pre-production or even in the developmental stages of a project to avoid room for neglect and poor planning around sustainability on set.

Many of the top US studios set up sustainability initiatives from the early stages of a production and have united through the Producers Guild of America’s Green Production Alliance to help accelerate the adoption of sustainable practices and technologies within the industry. One of the most useful tools is the Green Production Guide, which helps productions reduce their environmental footprint. But more needs to be done.

As Louise Marie Smith, managing director of Neptune Sustainability, points out: “We can't recycle our way out of climate change. We're going to have to fundamentally change the way we operate and how we power our sets. We know fuel and electricity use is about half the footprint of an average production, so that's where we need to focus.”

Smith has certainly walked the talk on major productions she’s worked on, including Universal Pictures’ Jurassic World: Dominion, which had a meticulous environmental accounting report put together in pre-production, so that all flight, hotel or accommodation booked, fuel used for ground transportation and boat and helicopter hired to get a shot, could be tracked. This was then fed into a carbon calculator.

While on Eon’s Bond film No Time to Die, Smith introduced the first zero-emissions vault stack batteries. She insists taking sustainable steps is not as hard as people think.

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But there's still a little bit of a gap in the ambition and the resources to make these changes happen, according to Smith. “A lot of these sustainable changes cost more money, but that's not reflected in the budget. So with all the will in the world, how is that producer supposed to take on all of these newer, cleaner, more efficient technologies if they don't have the budget to do so?”

STUDIO SUPPORT

Fortunately, many of the world’s leading studio facilities, including Pinewood and Warner Bros., are getting in on the green game, setting a positive example with things like solar panelled roofs, EVs and hydrogen generators.

Bristol’s The Bottle Yard Studios is a good example with its GBP12 million sustainably-designed television production facility, which is powered by a 1 MWp rooftop solar array that is community“A LOT OF THESE owned, thus expanding SUSTAINABLE its commitment beyond CHANGES COST MORE the industry.

MONEY, BUT THAT'S

NOT REFLECTED IN While over in Atlanta, THE BUDGET.” Georgia the Electric Owl Studios is showing that sustainability can be achieved from the very start. Welcoming clients such as Disney, Netflix and NBCU, the LEED certified facility has introduced a range of initiatives, including 30% of its studio power usage offset by solar energy, living walls integrated into its architecture, and water refill stations everywhere.

“Technology and construction technology is advanced enough that if it's something you're determined to do, you can do it. Getting LEED certified only cost us 1% of our budget,” says Michael Hahn, co-founder of Electric Owl Studios.

“It's not a cost that we have to pass on to the tenants that come here, so it costs them absolutely nothing to be green, or to be in a green facility. It’s important to communicate that to everybody – you can do it too.”

The film industry is gradually recognising the importance of sustainability and making efforts to reduce its environmental impact, although there’s still a way to go. As consumers become increasingly eco-conscious, there is a growing incentive for the film industry to prioritise sustainability not only for the planet but also for its own long-term viability.

As the European Film Academy recently pointed out there could be a time in the not-too-distant future, as our planet continues to crumble, where people choose to watch something or not based on whether it was made sustainably.

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PROFILE REinvent Studios In five years, REinvent Studios has become the top partner for Nordic producers trying to raise financing for scripted content on the international market. Now it is casting its net wider.

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riangles are one of the strongest structures in construction so when Rikke Ennis founded REinvent Studios in 2018 she knew it had to have production, sales and financing all in one.

“We had three pillars in order not to be too vulnerable,” she says. “If one leg does not work the other can compensate. The whole idea was to be independent and not have to depend on external finance.”

Ennis has a background in law and sales beginning with managing international sales for Lars Von Trier’s Zentropa in the heyday of Dogma and the first wave of Nordic content. She was CEO of TrustNordisk, which merged the sales wings of Zentropa and Nordic Film, prior to setting up REinvent.

REINVENT STUDIOS BASED IN COPENHAGEN CEO – RIKKE ENNIS CFO – FREDERIK NELSSON SALES & MARKETING DIRECTOR – HELENE AURØ CREATIVE PRODUCER & SALES MANAGER – PETER AHLÉN

Her company represents over 1000 titles from Sweden’s SF Studios and supports 15 new film titles annually targeting launch at major international festivals.

On the television side, it invests minimum guarantees – money REinvent pays to close a 10% to 20% gap in the financing and to represent licensing rights internationally. It does this for up to 10 series a year, mainly Nordic shows from Danish public broadcasters or Swedish group Viaplay.

In production REinvent is both co-producer and original producer. 2021 was “an amazing year for production,” she says, when they made two television series (Trom and Boys), but since then the Danish domestic industry has been in crisis.

Preceding events in the US by 18 months, Denmark’s scriptwriters, directors and actors under the union Create Denmark demanded greater control over fees and royalties. The major streamers, TV2 and Viaplay didn’t want to play ball and production ground to a halt for a year. More than 50 shows were stopped in development or from shooting as Danish production lost an estimated EUR200 million.

The company secured a EUR26 million guarantee loan from the European Investment Fund in 2021.

“Armed with this we thought it would be easy to ask banks for a loan but the reality is banks are risk averse and do not understand IP. We’ve been able to boost our investment in international sales with the guarantee but we have to fund our growth with private equity.”

A deal was reached in December 2022 but the damage was done. “It was too expensive for streamers to produce here. That, combined with the fact that Denmark doesn’t have a media tax rebate means that buyers are not requesting new productions. They prefer to order from Sweden and Norway but even there output is reduced.” Viaplay dropped from 60 scripted shows a year to just ten.

Additionally streamers want cheaper nonfiction shows. “Everything combined to make Denmark very unattractive for production.”

With solid financial muscle and just 10 employees, Ennis likens REinvent to a speed boat in stormy waters. “We can innovate whereas others are container ships making it difficult to navigate or change course.”

Some companies went bankrupt, others have cut back. “In the next couple of years the Danish industry will have halved in value compared to 2021,” she says. “It’s a natural outcome of an over-heated market.

“It is really critical and very sad, especially when we’ve seen such a rich period of international recognition.” Thomas Vinterberg’s Another Round won best international Oscar in 2021, the same year Danish editor Mikkel Nielsen won Best Editing for his work on Sound of Metal. “My fear is that this is now history.”

With its three-pronged structure REinvent has survived.

“When productions are low then sales go up. When we need money and cashflow we have it from our finance division. We are our own bank. Because streamers are consolidating and cutting budgets they don’t have money for originals so they want to acquire and coproduce instead. And we also do that.”

The dearth of homegrown content sees them expanding production in Norway and Sweden and casting for more English-speaking content. “We’d love to work with Irish and Scotland producers.

There are incredible stories to be told. The culture there is a bit like ourselves - The Dark North.”

The company is open to partnerships or acquisitions – if the fit is right. “We want to keep our independent spirit. We try to be a studio that can a push go and not wait three years to greenlight. We would expect the same of a partner. We don’t want to be the container ship. We want to remain an agile speedboat.”

STARGATE

REinvent is handling international sales for SF Studios’ film adaptation of the heartwarming Christmas tale Stargate, based on Ingvild Rishøi’s award-winning book. Directed by Ida Sagmo Tvedte, produced by Hege Hauff Hvattum and Yngve Sæther at Motlys and co-produced by Swedish B-Reel, Stargate is distributed by SF Studios in Norway, Denmark and Finland.

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IBC Review: AI ‘S’all good man’

The tech show drew 43,000 people to Amsterdam where many felt the buzz of AI even if practical tools were thin on the ground.

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few years ago, when the industry first began to take serious notice of AI, the technology was really an application of machine learning. The progression and development of the tools and apps since then has been phenomenal, which is why SMPTE president Renard T. Jenkins told the International Broadcasting Convention in Amsterdam, that the M&E industry is only just starting on its journey through a decade of massive change.

Actually, industry experts expect the next 20 to 40 years of developments in media and entertainment to be dominated by conversations around this technology. Media companies are beginning to explore Generative AI not to create entire new movies or shows, but to personalise content for users and improve the efficiency of media production.

Most execs chose to emphasise the view that AI is but a tool, not a usurper of jobs – but then it is not their jobs which are under threat.

Dex Hunter-Torricke, Head of Global Communications & Marketing at Google Deepmind told IBC that “people naturally want to see more creativity from humans and AI will amplify and build on this. We will see a lot more content where AI plays a role, but humans are critical to the process by adding value.”

His keynote could actually have been written and presented by an avatar, so relentlessly upbeat was its corporate messaging and so untailored to the actual audience of media pros he was addressing.

Avid’s CTO Kevin Riley urged the industry to embrace AI, much as his own firm has done in an extensive alliance with Microsoft.

“Don’t be afraid of this,” he said in one of many AI related sessions at IBC. “The cloud was similarly viewed as a massive disruptor, but what has happened already is that there are a bunch of new jobs being created—and the same thing is going to happen with AI.”

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Raghvender Arni, Director, Customer Acceleration Team at AWS posed one of the bigger questions for the creative industries. “Data is the oil that really pushes AI forward,” he said. “But once you’ve created the data, who owns the copyright for it?”

Adobe has a solution. Firefly, its suite of AI models for Gen-AI, are in essence cleared of rights for users to exploit. The company is also a founder of the Content Authenticity Initiative leading a standardised approach to how AI is deployed.

“The idea is to surface what is going on with an image, where it was trained, how it was altered to combat disinformation and increase transparency,” said Adobe’s Kylee Peña. “We are also introducing Do Not Train credentials for artists to tag their content if they do not want it used by AI.”

ACROSS CONTENT CREATION AND PRODUCTION, GENERATIVE AI CAN ACT AS A CREATIVE CO­PILOT.

Lewis Smithingham, SVP of Innovation & Creative Solutions at Media.Monks, was among several speakers to emphasise the potential of AI to automate and personalise media. He predicted that AI would “be the death of monoculture” and birth new “microcultures and subcultures that allow people to personalise their content.”

Content would no longer be created and programmed based on demographics like age or location, he said, but on terms such as individual identity. “AI gives us the opportunity to create personalised content at scale,” he said.

John Footen, MD of M&E at Deloitte, also pointed to personalisation of content as something that will be of “dramatic importance” in future. “One of the roles of GenAI might be to create an avatar of yourself, so you can then ask that GenAI to show content to match your mood and social situation,” he said.

His peer at Accenture, Andy Walker, predicted that by 2026 all creatives would be using GenAI to enhance media workflows. Across content creation and production, Generative AI can act as a “creative co-pilot.”

ADOBE ENHANCES WITH AI Most of the chat about AI at this show was just that.

Adobe was one of the few companies that has integrated AI into its product. These include an AI-powered speech enhancement tool to Premiere Pro that allows users to clean up speech affected by issues such as a poorly placed mic or low-quality archive footage.

Text-based editing now includes filler word detection to automatically identify “ums” and “uhs” in dialogue. Users can remove pauses or any other unwanted dialogue in one step using AI-powered bulk delete.

CAMERAS

EDITING

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

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In its first trade show outing since being acquired by private equity firm STG for USD1.4 billion, Avid majored on a tighter integration of Pro Tools with Media Composer. For instance, Pro Tools Track Markers now improve the workflow between Avid’s video and audio software, “so teams can have tighter collaboration notes”.

IPHONE TO RESOLVE WORKFLOW Blackmagic Design announced several new cameras, including one with a full frame 6K sensor and 13 stops of dynamic range. The model also uses an L-Mount which works with the latest full frame lenses from Leica, Panasonic and Sigma. The Blackmagic Cinema Camera 6K costs EUR2400.

For content creators desiring of an even lower budget way to film then Blackmagic released an app which gives iPhone users some of the professional controls featured in its high end cameras. The app, free from the Apple Store, has adjustable settings for frame rate, shutter angle, white balance and ISO. Recording can be made into the Blackmagic Cloud where footage automatically syncs with DaVinci Resolve for continued postproduction.

"Blackmagic Camera is a truly revolutionary workflow for creating feature film quality content using an iPhone,” said CEO Grant Petty, CEO in a release. “It will be really exciting to find out how Blackmagic Camera will change traditional news and post production workflows.”

Sony also had a cheaper version of its high-end cine camera Venice. The Burano has a sensor that matches the colour science of the Venice cameras but intended for smaller crews working on commercials, wildlife, or documentary productions.

BEHIND THE SCENES ON MISSION IMPOSSIBLE Editor Eddie Hamilton gave a masterclass into some of the tricks and challenges of cutting fast-paced action. The British editor who works with Tom Cruise and is currently on Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two showed clips from films including Top Gun: Maverick.

“Months and months of work goes to the cutting room, so there’s a lot of responsibility associated with that to make sure everyone’s best work is presented on screen,” he said. “I have to constantly put myself in the audience’s point of view, and make sure that every emotional impulse that they’re feeling from beginning to end is communicated as clearly as possible.” He’s not afraid to challenge himself with notes or test screenings. “If it’s not working for the audience, we’ll cut it out or figure out another way to tell the story more simply and economically.

Ultimately, the audience is right.”

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Scotland On Top

Image: Black Mirror’s Loch Henry episode © Netflix.

Netflix and Amazon are among many to bring their projects to the Scottish isles, attracted beautiful locations, great production support from the likes of Creative Scotland and funding options through Screen Scotland.

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cotland’s incredible scenery, including rugged mountains, pristine beaches and cities that double for US metropolis, as well as growing studio, crew base and funding options have attracted several big film and television projects in recent years, including Game of Thrones, Succession, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny and The Batman.

According to Screen Scotland’s latest report, inward investment from film and high-end television production spend increased by 110%, from GBP165.3 million in 2019 to GBP347.4 million in 2021. And total spend for all audiovisual content was an estimated GBP617.4 million. These are impressive figures and meant that 5,120 full-time jobs had to be created in the sector to meet the demand.

And Scotland has continued to see projects flow in…

VERSATILE LOCATIONS

One of the stand-outs last year was Netflix’s popular series Black Mirror, which set up in Scotland for the filming of its murder mystery inspired episode Loch Henry (season 6, episode 2). Led by location manager and Scotland native Liam Irving, the

production team took full advantage of the country shooting across 18 different Scottish locations, travelling from idyllic towns to remote valleys.

“Scotland has demonstrated its ability to be a very viable country to film in,” says Irving. “It has a strong industry and welcomes other UK and overseas productions regularly. Each production has its own creative and visual requirements but Scotland is rich and diverse in filming locations.”

For the Loch Henry episode, the production team had the daunting task of “finding a derelict farmhouse with mountain views and a country pub interior we could film for an extended period,” according to Irving. But they managed to find them at The Village Inn in Arrochar, near the head of Loch Long, a popular gathering place for mountaineers with its excellent road and rail links and close proximity to the Arrochar Alps.

Other stand-out locations used to depict the sinister landscapes in the show included the main roads of Inverary with its black and white buildings, and the Falls of Falloch, where one of the lead characters Pia has an accident.

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PART OF THE APPEAL TO A PRODUCER OF FINDING THINGS ON LOCATION IS THAT YOU GET GREAT VALUE FOR MONEY ON CAMERA ALREADY.

SCOTTISH STUDIOS

Aside from the breathtaking natural locations, Scotland also offers an impressive array of studio facilities, which prove useful in the inclement weather. Indeed, the country is home to 15% of the UK’s total studios, including First Stage Studios, Pyramid Studios and Studio Alba, which have all hosted a number of productions in recent years.

“Scotland’s studio and build space landscape has expanded over the last 10 years, now with seven dedicated sites for features and high-end television series to choose from,” says Cheryl Conway, head of screen commission at Screen Scotland. “Scotland’s first virtual production studio Nightsky Studios opened this year and has world class facilities available, as well as a joining build space and backlot.”

Amazon Prime Video’s Good Omens returned to Scotland recently for the filming of its second season, setting up base at Pyramid Studios in Bathgate. The recently expanded facility was heavily used by the production team, especially for the impressive VFX work, even standing in for Soho.

As writer and co-show runner Neil Gaiman pointed out on social media recently: “Bathgate was chosen because it has a great big studio where we could build Soho. Also, because it’s not that far from Leith where we are shooting Anansi Boys. (Leith was chosen for Anansi Boys because it had an even bigger studio in which we could build Brixton and Florida and a Caribbean Island).”

The Good Omens production team also couldn’t resist filming on location, including in the capital, Edinburgh, against backdrops such as the old town cemetery and cobbled streets surrounding the castle in Stirling, as well as historically preserved locations such as Victoria Street and Bo’ness Hippodrome.

“Part of the appeal to a producer of finding things on location is that you get great value for money on camera already,” says Fenelon. “Going to a disused factory to film Hell, for example, needed some production design, but at least we didn’t have to build walls or windows or floors. We would just add things to what was already existing.”

STUDIOS STREAMING Image: Good Omens season 2 © Amazon Studios.

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SPENDING

Conway adds, “Our cities are vibrant and offer a range of architecture that means several named locations in a script can all be found within a small radius in Scotland, along with our strong crew networks and links for doing call outs make creating a stable base for productions simple.”

Much like in the rest of the UK, there is a very strong, highly-trained crew and service base in Scotland who can assist with productions of all sizes.

“You can get locations anywhere but you can’t “YOU CAN GET replicate the quality of LOCATIONS people. Our excellent ANYWHERE BUT YOU crews are one of the top CAN’T REPLICATE THE reasons I would come QUALITY OF PEOPLE.” back to Scotland,” insists Fenelon.

One of the stand-out production service suppliers is Supply 2 Location who have worked on some of the biggest projects to come to the country over the past year, including Disney’s latest Indiana Jones and Apple TV’s Tetris. Expanding to meet demand, the outfit has set up a second depot this year.

FUNDING OPTIONS

Incoming productions have the added incentive of plenty of funding options. As Scotland is part of the UK, filmmakers have access to the UK Film Tax Relief, which is a payable cash rebate of up to 25% of UK qualifying expenditure (capped at 80% of core expenditure with no budget limit).

Screen Scotland also offers plenty of other funding options, including the Film Development and Production Fund for filmmakers based in Scotland; the Production Growth Fund for large scale productions shooting in the country who spend more than GBP2 million, and a Broadcast Content Fund.

All this combined, it is easy to see why the country is proving so popular for productions looking for natural beauty, diverse locations, good crew and much needed financial support.

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Image courtesy of Christian Witkin.

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interview Pinar with Seyhan Demirdag I

t has been said that Pinar Seyhan Demirdag knows more about the creative potential of AI than anyone on the planet.

She found herself at the epicentre of the early days of generative AI developments in 2017 when Google contacted her to say that their Generative AI discoveries looked like Demirdag’s work as an artist. In 2020, with Gary Koepke, she founded Seyhan Lee, a tech firm aiming to bridge the gap between Gen-AI and the entertainment industry. It created one of the first feature films (Descending The Mountain) using Gen-AI and an early brand-sponsored AI film (Connections/Beko). Last year they launched Cuebric, a tool that combines several different AIs to streamline the production of CG environments for virtual production stages.

A regular on the speaking circuit including at SXSW and TEDx, Demirdag’s views about generative AI, consciousness, and futurism are informed by her work as an artist working across many different media.

MAKERS MAG

What does the future of Gen-AI filmmaking look like?

PINAR SEYHAN DEMIRDAG

I would like to imagine a world where no matter your background or talent, anyone can play a central role in the

CREATIVITY

filmmaking process. A world where their vision is facilitated and co-produced by AI tools in realtime. This will enable an auteur’s vision to be realised much more accurately.

Today, filmmakers conceptualise, pre-produce, produce and postproduce in a linear fashion with many weeks of lost time in between. Imagine a production process where all that collapses into one, and everyone collaboratively exchanges ideas in the now. Imagine testing ideas and seeing a vision come to life in realtime.

Are crafts people right to be concerned about AI’s advance into the industry?

No-one should be fearful of AI if they view the technology objectively. The more we personalise AI, the more it subconsciously dehumanises humans. What AI does is actually quite simple. There's a data set and there's an algorithm and it produces results in order to serve your creativity.

Can AI create art autonomously?

Generative AI has nothing to do with creativity. It has everything to do with being your parallel processing, never tiring, just your assistant constantly giving you options for you to curate, review, and select. The AI does not create. We create by using AI.

So artists should embrace AI as a tool?

Every media outlet has an honourable duty to serve humanity by creating space for conscious information instead of angering them with provocative sentences like ‘Your job will go unless…’ Unfortunately, the media has a track record of sensationalism. I would like to invite people to be curious about AI and to contemplate what AI means.

Will key crafts of, say, cinematographer or editor, disappear?

Quite the reverse. There’s the danger of normalisation of mediocrity. We collectively have a deep understanding about what quality is and what it is not and so just because everybody will be able to make photorealistic films doesn’t mean that what they produce will be great. Almost everyone has a digital camera in their pocket but a few photographers have the talent and skill to use the technology to produce work of value.

Tell us about your route to media and entertainment.

I am an image generator on my own. I am trained to generate different images for different surfaces. I don’t know how to read or write code but through graphics, art and design I have an intuitive knowledge about where image generation is going.

Is it right to train an AI on data without copyright attribution/renumeration?

There is a very big difference in training a data set on images from the total sum of humanity [like Cuebric, which trains on Stable Diffusion dataset LAION] versus data based on the works of a particular artist or group of artists.

If Cuebric were to be trained to generate artworks without seeking the artist’s permission it would simply be wrong.

Currently there is chaos and confusion about the difference between the two.

How do you steer the right side of that?

At Seyhan Lee, Gary and I work with a spiritual teacher on how to develop tools where at all times we put humans on a pedestal.

The human creative element in our workforce is non-negotiable and the background of our company.

FOR MORE MAKERS AI CONTENT Page 19 AI, an engine for creativity.

Page 56 Writers programming the programme.

Page 90 AI ads but at what cost?

Page 160 Double trouble for actors.

IMAGE MAKING

GENERATIVE AI

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Thinking outside the box in the gaming world

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WITH THE LAUNCH OF ENTERTAINMENT LIONS FOR GAMING, THE CREATIVE WAYS IN WHICH GAMEPLAY IS BEING UTILISED BY BRANDS HAVE BEEN BROUGHT TO THE GLOBAL STAGE. MAKERS EXPLORES THE STRATEGIES GAMING MARKETERS ARE EMPLOYING TO REACH COMMUNITIES OF PLAYERS.

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ong gone are the days when the face of gaming exclusively belonged to teenage boys isolating themselves in front of computers.

With sophisticated design formats, better inclusion and accessibility for all and an expansion into immersive and personalised experiences such as Fortnite, Roblox and Minecraft, the world of gaming has been blown wide open.

“Marketers are beginning to understand that gamers and game communities have unique cultures – and in order to reach these communities, and drive value for the brand, they need to develop innovative ideas and experiences that resonate with these audiences,” said Frances Li, Riot Games’ global head of marketing, and Entertainment Lions for Gaming jury president.

Entertainment Lions sets a new precedent for gaming’s place in the marketing space, providing a great opportunity for effective communication with consumers, but it also comes with additional challenges.

“For a lot of people, gaming isn't just a hobby, it's an identity. The culture around it has become undeniably important,” say Darcie Burrell and Lawrence Melilli, creative directors at advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy. “It provides more surface area to play in, more space for ideas, more people to talk to, and new ways to talk to them.

“Plus, it provides room for creatives already embedded in the culture to come up with ideas for something they already love and are a part of. People who play games invest hundreds of hours of their lives into whatever it is they play. You can have a richness of story and a connection that you just can't get from something like a 30-second commercial.”

Wieden and Kennedy have already proved their understanding of gamers and their expectations for the content they consume. With their 2022 Ogilvy winning online puzzle game What’s Grandma Hiding with Metacore, starring Kathy Bates, they were able to tap into the game’s main demographic of middle-aged women.

Their Clash from the Past campaign for Supercell’s popular free to play mobile strategy game Clash of Clans won two Grand Prix at Cannes thanks to its different approach. W+K created a documentary and campaign centred around 40 fictitious years of Clash of Clans. The campaign followed a series of brand partnerships, mini games and an animated cinematic experience that sent the game, which is only ten years old, back to 1982.

The goal of the campaign was to envelop fans in this fake history and make them believe it was real through never-before-seen, re-released games, created by digital agency Rose, one from each era of game design history. The campaign “GAMERS ARE OFTEN not only tapped into the UNRESPONSIVE TO consumers’ love of INAUTHENTIC AND gameplay, but also INVASIVE MEANS the relationship they build with the game’s OF ADVERTISING. characters and storylines.

THEY HAVE LITTLE TOLERANCE FOR

“This one really MARKETING THAT intended to serve the INTERFERES WITH fans,” say Burrell and Melilli. “It was a labour PLAYING TIME.” of love from a group of people who love the game to a larger group of people who love the game. This isn't the first time Wieden+Kennedy has played in the space, and it certainly won't be the last. It's a huge opportunity to speak the language of a group of people like those in the gaming space.”

Doing away with traditional practices within marketing, the gaming industry is a completely new territory for brands and agencies. Gamers are often unresponsive to inauthentic and invasive means of advertising. They have little tolerance for marketing that interferes with any element of playing time. Therefore, an all-round understanding of the game, platform and its players, as well as the brand itself and how it fits within the new market, is critical.

Saatchi and Saatchi took that onboard, bringing together Oreo and Xbox for an unconventional yet perfect partnership. The Oreo Cheat Cookies’ campaign brought the nostalgia around cheat codes back by inviting consumers to create combinations

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FOR A LOT OF PEOPLE, GAMING ISN'T JUST A HOBBY, IT'S AN IDENTITY. IT PROVIDES MORE SURFACE AREA TO PLAY IN, MORE PEOPLE TO TALK TO, AND NEW WAYS TO TALK TO THEM.

with cookies. For the first time in Europe, Oreo has launched six different embossments, inspired by the Xbox controller buttons, giving the cookies an innovative role and creating a gaming experience.

From the iconic Xbox logo to the signature A, B, X, Y and arrow buttons, consumers were able to create cheat codes with the OREO Xbox Special Edition and unlock in-game content within Xbox games.

Bringing gamers even closer to their playing experience, Pringles and Grey launched the Stay in the Game campaign. Offering someone the chance to get paid GBP20,000 to work as a non-player character (NPC), Pringles brand platform Mind Popping invited applicants to appear in Train Sim World as a Pringles vending machine re-filler.

Adding to the immersive experience, existing NPCs were also featured in a series of films created by Grey, expressing their displeasure at having a human in their world.

On the launch of the campaign, Grey London Global Group creative director Aaron McGurk commented: “The gaming world has opened up opportunities that only existed in our dreams, and in this case, the dream of becoming a vending machine filler.”

Taking an immersive approach to in-game advertising was unifying trend for many of the Entertainment Lions winners. Through the narrative of game formats, players form an attachment to their avatars and are invested in their environments and wellbeing. As brands embed themselves in those virtually crafted worlds, the impact of their messaging is much better received.

Pringles’ brand awareness rose an impressive 38% thanks to its immersive activation, proving the benefits of sophisticated brand integration into gaming. But, more than amplifying brands, gaming

GAMING

CANNES LIONS

BRAND INTEGRATION

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is being utilised to spur real change, opening the floor for important conversations between organisations and gaming audiences.

In the face of the ongoing climate crisis, 2023 Cannes Lions winning Los Santos 3°C partnered Green Peace with VMLY&R in the world of Grand Theft Auto. As one of the most well-known “AN ALL-ROUND cities in the virtual UNDERSTANDING OF world, Los Santos was THE GAME, PLATFORM used to portray the real life effects of climate AND ITS PLAYERS, change. Through the AND HOW BRANDS experience, characters FIT WITHIN THE NEW were taken through MARKET, IS CRITICAL.” unique missions and were even required to wear masks. From floods, air pollution and the destruction of ecosystems, real life environmental challenges were brought to the forefront of the gaming experience.

Commenting on the project, VMLY&R says: “To launch the immersive experience, 50 top Brazilian streamers played it live for an entire week. Soon, millions of followers did the same. This interplay of entertainment and information inspired action in millions of GenZ, achieving an unprecedented engagement against climate change.”

Gaming is opening up the creative possibilities for marketers. The vertical is forcing the teams behind the campaigns to step outside of the box to fully understand their target and push the boundaries of communication between a brand and its consumers.

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Pulling the Purse Strings

As production activity grows, so does the need for accountants, seen as the bridge between finance and the creatives. This is why on set training and partnerships with other finance professionals are currently flourishing. Chris Evans goes behind the scenes to speak to those involved.

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he rise of the streaming giants and bigger budget productions means that accountants are more important than ever to help with managing the finances and access the incentives,” says Sam Ampah, accounts senior, media sector at Alliotts accountancy firm. He adds: “I can tell from the first 10 minutes of looking at something whether they’ve got a decent production accountant or not.”

This is why there has been a huge drive to recruit and properly educate hundreds of new production accountants. The major UK training bodies have been forming partnerships with the top studios and streamers to entice people into the roles from inside and outside the screen sector and give them valuable experience behind-the-scenes on major projects.

The National Film and Television School (NFTS) offers a diploma in production accounting for film and television that is supported by Disney, so trainees get a stint working on the likes of Thor, Star Wars or Indiana Jones. While the Production Guild of Great Britain (PGGB) has partnered with Netflix for its Netflix Assistant Production Accountant Training Scheme

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(NAPATS), offering 12 month placements supporting the work of production accountants and assistant accountants on top shows like Bridgerton or Sex Education.

“Our highly successful NAPATS scheme encourages new industry entrants, links them to available jobs and directly benefits productions that are continuously on the lookout for new talent,” says Lyndsay Duthie, CEO, PGGB. Louise Black was part of the first NAPATS cohort in 2018/19. Before doing the scheme, she’d worked in several small creative businesses doing bookkeeping. “I’d always wanted to work in the film and television industry… imagining I’d start as a production assistant and work my way up through the production management side. I had no idea that I could use my accounting experience to be part of a TV crew,” she says. “The training is great for arming you with the basics of production.”

Louise has since gone on to work on several Netflix shows, such as comedy series Turn Up Charlie and fantasy Cursed. On the latter, she was involved

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for the duration of the project. “Aside from numeracy, I think the main qualities you need for the job are patience, good humour and organisation skills,” adds Louise, who now works in accounts for Netflix’s Production Finance Department, specialising in prep/wrap.

I WAS A DATA ANALYST FOR DELOITTE, BUT IT FELT QUITE REPETITIVE. I ENROLLED ON THE TRAINEE FINDER SCHEME AND WITHIN A COUPLE OF WEEKS GOT A CALL FROM THE PRODUCTION ACCOUNTANT ON NETFLIX’S SEX EDUCATION.

ScreenSkills also offers training and production placement support at all levels from payroll assistants to production accountants on a variety of film and high-end television shows. At the new entrant level is the Trainee Finder Scheme for those who’ve just qualified or been a cashier, which provides an induction course and then places the trainee on a project (recent examples include the BBC shows The Outlaws and Ghosts).

“I was working as a data analyst for Deloitte, but it felt quite repetitive, so I enrolled on the trainee finder scheme and within a couple of weeks I got a call from the production accountant on Netflix’s Sex Education series (season four),” enthuses Wales-based Ashley Thomas-Evans. “I was organising and managing the petty cash spend throughout the production, making sure the crew were paid, and generated weekly and monthly reports. It was really interesting.”

Ashley even got to (briefly) star in the show when a couple of supporting artists dropped out at late notice, “which was very cool”. But he admits the hours are tough (around 11 hours a day), especially coming from a 9-5pm job. To compensate, he and many others in the industry tend to work on a project for months and then take some time off before starting the next one.

But despite having the production experience, it wasn’t an easy swap “as I’d established my position as a co-ordinator on a number of shows, and so it was tough to start from the beginning again,” she says. “This is why I decided to do the training to give me confidence and to hopefully shortcut a little bit.”

Kathleen undertook the NFTS course up in Scotland where she’s based, while working on the historical series Outlander as a second assistant accountant, so got to put what she was learning into practice. The part-time course, geared towards those with a finance or business background, is designed to help trainees apply their knowledge to the film set, so they learn all the accounting aspects of a project from script to completion, including budgeting for locations, cast and art department, cash flow, currency and tax issues.

“Not everyone then makes the leap because it’s a scary thing, going from doing an evening course to then giving up a highly paid job in one sector to becoming more junior in another “SCREENSKILLS to work your way OFFERS TRAINING through,” admits Jon Wardle, director of the AND PRODUCTION NFTS. “But since we’ve PLACEMENT SUPPORT been partnering with AT ALL LEVELS FROM Disney on the course for PAYROLL ASSISTANTS a couple of years that’s TO PRODUCTION really helped.”

ACCOUNTANTS ON

Although other are used to the hours, like Andrew Muir, who also did the ScreenSkills Trainee Finder course having previously worked long days as a bookkeeper for his family’s news agents, while moonlighting as an extra.

The course includes a A VARIETY OF FILM guaranteed two week AND HIGH-END placement on either a TELEVISION SHOWS.” Marvel or Lucasfilm project, and Disney has gone on to offer graduates of the course full-time positions at its company, in case the freelance production life isn’t right for you.

“I’m a huge film fan and was keen to get into that world when I found out about the accountancy route,” Muir explains. “Initially I did a bit of basic work on the Anansi Boys series and completed the training programme over six weekends, learning the process from script movie magic to accounts and budgeting. And then I moved onto more responsibility with Rodger Griffiths’ thriller Kill, before working on ITV series Payback where I got to see how the different departments work, including art and props, and had a couple of days on set.”

Kathleen found the course very useful, especially when chatting to more senior people in the creative and finance teams because she understood more of what they required and could ask relevant questions. “I can’t design costumes or direct actors, but I’m fascinated by the process,” she says, although concedes the accounts team have to be “an impediment in the process sometimes, as they have to make sure the books are balanced when sometimes the creatives just want items purchased a.s.a.p.”

One person who has benefitted from training provided by all three bodies (NFTS, PGGB and ScreenSkills) is Kathleen Lambie. Unlike others who have transitioned from accounting in other sectors, she had already worked in television as a production co-ordinator, but enjoyed budgeting and putting together purchase orders, so moved into the accounting department.

At the end of the day, it’s an exciting world to work in. “I can be sitting at my desk, working out important budgets, and then get up, walk through a couple of doors and be in a completely different world of futuristic or historical sets. There’s always a fresh surprise every day,” concludes Thomas-Evans.

BUDGETS

FINANCE

TRAINING

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Turkish delight at dizi success

Image: Midnight at the Pera Palace © Netflix.

THE INTERNATIONAL SUCCESS OF THE DIZI JOINS CONTENT FROM BOLLYWOOD TO K-DRAMA IN CHALLENGING THE DOMINANCE OF AMERICAN POP CULTURE WITH NEW FORMS OF MASS CULTURE FROM THE EAST. KATRINA WOOD, CEO, MEDIAXCHANGE REPORTS.

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he importance of Turkey’s productions within the global market initially landed on my radar ten years ago when Eccho Rights established an office in Istanbul. By the end of this year it is predicted that there could be USD1 billion in media exports, tempered by the loss of business in the Middle East, but offset by expansion in Latin America and increasing interest from Southern European markets. Turkish distributor Inter Medya recently sold two miniseries, Interrupted and Dreams and Realities to Mediaset in Italy and in other countries like Spain interest is on the rise, following the success of The Protector (Hakan: Muhafız) a Turkish drama fantasy series which ran for four seasons on Netflix.

The popularity of Turkish television series has skyrocketed over the last decade, with its series exported to over 100 countries, contributing to a boom in the country’s domestic television industry.

What are the components that comprise it success?

As always, the essential ingredient is great storytelling as evidence in Turkey’s greatest export: the dizi. This genre, which is neither soap opera, nor telenovela, or period drama combines unique narratives with high production value – great sets, locations and strong charismatic actors. The format of longer episodes (usually running to two hours or longer) and seasons generates more in-depth character development and storytelling. Also, whether through romantic relationships, family dynamics, or societal issues, they often tackle complex and emotional themes giving a more satisfying experience.

Their hugely popularity domestically and abroad is attributed to a feeling that the dizi have an emotional resonance lacking in US shows which are considered more anodyne. Now there is an increasing tide of local productions sold internationally. The Protector made by Turkish producer Onur Güvenatam, Founder and Executive Producer of OGM Pictures, for Netflix offers international audiences a glimpse into Turkish life.

The Guardian ran a lengthy editorial into the genre in 2019 noting that advertising time is cheap in Turkey where the state broadcasting watchdog mandates that every 20 minutes of content be broken up by seven minutes of commercials. Every dizi has its own original soundtrack, and can have up to 50 major characters. They tend to be filmed on location in the heart of historic Istanbul, using studios only when they must.

Perhaps the most famous dizi, Magnificent Century made by Tims Productions, first aired in Turkey in 2011, and claimed one-third of the country’s television audience. The foreign press called it an Ottoman-era Sex and the City and compared it to a real-life Game of Thrones. It had multiple historical consultants and a production team of 130, with 25 people working on costumes alone.

Istanbul-based distributor Global Agency estimated in 2019 that Magnificent Century has been seen by more than 500 million people worldwide.

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Image: The Protector © Yigit Eken & Netflix.

NO DOUBT THIS IS A PRECURSOR OF MORE INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRY INTEREST TO COME AS THE SIGNIFICANT BUILDING OF THE LOCAL INDUSTRY CONTINUES.

Series have travelled both ways, with adaptations between Turkey and India, Pakistan, Arabia, Mexico, as well as Sweden and the US. This opportunity is amplified by Netflix, Amazon and others streamers’ policy of distributing non-English shows with subtitles or dubs. Most dizi get 10 to 20 dubs.

production service provider. Organisations like the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT) offer grants and incentives for indie filmmakers. There are prominent festivals too, notably the Istanbul Film Festival and the Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival.

Binbir Gece (1001 Nights) from 2006 was the first dizi bought by Japan. Since 2002, about 150 Turkish dizi have been sold to more than 100 countries, including Algeria, Morocco and Bulgaria.

There are challenges of shooting here most notably the influence of the political and cultural climate on creative freedom, censorship and market competition. Nevertheless, Turkey has a broad community of talented creatives filmmakers, directors, musicians and writers many of whom have garnered domestic and international recognition.

Fatmagül'ün Suçu Ne? (What Is Fatmagül’s Fault?) explored themes of sexual assault and justice and was adapted into Indian TV series Kya Qusoor Hai Amala Ka? It was a huge hit in Argentina, and in Spain its primetime slot drew close to a million viewers per episode.

Ask-i Memnu (Forbidden Love) a drama revolving around a forbidden love affair was adapted into Pakistani series Ishq-e-Mamnoon.

Söz (The Oath), made by Tims Productions, ran for 84 episodes between 2017 and 2020 and was about an elite military unit fighting terrorism from the perspective of a soldier.

Gümüs was a huge hit in the Middle East where it was titled Noor and dubbed into Arabic. It was subsequently a hit in places including Bulgaria.

Further evidence of the vibrant local production industry is the strength of its local indie producer sector. Producers get as much as 50%... Shows are edited the same week they air, production is very modern. Moreover, there is often the use of double crews where two units shoot an episode simultaneously which speeds up production.

Although there are the usual financial constraints there are grants, co-productions and international partners to draw into a project. Turkey offers cash rebates of up to 30% for feature films, documentaries, and television series. Foreign film producers can receive a VAT refund (up to 18%) for all expenses relating to the procurement and import of goods and services during film shooting.

The applicant must be a Turkish co-producer or

The rise of the domestic industry is highlighted by an influx of international interests. The most recent example is the acquisition by Peter Chernin’s North Road of Karga Seven Pictures one of Turkey’s leading producers. Istanbul and LA-based Karga Seven is best known for English-language period piece Rise of Empires: Ottoman and Turkishlanguage time travel drama Midnight at the Pera Palace, both of which were made for Netflix and reached number one in Turkey and charted on the streamer’s Global Top 10. The company also produces hit Turkish dramas such as Hekimoglu, adapted from the US series House.

No doubt this is a precursor of more international industry interest to come as the significant building of the local industry continues.

As Founder and CEO of MediaXchange for 30 years, Katrina has formed a global network of professionals working in television and film drama and, increasingly, games entertainment. She was co-Founder of Women in Film and TV, the leading membership organisation for women working in media, of which she remains an honorary lifelong member.

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Image: Who is Erin Carter? © Netflix.

SPAIN california of europe

Spain is one of the hottest territories right now thanks to the increased national financial incentive to 30%, expanding studio offerings, including the re­opened Ciudad de la Luz, great locations, and the government’s EUR1.6 billion media funding initiative.

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pain is living up to its reputation as the California of Europe. The government’s initiative, Spain: Europe’s Audiovisual Hub, which is investing EUR1.6 billion in the country’s media sector between 2021 and 2025 is already bearing fruit, especially the Shooting in Spain strand, which is promoting the country as a prime destination for shoots and investment.

“The opportunities and infrastructure are in place in Spain,” says Teresa Azcona, director general AVS Hub at the Spain Film Commission. “We can connect you with everybody, and we can find creative solutions for everything. If you want to shoot in Spain, we are here to help you make magic.”

Spain is one of the few countries to boast not only a stunning array of locations that can double for anywhere from Paris to Kabul, but also an expanding range of studio THERE’S THE space across the whole country.

SECUOYA STUDIOS AT MADRID CONTENT CITY, WHERE NETFLIX HAVE SET UP A BASE, BOASTING 10 SOUND STAGES.

To give a flavour of the latter, there’s the Secuoya Studios at Madrid Content City, where Netflix have set up a base, boasting 10 sound stages. While in Guadalajara, the Castilla-La Mancha Film City is under construction at the military Fort of San Francisco, and in Marratxi new film studios will be built to house the first floodable set in Mallorca. There’s also a film city planned for Bilbao and a major studio complex at ICT City in Galicia.

Plus there’s the much talked about re-opening of Ciudad de La Luz studios in Alicante. The major complex, just five minutes from Alicante

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

Sioux City, Canary Islands This Wild West theme park in the Cañon del Águila, modelled on the history of Sioux City Iowa in the US, boasts all your typical western town sites such as a saloon, school, prison, and church. Visitors can enjoy the usual high jinks of men falling from buildings, quick draws, high noons and saloon brawls.

But in recent years the town has struggled due to a lack of investment and competition from newer attractions closer to the tourism heartlands of Maspalomas and Playa del Ingles.

However, for filmmakers it is an ideal ready-made set (sans the tourists). It has featured in numerous television productions, music videos and adverts and now will be the setting for Amazon series Zorro, an new vision of the classic hero, produced by Secuoya Studios and starring Miguel Bernardeau (pictured above). It shot there between July 2022 and February 2023.

Image: Zorro © Secuoya Studios.

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Q&A JORGE DORADO PRODUCER

HBO’s The Head

The Head is an English-language SpanishJapanese psychological thriller series set in Antarctica involving a series of murders and a killer on the loose.

Q: What was it like filming on the

Canary Islands?

A: We practically shot both seasons of The Head entirely on the islands of Tenerife. It has been a wonderful experience thanks to the technical team that assisted us, the locations, the places where we shot, the people involved, the logistics… It’s been a true delight.

Q: Were you doubling Tenerife for

International airport, covers about 6,000 sqm and offers six sound stages, workshops, backlots, and an exterior and two interior water tanks. Earlier this year, it hosted its first international project since re-opening, the French-Belgium film Sharks in Paris and expects to accommodate several more in 2024.

CATALUNYA CALLING

Meanwhile, in the Catalunya region, the Parc Audiovisual de Catalunya in Terrassa also plans to expand its facilities by 6,000 sqm with the construction of sets between 1,500 and 2,500 sqm (due 2024). This will be an added bonus to the region, including Barcelona, which is proving an increasingly popular shooting location. One of the stand-out productions to film there recently is Left Bank Pictures’ TV series, Who is Erin Carter?, which reached the global number one spot on Netflix in its first week of release in August.

The drama shot in more than 20 Catalan towns and villages around Barcelona, including Manresa in the north and La Barceloneta and Sitges. “It was an expansive but smooth shoot around the city. We had great support from the Barcelona and Catalunya film commissions,” says Mike Day, CEO, Palma Pictures who collaborated with Left Bank on the project.

Palma Pictures also worked with Left Bank on Netflix’s other hugely popular series, The Crown, which shot series six across Barcelona. “We were doubling Barcelona for Paris slap bang in the middle of the city. Again we relied on the support of the local commissions, and had to change a lot due to it being a period drama, so cars, signs, extras etc,” says Day.

other locations?

A: We had the chance of shooting the first

season on an oil platform in the bay where we recreated part of a station in the Antartica and, on season two, we used that same platform to recreate the interior of a cargo ship at sea.

We turned La Tejita beach into an island of the Philippines. The judicial court in Tenerife became the judicial court in Ireland.

In general, it’s a highly versatile place. Just by saying that The Head season one takes place in Antarctica when 90% of it was filmed in Tenerife, I think that says it all. To me this is the ideal place to tell any story.

International productions shooting in Catalunya can apply for the 30% national tax rebate, as well as a minority co-production fund offering up to EUR300,000 per project. “There’s also a new HETV fund that grants up to EUR1.5 million for television series using Catalan as the majority language,” says Carlota Guerrero, manager of the Catalunya Film Commission.

She points to the Catalunya Media City currently in the works, as part of the government’s Spain: Europe’s Audiovisual Hub initiative, which is “a creative hub for the audiovisual and design sectors intended to advance every step of the value chain of the industry, from creation to exhibition, through research, education, innovation and production”.

The site will include a new set of sound stages to host feature film and high-end television projects.

BALEARIC AND CANARY ISLANDS APPEAL

In the Balearic islands the city of Majorca was used as a filming location for the latest series of The Crown. “We were doubling it for the French Riviera, San Tropez, Monaco, Monte Carlo and even a Bosnian town. Plus quite a lot of marine unit stuff on some big, swanky yachts,” says Day.

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“Spain’s jewel in the crown is the diversity of its locations. But there’s also a solid crew base, appealing incentives, it’s a safe place to shoot, and access is great thanks to tourism and quality infrastructure, like high-speed trains and lots of international airports.”

Majorca has also been filmed as itself for the popular Amazon series The Majorca Files, which recently shot its third season, particularly around the capital city Palma, including at the busy Plaza Cort, which was transformed into a giant movie set.

Image: A Town Called Malice © Cristina Rios Bordon.

ESSENTIAL FACTS TAX INCENTIVES

30%

Spain offers a 30% rebate for productions on the first EUR1 million spent in the country, and 25% for any amount above that (up to EUR20 million per film and EUR10 million for any single series episode).

In the Canary Islands, producers can benefit from a 4% reduced corporate income and a 0% VAT rate applies to the delivery and import of goods and rendering of services.

In the Valencia community (home of Ciudad de la Luz Studios), regional incentives compatible with the national incentive consist of a direct grant equal to 25% of the local spend incurred during production up to a maximum of EUR1.5 million per production.

ATA CARNET

YES CO­PRODUCTION TREATIES

Spain co-produced an impressive 70 films in 2022.

The Canary Islands are also proving hugely popular, with 40% of all inward investment from international productions in Spain focused on the archipelago in 2022. The islands’ potential 50% cash rebate [potentially rising to 54%] for the first EUR1 million invested certainly helps draw these projects in. But the stunning variety of landscapes is also key.

The long list of recent projects to shoot there include Amazon Prime’s Jack Ryan season 4, which doubled Gran Canaria for Thailand and Myanmar, and Tenerife for Mexico and Thailand; Netflix’s The Mother, which doubled Gran Canaria for Cuba; Disney+ series AMMO, which filmed Fuerteventura for Mali; and Sky Max recreated the Costa del Sol in Tenerife for A Town Called Malice.

“Filming in Tenerife, which is less built up than the modern-day Costa Del Sol, gave us the opportunity to recreate the 1980s setting more authentically,” says Nick Love, creator of A Town Called Malice.

“But given the historical context, it wasn’t just a stylistic choice. The backdrop of our neon-lit beach clubs, palm trees and sun-kissed coastlines, represents a playground of opportunity for anyone with aspirations of reinvention.”

In a further boost, “the deduction limit on the local incentive stands at USD36 million (compared with EUR20 million in the rest of Spain) for films, and EUR18 million per episode for television series, and there is no cap for European creative staff,” says Lorena Martin, project manager at Canary Island Film. “Capped at 50-60% of a total budget, the islands shoot incentives now rate among the biggest in Europe.”

SOMETHING ELSE

Ever wondered where the wealthy choose to live?

According to recent data from the Tax Agency, there are 8,484 residents of the Balearics with a combined wealth of EUR33.5 million. To give this some context, that is four times the local government’s budget for 2023.

The region boasts the most number of millionaires as a percentage of the population with average assets of just under EUR4 million, making the Balearics one of the three wealthiest regions of Spain.

Property taxes on all the Balearic islands are the same. This includes the large islands of Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza and Formentera. If you’re looking to move there and be neighbours with the rich and famous, you’ll need to pay VAT/transfer tax – new builds require a one-time fixed payment of 10% of the total value of the property, plus an additional one-time 1.5% stamp tax. Resale properties are subject to a scalable transfer tax of between 8% and 11.5%.

While to moor your boat can cost anything from EUR20 a night for a small yacht to about EUR4,000 a day for a 55-metre superyacht at the exclusive Marina Port Ibiza, which offers a concierge service and divers on request. Oh and the nightlife is apparently pretty good in the summer!

TIME ZONE

GMT+1 THE INDUSTRY

There are over 72,000 professionals and 6,700 companies in Spain’s audiovisual sector.

Image: The Mother © Doane Gregory/Netflix © 2023.

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Truth should not be the first casualty of war

Channel 4 documentary Evacuation recounts the last-ditch rescue of thousands of British nationals and Afghans from Kabul airport in August 2021.

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WITH FIRST-HAND INTERVIEWS AND ON-THE-GROUND FOOTAGE, CHANNEL 4 DOCUMENTARY EVACUATION GAVE A RARE INSIGHT INTO THE EMOTIONAL IMPACT ON ARMY AND AIRFORCE PERSONNEL OF THE OPERATION TO RESCUE 15,000 PEOPLE FROM KABUL IN 2021 AS THE TALIBAN CLOSED IN.

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to chase a political piece – which we did with Wonderhood. We just wouldn’t be allowed to get involved in it otherwise.”

Told largely from the British army’s point of view the film features rare candid displays of emotion from serving personnel as they relive the desperate and alarming situation they encountered on the ground.

He adds, “We want to appeal to as diverse an audience as possible, a youth audience. There are those people who like watching troops marching up and down the Mall but we need to stretch ourselves to audiences in new places without making idiots of ourselves. The point with Channel 4 and More4 is that these are the kind of audiences it is going to bring.”

hannel 4 documentary Evacuation recounts the last-ditch rescue of thousands of British nationals and Afghans from Kabul airport in August 2021.

However, getting the army to speak on the record required sign off from senior military bosses and the ministry of defence.

“Soldiers don’t sit around waiting on their bergens to do documentaries,” Bayard Barron, head of communications for the British Military explained when the three-part film premiered at Sheff Doc Fest. “You’ve got to stop them doing something which the tax payer is paying for and ask them to invest hours in interviews.”

Barron explained the balance he has to strike between wanting to generate positive media relations in order to help the army’s recruitment drive whilst managing the reluctance of the institution to do anything that might their reputation at risk.

“Unsurprisingly, most people in the army, air force or navy are fiercely proud of serving and that brings a conservatism toward media. “But at the same time, we are trying to bring down barriers to recruitment and to enhance the MOD image and this is a powerful way of doing it.”

Over 2000 army personnel were involved in Operation Pitting, one of the largest British military undertakings since World War II. Barron said he fielded lots requests for access to the story and that Wonderhood Studios’ bid was helped

by Channel 4’s participation and because it agreed not to politicise the story.

“We know that the whole Afghan deployment is something that can have a debate about,” Barron said. “The embers of it are still glowing hot in parliament as we speak. The military is a department of state so therefore there’s a political angle to any consideration but we don’t want to get involved in [media] that is going to skew the picture politically because we are not a political entity.

“So, the easiest thing for us to do is offer those people who can give authoritative testimony and try to get agreement from the production company not

Katharine Patrick, Head of Factual at Wonderhood, negotiated access with the MOD. “Through my own contacts with the military I started to have “THERE ARE THOSE informal chats exploring PEOPLE WHO LIKE areas we could look at,” WATCHING TROOPS she says. “I asked if MARCHING UP AND there was any headcam footage of the evacuation.

DOWN THE MALL BUT We did some digging WE NEED TO STRETCH and found out there was OURSELVES TO a combat camera team AUDIENCES IN NEW filming out there. We PLACES WITHOUT then talked about how MAKING IDIOTS OF we could obtain that OURSELVES.” footage.”

Director James Newton said he was wary about being given people to interview that were pre-vetted “when we are here to tell an honest story. We went to the barracks and started talking to people, comparing notes and trying to work out what actually happened, since everybody has a different perspective.”

The casting process was also research. “You want to find people who have a story to tell, for example, those people who have served in Afghanistan, those who have a relationship with country, those who are changed by the experience. The strongest thing that came out was that everybody has been affected by the experience.”

Diana Bird, Squadron Leader in the RAF Police gave one of the eyewitness testimonies and says she wouldn’t have agreed if producers Wonderhood Studios were going to portray them as heroes.

“This is a story that is important to tell properly,” Bird said. “It was explained to me that [the documentary] was not going to be the hypermasculine macho war type of thing you would normally see with the military but about the softer side of what we do as the armed forces. If we were going to do that and not make us all out to be heroes than I was happy to be part of it.”

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Making of One Piece

ADAPTING THE WORLD’S BIGGEST SELLING MANGA INTO A LIVE ACTION SERIAL

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etflix reportedly spent USD144 million on the eight pisodes of pirate drama One Piece, making it one of the most expensive shows ever made. It’s also the biggest show the streamer has made in Africa. Production was located at Cape Town Studios where it employed 1000 local crew many of whom, including editor Tessa Verfuss, had worked on Starz adventure series Black Sails.

Although filled with VFX, much of the budget went on large scale sets on soundstages and water tanks.

Virtual Production was considered but since there wasn’t a Volume stage in South Africa it would have meant building one. Production designer Richard

Bridgland’s team were given a head start on the massive ships required by repurposing ones that were initially built for Black Sails.

Bridgland said there were so many sets, “it was like designing four feature films because every two episodes the story moves to a different part of the story world.”

All the interiors for the ships were filmed on sound stages with the exception of Captain Alvida’s ship, Miss Love Duck, which was one of the largest repurposed vessels from Black Sails. Two ships were built entirely from scratch including the Straw Hats’ iconic ship, The Going Merry.

One Piece is the best-selling manga created by Japanese writer and illustrator Eiichiro Oda who is credited as exec producer. Locations he created for One Piece were taken from actual Balinese pagodas, storefronts in Florence and Belton House in Lincolnshire, replicated on screen.

Prosthetics were used whenever possible to help capture some of the wackier aspects of the story.

Four fully animatronic snails, roughly the size of house cats, were created for the show as well.

These had detachable eyeballs so the puppeteers could give them a variety of expressions and movement to the face.

Images: One Piece © Raquel Fernandes, Casey Crafford & Netflix.

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PROFILE Serviceplan Group Europe's largest independent agency network continues to grow, fuelled by its commitment to internationalisation, digitalisation, and its unique, integrated House of Communication approach.

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hen Alexander Schill joined Serviceplan in 2006 he asked the logical question ‘Why was the company so named?’

“We always operate from one House of Communication building in every country. We don’t change our concept which is always about three brands. We do not want to be recognised as the most creative agency nor the best technology company.

Our aim is to be among the top three in creative, media and platform in each market.” The company dubs this ‘ÜberCreativity’.

In the UK, it works closely with Unlimited Group.

In Latin America, its partner is Ariadna. In Asia it works with Japan's second largest agency Hakuhodo.

with high inflation rates, consumer restraint, and reduced client budgets amidst ongoing political and economic uncertainties.

In October 2020, the Group launched its partnership with award-winning US creative agency Pereira O'Dell, and in 2022 founded Mediaplus Americas. It has since founded Plan.Net Americas and acquired a stake in creative agency L&C in New York to complete the House of Communication states side.

Back in 1970 when Peter Haller and Rolf Stempel founded the company, he was told, they had a vision for an integrated agency decades before the concept became reality.

“They took a sheet of paper to clients and explained that they offered production strategy and distribution strategy, media and market analytics.

They said, ‘In the future the holistic concept will be key’. So they founded Serviceplan with the DNA of an integrated agency long before anyone anywhere actually built one.”

In 1983 the founders added Mediaplus, handling media and data complementing Serviceplan’s creative and content. Plan.net, a digital experience and technology arm, arrived in 1997. These remain the group’s pillars.

SERVICEPLAN GROUP ESTABLISHED 53 YEARS AGO EMPLOYS 5500+ PEOPLE OPERATES 35 AGENCIES IN 22 LOCATIONS INDEPENDENT NETWORK OF THE YEAR 2022 WON 11 CANNES LIONS IN 2023

Haller senior passed the reigns to his son Florian in 2002. Together with Schill – Global Chief Creative Officer & Partner – they spearheaded an international push.

The group went from one central office in Munich to three more locations in Germany, then throughout Europe, Russia, (from which it has since pulled back), the Middle East and Asia (Korea, China) and recently into the US.

Eighty per cent of the campaigns it works on are hosted in all three Serviceplan divisions. It is able to do this because it is not only independent (the largest in Europe) but partner owned. “All our partners own a substantial share of the company. We all run the agency and we all implement a philosophy of independent entrepreneurship.

“Sometimes we struggle if we are honest. We recognise it is very German to always think rationally.

In some countries the people who become partners in our agency find it difficult to understand there are no rules or targets or KPIs that come centrally.

“We do it together. We are entrepreneurs. This is the reason we go to work every morning. You can earn a lot but also nothing if your business is not running.”

Practically, it means that when Schill pitches creative ideas to a client he can invite a partner, for instance, on the media strategy side. “That makes it much easier than phoning up and liaising with a third partner agency, although we respect any client’s wish to do that.”

The growth plan is working – and then some.

Serviceplan Group reported revenues of EUR739 million for the last financial year – a significant 19% increase from the previous year's EUR623 million.

Notably, this growth occurred in what was predicted to be a high-risk year for the advertising industry

“Many European agencies have tried and failed to succeed in the US but we pushed really hard and today we have very good foothold.”

Just as importantly, it aims to become the first net-zero climate positive agency group in the world. It is not far off from reaching this goal. Many of its locations have already been certified as climate-neutral.

“We are independent today and will be forever.”

PENNY

Discount retail chain Penny came to universal attention with its award-winning Christmas 2021 campaign The Wish made while the world was in the grips of Covid-19. Serviceplan Munich repeated the success last Christmas with The Rift, again highly topical and no less emotional than its predecessor. The Rift addresses the divisions that are increasingly running through our society, and implores viewers to encourage an open dialogue with their neighbours.

“What made it so successful is that it communicates an insight that everyone can understand,” says Schill. “My personal belief is that we have to interconnect brands with society far more deeply than by advertising.

No matter how well a TVC is executed brands have to be connected, genuinely, to culture.”

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SWITZERLAND

smooth operator incentive, eligible applicants are required to have a minimum spend of approximately CHF100,000 (USD103,933) over at least five shooting days.

Supporting the upcoming animated movie from My Life as a Courgette and La Femme Canon creator Claude Barras, the VFC also aims to attract large-scale productions to set up in its new studio, Studio 13, which is scheduled to open January 2024.

The VFC says it wants to counteract the idea that Switzerland is expensive and therefore less attractive than other countries. “Although production costs in Switzerland are higher, the cantons’ hospitality and the simplicity of the collaboration methods favoured by the VFC considerably reduce the impression that it is expensive,” emphasises Tristan Albrecht, in charge of the VFC. Jakobs Ross © Ticino Film Commission.

From the romantic coastal city of Lucerne to the cozy mountain village of Zermatt, Switzerland is overflowing with location diversity. Facilitated by the expertise of regional film commissions and talented crew, the experience of filming in Switzerland is one to be envied.

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ilming for season 2 of Netflix’s New Heights took place from March to July of 2022 in Zurich. Produced by local company Zodiac Pictures Ltd and broadcaster SRF, the project swapped the country’s obvious landscapes for its darker, more mysterious aesthetics.

Switzerland’s sweep of landscapes, from lakes to snow covered mountain peaks and blankets of Alpine greenery make it an alluring visual paradise, malleable to many stories. New Heights was released on the streamer at the start of 2023.

Garnering international applause, Switzerland’s entry for the 2023 Oscars, A Piece of the Sky, first generated buzz during its premiere at Berlinale 2022. The Swiss-German drama was produced

by Zurich based production company Hugofilm Features “THE PROJECT and Germany’s Pandora Film SWAPPED THE Produktion, with the support of COUNTRY’S OBVIOUS SRF Swiss Radio and Television, LANDSCAPES FOR ITS SRG SSR and Arte.

DARKER, MORE MYSTERIOUS AESTHETICS.”

As the largest city in Switzerland, Zurich is home to a force of production companies and crews ready to tackle any project. Local production company Turnus facilitated the filming of Jakobs Ross, directed by Katalin Gödrös, which shot in the Vallemaggia, Val Bavona and Val Lavizzara areas of Ticino. Although relatively small, Ticino and its dedicated film commission are set to welcome an upcoming major streaming project – after servicing as a base for 37 projects last year.

Launched in August 2022, the Valais Film Commission (VFC) became the first Swiss canton to launch a cash rebate. Offering a 15%-35%

The interregional communication between Switzerland’s various filming organisations allows for a country-wide supported production experience from location scouting to funding.

LOCATION HIGHLIGHT

The Lauterbrunnen Valley is a breathtakingly beautiful valley located in the Swiss Alps. The valley is known for its stunning scenery, including towering mountains, cascading waterfalls, and charming Swiss villages. With its dramatic landscape, it is a popular destination for outdoor enthusiasts.

In addition to its natural beauty, the Lauterbrunnen Valley is also home to several cultural and historical gems, including the Trümmelbach Falls, a series of ten glacier waterfalls hidden inside the mountain, and the Mürren-Schilthorn, a panoramic cable car ride that offers jawdropping views of the surrounding mountains.

It is also a popular filming location, having been featured in several movies, including James Bond's On Her Majesty's Secret Service and The Eiger Sanction. With its stunning scenery, rich history, and endless outdoor activities, the Lauterbrunnen Valley is a must-visit destination for anyone traveling to Switzerland.

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Running the Show

House of Cards © David Giesbrecht/Netflix.

CAN THE ROLE OF THE TV SHOW RUNNER KEEP PACE WITH A RAPIDLY EVOLVING INDUSTRY?

The TV showrunner has achieved almost mythical status as a creative and managerial powerhouse but the role and the skills needed to be a success are changing along with the structure of the business. The writer-producer who literally wrote the book on show running, Jeff Melvoin, charts its evolution.

he concept of the showrunner has been around since the mid-nineties when a New York Times article used the term to describe the role of exec producer John Wells on NBC’s long running hit drama ER.

T

“It has never been more complicated or as confusing as it is today to be a showrunner,” he concludes.

“How do you become a future showrunner in an industry where the writers are not in the writers’ room?”

Wells was one of the first executives to combine the role of both creative (as writer) and money controlling positions to oversee all aspects of production.

The concept emerged in the US along with television itself out of radio drama. A Henry Ford style of production saw 39 episodes of radio drama developed by a non-writing producer, story editor and a host of freelance writers. The same principal applied to television in the 1950s, switching to a standard 22 episodes per season up until the 1980s.

“The showrunner was the person with responsibility for delivering a really high quality product, still produced on a factory floor basis, but with a personal touch,” says Jeff Melvoin a writer and producer (from Remington Steele to Killing Eve).

“The apotheosis of that was ER. The notion of showrunner gathered momentum and everybody aspired to climb the ladder.”

In Running the Show: Television from the Inside published earlier this year, Melvoin details the evolution of the role.

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Drama like Hill Street Blues (on which Melvoin was co-executive producer), while not serialised, began to extend storylines over several episodes and develop character arcs. Within that environment the showrunner was born.

“The model dominated drama at networks and premium cable (such as HBO’s Sex and the City from 1998; The Sopranos from 1999 and AMC’s

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IT HAS NEVER BEEN MORE COMPLICATED OR AS CONFUSING AS IT IS TODAY TO BE A SHOW RUNNER. HOW DO YOU BECOME A FUTURE SHOWRUNNER IN AN INDUSTRY WHERE THE WRITERS ARE NOT IN THE WRITERS’ ROOM?

Breaking Bad from 2008) where seasons would run 13 episodes and the showrunner was this multitasking individual with writing and managerial skills to oversee a production,” he says. “The serious erosion in network audience and subsequent altering of how we make series did not happen until Netflix’ House of Cards (2013).”

The US television industry has gone from monolithic broadcast system to a much more fragmented one which earlier this year seemed in danger of imploding. The strikes were in part protest against the threatened loss of mentoring and production experience on which next generations should be trained.

“As a result, the role of showrunner has changed, in some cases out of ignorance and in other cases out of preferred practices,” he says.

“The erosion of opportunities has been of concern for a number of years and now it’s a hot button issue.

With the proliferation of cable platforms, a lot of younger writers were put into positions of authority without the knowledge to run the show. Even now I have people applying to my showrunner programme who have reached a high level in the industry but “THE GREATEST who have not sat in on DISTINCTION a single edit, or had BETWEEN THE US anything to do with AND REST OF THE post. That’s alarming.

He says the greatest distinction between the US and rest of the world is that in the US the writer is perceived as labour and management.

“Elsewhere the writer is perceived exclusively as creative – the children who give the adults in the room a shiny new toy to play with. That’s why it’s been very difficult outside the US for the showrunner to be taken seriously. The culture doesn’t exist.”

The fiscal and managerial discipline that was the hallmark of the showrunner under broadcasters has diminished. According to Melvoin this began with subscription cable and continued with streamers where platforms have less need to hit unmoveable release dates and “have wasted tens of millions of dollars in covering mistakes in production.”

The new vogue for short order series of six or eight highly serialised stories has arguably put the emphasis even firmer on production value.

“Instead of contracting a television model to fit a six-episode run it’s like the movie model has expanded to making television,” Melvoin says. “I question whether a show like The Queen’s Gambit, was a television show or an expanded movie based on IP. It’s a great piece of work, but it had very little point of convergence with the television I grew up writing and producing.”

“I’m not putting a value on one model or the other, just that the ways we produce drama have grown and so the skills of the show runner have had to adapt.”

Melvoin argues that streamers have begun to erode the responsibility of the showrunner. In some cases, the responsibility has been assumed by the platform (in the case of Marvel) or handed to a high-profile director by platform bosses who prioritise the director over the writer.

“There are some studio and platform chiefs saying that if Mike White can do White Lotus or Taylor Sheridan could do Yellowstone and its spin-offs then why do we need the writers’ room? Why can’t one person do it all? It’s a specious argument. There have always been uniquely talented and prolific individuals as from Rod Sterling in the 1950s (The Twilight Zone) to David Chase (Northern Exposure) or Vince Gilligan (Better Call Saul) but one size doesn’t fit all. The industry has to accommodate all sorts of writers and showrunners.”

WORLD IS THAT IN

“I don’t believe the THE US THE WRITER streamers deliberately IS PERCEIVED AS broke the back of what LABOUR AND had been a very MANAGEMENT.” constructive way of bringing people up in the business but regardless of the intent the impact is clear. We have to do something if we want to train people to run shows.”

AI STORY GENERATION Whether we like it or not AI exists but it’s only an exponential expansion of writing aids that already exist. Writers often use outside sources to help them prepare material for submission and in one sense what AI is able to do is use more sources and provide feedback albeit in seconds.

“A writer might ask ChatGPT to ‘give me three ideas in the manner of Aaron Sorkin’,” says Melvoin.

“How are we going to stop people from doing that?”

“To me, the key is that no matter who proposes an idea somebody has to decide whether that’s something to greenlight and, if so, how will it be shaped? If an idea is generated by machine it still has to be filtered through that sensibility.”

The biggest threat he says is that studios will simply ask an AI to write six stories for a season. “For me, that’s impractical and heinous but some studios will do anything to save money. AI cannot yet write convincing dialogue - but that will come. The question then is how to regulate AI in a humane way.

“Nobody has the answer yet. Perhaps nobody quite knows what the questions are.”

Drawing on his extensive experience as a Showrunner and EP, Jeff Melvoin leads education programmes to help peers analyse how to manage the creative process through production. Run in conjunction with MediaXchange, the latest dates can be found at www.mediaxchange.com

“The role of the showrunner will remain important but part of their new skillset is having the resilience to adapt to different circumstances.”

Writer & producer Jeff Melvoin.

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Building it for Themselves WOMEN ARE BREAKING CREATIVE AND CULTURAL BOUNDARIES IN THE INDUSTRY OF IMMERSIVE TECH.

The tech industry has a history of being dominated by men, but the gender disparity is slowly changing through networking collectives and support systems, like Women in Immersive Technologies, which is affording women more opportunities in the sector. makers speaks to its members and ambassadors about how they’re pushing boundaries with their projects and products.

he headline stats still don’t make for great reading…. the number of women in leadership roles in the tech industry has fallen to a devastating low of 28%, according to the DDI's Global Leadership Forecast.

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Funded by the WIIT Meta Grant ’23, the series of workshops tapped into the next generation of immersive technology professionals, promoting equal representations and exposing the possibilities for a prospective career choice.

This is obviously discouraging for women considering entering the industry. But the ones who have made it to the top are determined not to give up and continue to break boundaries by forming support networks, sharing personal insights into the industry and crafting initiatives to entice and support the next generation.

Starting on Facebook in 2016, WIIT Europe’s vision is to create an inclusive network of talented women driving Europe’s virtual, augmented and mixed reality sectors. Members can look for a business partner, talent, mentors or investors. They run a number of events like the one above that offer further networking opportunities.

A good example of this is the Women in Immersive Technologies (WIIT) Europe and iVG.World’s Bad*ss Metaverse Design Competition (the latest event took place across May and June), which has opened up the world of VR to girls aged 13 to 17 living in Europe and Nigeria.

makers spoke to some of the WIIT members and ambassadors about how they’re working on a variety of exciting immersive tech projects, incorporating gaming, science and more, and tackling gender disparities…

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VANESSA JULIA CARPENTER & LEMKE MEIJER

THE KEY THING ABOUT IMMERSIVE TECHNOLOGY IS WHEN PEOPLE DISCOVER THINGS FOR THEMSELVES AND GROW THEIR SENSE OF CURIOSITY.

Gagarin Iceland is an experiencd design studio based in Reykjavik that creates installations, which weave education, information and data together.

Interestingly, neither say they have had any issues in the immersive tech industry as women or faced any misconceptions or stereotypes from others, which is a positive sign and hopefully indicative of change.

ALEXANDRA HUSSENOT

The company’s interaction designer Lemke Meijer and chief innovation officer, Vanessa Julia Carpenter, are captivated by the multidisciplinary craft of immersive tech, merging the creativity of storytelling, the complexity of science and binding it all together with the technology and craft.

From playing zombie killing games and enjoying Travis Scott’s Fortnite concert, to hosting team meetings in Altspace, immersive tech is an ever present playground for Alexandra Hussenot, CEO of creative media technology company Immersionn.

“My whole career revolves around making complex things accessible to everyone and fun to experience,” says Meijer. “I like teaching people something and I do that through making interactive experiences. I always explore new technologies and see how they could work for my ideas.”

Transforming flat two dimensional web pages into 3D virtual worlds, using the power of the gaming industry, Immersionn is trying to evolve how we use the internet.

Using mixed reality technologies on mobile, headsets or even through binoculars, environments are brought to life. Meijer is also design lead on the platform, Astrid Climate Change, which keeps educators and students up to date on important developments in climate change.

Carpenter stresses the importance of trying and combining mediums to challenge people’s perceptions. “I was fascinated by what was possible when we combine computers and art,” she says.

“The school that I went to had a programme, Interactive Art and Technology, which was so inspirational, pushing our understanding of how to combine mediums like film, dance, design, sound, and traditional computing such as programming into new configurations that could challenge people’s understanding of the world and give them the opportunity to reflect and change in their own lives.”

Both Carpenter and Meijer insist, “The key thing about immersive technology is when people discover things for themselves and grow their sense of curiosity.”

DIVERSITY

“WOMEN IN THE INDUSTRY ARE BUILDING SOMETHING NEW IN THE CREATIVE FIELD. GOING INTO IT, WE WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT THERE IS A PLACE WHERE WE AREN’T EXCLUDED FROM THE START.”

“In 2014 I went to the Imax in London and I tried a Samsung Gear VR experience (phone nested into a stereoscopic viewer) and an Oculus experience,” says Hussenot. “It blew my mind and I thought "that's it, this is the future of connecting people, we all go inside the phone and the internet!"

Hussenot previously worked as the UK lead for WIIT and continues to explore and predict where the industry is going, foreseeing the arrival of Apple to the market, and a world where AI and virtual reality combine to assist in the choices we make. At the core of this is her value for industry collaboration and the initiatives behind building the immersive tech community. Often battling misconceptions of the people behind the tech, shifting our way of life and work.

“We have challenged ourselves with every project a little more. Often we have succeeded to overcome any obstacles and sometimes we have failed. Many non tech people think that technologists know

IMMERSIVE

TECHNOLOGY

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exactly what they have to do before they do it.

But often it is more about planning the right time, tasks and team and executing with smooth communication between all teams. In the immersive technology space collaborations are essential.”

GABRIELLA CHIHAN STANLEY

Paraguay born Stanley is the Co-founder and chief creative officer of Vrisch. It was set up to utilise immersive technologies to improve communications between companies and their audiences.

Vrisch offers impressive VR and AR experiences, such as Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Hung Parliament, which is a full-motion video adventure game, but which crucially also include the real human experience.

WE NEED MORE DIVERSE ROLE MODELS. WHETHER THIS IS IN TERMS OF GENDER, ETHNICITY, SEXUAL ORIENTATION OR ABILITIES WE NEED TO SHOW EVERYONE WHAT IS POSSIBLE AND WHO IS CREATING THE FUTURE OF TECHNOLOGY.

“Through our series of XR installations for the visitor centre of Central Europe’s last remaining primeval forest here in Austria called Dürrenstein, we could help people understand the value of wilderness, as well as invite them to see nature from the inside out and explore through AR,” says Stanley.

She is concerned, though, that the immersive tech industry is growing at such a rapid rate with new trends emerging all the time that quality could be compromised. Commenting on the “misalignment between the expectations from users, companies, and clients and the current capabilities of XR,” Stanley emphasises the importance of “looking at the industry as a journey, instead of a destination.”

She believes we need to look at why we’re doing certain things in XR, “why now, why this way, why with this person. These are all questions that come together as a whole and we can’t cherry-pick them and expect the outcome to be mind-blowing.”

LIZ ROSENTHAL

In the highly competitive and exclusive festival circuit, Liz Rosenthal, CEO and founder, Power to the Pixel, broke through to become curator of the Venice Film Festival’s new competition programme, Venice VR, which showcases the best virtual reality films.

Rosenthal has a lot of experience in the film world, including as owner of Earthly Delights Films and most notably at Power to the Pixel, which helps media businesses adapt in the ever-evolving connected world. She has helped organise and attends a number of initiatives for the industry, including the annual Power to the Pixel: The Cross Media Forum in association with the BFI London Film Festival.

But she is keen to get ‘immersed’ in the world of immersive technology. “For me, the industry felt like a space where I could find like-minded people,”

GENDER

CAREERS

MIXED REALITY

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she says. “But at first it was really difficult. I was moving from the certainty of the film industry to this, and had people thinking I was crazy to do this. They probably still do. I find with this medium, because it’s so new, and there are so many different disciplines, when you get people together in the same room to collaborate and bring ideas together, it’s incredible.”

She believes women in the industry “are building something new in the creative field. Going into it, we want to make sure that there is a place where we aren’t excluded from the start, which hadn’t happened in other sectors of the industry.”

WE’VE GOT WORK TO DO

Undoubtedly, these women and their stories show that progress is being made. As the immersive industry evolves so are attitudes and approaches to creative content. The key is having the right teams in place and understanding the end user, no matter the gender.

LIZ ROSENTHAL

“I think the numbers are terrible for the balance between men and women in the industry, but there is a lot of support. What’s really important is that young women entering the industry know that there are people they can get advice from.”

GABRIELLA CHIHAN STANLEY

“If we always choose the same profile of individuals to work on projects out of the convenience of predicting the safe outcome we will never truly see the life-changing potential of this tech.”

ALEXANDRA HUSSENOT

“Immersive technologies are emerging technologies.

It is mathematically challenging due to the three dimensional element, creatively exciting, intellectually fulfilling, socially amazing and commercially difficult. In other words, this is a choice of vocation like, for example, making films or becoming a teacher. You'll need passion and be eager to collaborate with many different experts for as long as the sector is still nascent.”

VANESSA JULIA CARPENTER & LEMKE MEIJER

“We need more diverse role models. Whether this is in terms of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation or abilities we need to show everyone what is possible and who is creating the future of technology. We need to expand the narrative and perspective of how we present technology and experiences. There is an entire perspective of the world which isn’t represented well and we need to incorporate these (and more than women’s) perspectives into what we design, so we are creating a future which doesn’t repeat our past societal structures.”

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Double Trouble

Image: The Irishman © Netflix.

The use of AI to double, de-age or even replace actors is a huge talking point, especially with the strikes. But is there potential as well as problems for Hollywood with this new tech and how can image rights issues be resolved? makers speaks to experts and insiders to find out.

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I was first used in film nearly 100 years ago in the dystopian drama Metropolis but it has come to prominence in recent years with the de-aging of actors. Robert De Niro in Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman, Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny and Tom Hanks in Robert Zemeckis’ Here, are some examples.

A GAME CHANGER

“AI has definitely changed the game,” says Kevin Baillie, production VFX supervisor on Here. “With a standard CGI of a face, you’re starting from quite a sparse data set where you have your 3D scans with say 100 poses, but that’s a tiny fraction of the maximum activations of each muscle. While the motion capture approach can be quite onerous with multiple cameras and actors wearing helmets and covered in thousands of dots, which are still missing a lot of information. And then there’s blood flow to factor in on top of that.

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“But with AI it can be trained to scan thousands of images of the actor and it builds an understanding of the permutations of what the face could go through and builds a map. It’s like a digital genetic code. There’s no need for lots of cameras and the crew teams can be smaller, so it’s cost effective.”

Done well, the results can be very impressive. The ultimate goal being that “nobody will think about the technology when they’re watching the film because it works,” adds Baillie.

“Broadly speaking, they’re just useful tools for creating a different performance or look, and not really a threat to actors,” insists Alex Connock, senior fellow in management practice at Said Business School, University of Oxford.

Where the potential threat and concern comes in is with the use of AI to take an actor’s image and voice to recreate an artificial likeness that can be used in other films and TV projects.

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Image: Indiana Jones & the Dial of Destiny © Disney Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

ACTORS’ UNIONS AND AGENTS NEED TO BE CAREFUL TO STOP ACTORS BEING SIGNED UP FOR CONTRACTS THAT TAKE OWNERSHIP OF THE SYNTHETIC RENDITION OF THEIR FACE.

When Hollywood actors confirmed through the Union SAG-AFTRA that they were going on strike, their rights with the use of AI was a chief sticking point. The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) responded in a statement that it “presented a groundbreaking AI proposal that protects actors’ digital likeness for SAG-AFTRA members.”

But Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the chief negotiator for SAG-AFTRA, responded to the statement by saying: “They proposed that our background performers should be able to be scanned, get one day’s pay, and their companies should own that scan, their image, their likeness and should be able to use it for the rest of eternity on any project they want, with no consent and no compensation. If you think that’s a groundbreaking proposal, I suggest you think again.”

The AMPTP denied this, but the potential science fiction-turned reality scenario does raise interesting moral and legal questions.

Could film studios and production companies potentially keep using an actor’s image repeatedly because they signed a contract once on a project?

Connock thinks this unlikely. “If you’re a Disney and you’re making a USD200 million Marvel movie, you wouldn’t just rely on someone’s word that they used an actor for a commercial two years before and got them to sign a buyout for their full image rights, especially without checking with the actor first. No studio is going to compromise their IP at that level.”

But he does stress that actors’ unions (and agents) “need to be careful to stop actors being signed up for contracts that take ownership of the synthetic rendition of their face. Plus, secure for the actors’ original authorial rights on content propositions and ideally watermark imagery of them.”

SUPPORTING RIGHTS

There are organisations, including those working in AI, who are actually supporting actors and other creatives in how to protect their rights and trademark their likeness. Metaphysic is one, and the UK’s Equity is another. The latter launched a toolkit in June to help protect performers from what it describes as a “surge in unregulated technology”.

The toolkit, produced in partnership with intellectual property expert Mathilde, was set up after Equity received a considerable increase in members contacting the union for advice, support and legal representation in the wake of the growing

use of AI, and the government introducing a voluntary code of practice on copyright and AI, as opposed to firm regulation.

It includes resources like how AI can be applied ethically by the industry; a template AI contract to protect artists engaging with performance cloning work and model AI clauses to protect artists from having their performances cloned without their consent.

ACTORS V ROBOTS

“It’s also important to note that actors bring something special to the screen. It’s not just about their pretty face, it’s the underlying performance,” stresses Baillie. “I have seen the really talented ones work hard with directors, cinematographers, costume designers etc to make sure their character is represented right on screen. You can’t just “THERE ARE BILLIONS replace that with Joe Blow standing in front of OF IMAGE DATASETS the camera pretending AVAILABLE FROM to be Christian Bale, and WHICH NEW then put Bale’s face over SYNTHETIC FACES the top. The audience COULD BE CREATED.” would be like ‘what the hell am I watching?’.”

Equally, just having robots performing wouldn’t necessarily work either. “As Microsoft’s CTO Kevin Scott recently pointed out, a Queen’s Gambit series could’ve been made about two machines playing each other and nobody would’ve watched it. What makes the series interesting is it’s a female chess player and it’s her human journey and connection,” says Connock. “I don’t think synthetic actors are going to meaningfully replace real actors any time soon.”

However, it’s also worth pointing out that not all actors are fully opposed to the idea of AI creating doubles of them. The prospect of their careers being prolonged longer (even after they die) and their family/estate benefiting financially is not necessarily a bad thing.

Last year Bruce Willis became the first Hollywood star to sell his image rights to technology company, Deepcake, which specialises in creating movies through AI. This was after he retired from acting having been diagnosed with aphasia.

Image: The Queen’s Gambit © Phil Bray/Netflix.

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HANDLING DECEASED ACTORS’ RIGHTS

Even Tom Hanks said recently that the technology may well be used to recreate his image, ensuring he continued to appear in movies long after he dies. He told the Adam Buxton podcast that “there are discussions going on in all of the guilds, all of the agencies, and all of the legal firms in order to come up with the legal ramifications of my face and my voice and everybody else's being our intellectual property," he said.

Image: East of Eden © Warner Brothers Pictures.

IF YOU THINK OF YOUR ACTING PERSONA AS A BUSINESS ASSET, THEN IT IS HUGELY COMPELLING THAT YOUR IP WILL BE MONETISABLE AFTER YOUR DEATH.

"What is a bona fide possibility right now is, if I wanted to, I could get together and pitch a series of seven movies that would star me in them in which I would be 32 years old from now until Kingdom come.”

Some actors, though, are concerned about the creation of entirely AI-generated actors or metahumans stealing their roles. There’s even talk of studios potentially creating synthetic performers from an amalgamation of actors’ images.

“Actors (and everybody) have their images ingested all the time on places like facebook, Instagram or Flickr. There are billions of image datasets available, from which new synthetic faces could be created and used,” explains Connock. “Background artists may no longer be required in the future.”

CONTROLLING AI

There’s also the problem of controlling AI. “It can be a little unwieldy, especially when it produces results that you don’t like, such as interpreting an actor’s expression slightly wrong,” admits Baillie.

“How do you trick it or guide it into doing the right thing? Does the training data need to be changed or removed. What if you don’t have the footage that shows the expression you need? Do you need to create it? Then there’s the potential issue of misappropriating data. That is why you really need the right team of people, like at Metaphysic where they have guys with PhDs and lab coats, alongside talented artists from places like ILM who understand the creative side. They can train the AI and coerce the output in the right way.”

FOR MORE MAKERS AI CONTENT Page 19 AI, an engine for creativity.

Page 56 Writers programming the programme.

Page 90 AI ads but at what cost?

Page 126 Interview with Pinar Seyhan Demirdag.

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However, he admits there are a limited number of people who can perform these tasks. That will change as capability expands, but it’s still a point of concern. As is the lack of footage of actors when they were younger limiting the capabilities of de-aging using AI, and the hardware limitations on things like resolution, insists Baillie.

Ultimately, though, AI is here to stay. More filmmakers are experimenting with it. There are even AI tools, like Wonder Studio [set up by Nikola Todorovic and actor Tye Sheridan], which allow live actors to be replaced by CGI characters at the simple touch of a button. The key thing is grasping both the potential and limits of the tech.

Hollywood legend James Dean died in 1955 having starred in just three completed films. But nearly 70 years later, a science fiction film is now being made with him as the main star thanks to AI. Back to Eden will use a digital clone of the actor – created using AI tech similar to that used to generate deepfakes – who will interact with other actors in the film.

This is not the first time deceased actors have been returned to life on screen with the help of advanced digital technology. Others include Carrie Fisher, Harold Ramis and Paul Walker.

“If you think of your acting persona as a business asset, then it is hugely compelling that your IP will be monetisable after your death,” says Connock.

But it also raises some uncomfortable legal and moral questions. For example, the long deceased actors obviously have no say, so it falls to their estate to make the important decisions.

“In these cases, the estates have unfettered rights to monetise and use the actor’s image, unless there was some kind of covenant or contractual reason, like if the actor said he didn’t want his image to be used by AI,” says Erik Kahn, a lawyer at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner with expertise in AI. Robin Williams is one of those stand-out exceptions, as the late actor filed a deed that states his image cannot be used in any film or publicity until 2039.

Where things get a little more complicated is the rights of the estate to restrict how the actor’s image is used in an AI manner. “In the US, the estate rights of publicity laws vary from state to state, factoring in things like where and when the celebrity died, what are the rights limits timelines etc. So it can vary from one celebrity to another,” explains Kahn. “There’s also the question of commercial gain versus first amendment, protected editorial rights. With a film, you can make an argument that it’s really just commercialising the person’s image and you’re not using them to convey an idea or how they view something.”

But potential concerns could arise if it’s not the real actor’s voice used in the film but rather AI creating a similar one, and if he says anything clearly promoting something or if it’s controversial, even defamatory (like admitting to having sexual relations with someone who’s still alive).

It’s a potential minefield and it’s still early days.

The hope is that as AI becomes more prevalent in film, there will be better understanding of the rights (and wrongs) involved for all parties.

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