In this video, we sit down with Tom Bancroft, the legendary animator behind Mushu from Mulan, to discuss the recent shifts at Marvel and Disney. We dive into whether project-based hiring compromises the creative process and how generative AI might allow smaller teams to produce feature-length films at a fraction of the traditional cost. If you want to support, check out Tom Bancroft’s YouTube channel, Pencilish Studios, where he shares animation insights, behind-the-scenes art, storytelling advice, and updates on his latest hand-drawn projects: https://www.youtube.com/user/mushume3. Follow Tom Bancroft’s socials: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tombancroftart/ X: @TomBancroft1 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tombancroft/ For more tech and creative industry analysis, visit https://www.techrepublic.com/topic/news. Read the full article: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/news-marvel-layoffs-ai-hollywood-animation/ The TechRepublic team has one simple goal: helping you make great decisions about technology. From breaking IT news to best practices, advice, and how-tos… our global team of tech journalists, industry analysts, and real-world IT professionals has the tech market covered like no other site. Connect with us on social — Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TechRepublic Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/techrepublic/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/techrepublic/ X (Twitter) - https://x.com/techrepublic
ADVERTISEMENT
I still have a book The Illusions of Life. I couldn't study that yet, but AI came to reality.Sad.
The argument about "well maybe more studios will appear and smaller teams can make stuff". That already happens. There are already solo film-makers making amazing films and putting them online. What are their audience numbers like though? What will their audience numbers be like in the future as more and more people are churning out their own films? How much money will anyone be able to make from their films when they do show them to an audience? We don't really need to guess, we can look at photography and video on social media as forerunners to this situation. The answer is: As cameras became ubiquitous, the value of photos and videos has dropped to zero for almost everyone publishing their photos and videos online. That's what will happen to animation and film. Everyone will be able to make their own 'content', most of it will be low quality and/or advertising and a small amount of it will stand out as being genuinely worth watching. But even that small percentage of quality content will be valued at close to zero, because the value of _all_ animation and film will have been brought so low by the abundance of do-it-yourself slop.
"innovation or exploitation ?"... More like exploitation and regurgitation !
Actual storyboard animation people here... I'm getting freelance offers to fix bad AI animatics that are completely useless in the animation pipeline. Animation has always been super precarious. I don't fear it for now, I fear execs thinking it can do my job.
To be honest I wouldn't be too worried. I'm getting clients sending me AI art and concepts they generated and they range to bad to very mid. Technically they look great at first glance, then when you start trying to use them in actual production, they're very much unusable. I have ended up redesigning everything even storyboards, because the AI just sucks at storytelling. Maybe its because these clients are not artists, but tis the same with code, where there's a profession now for fixing AI generated code. It requires a lot of hand holding. I think AI will end up just being a tool for the professional. Of course jobs will be lost but that's just the nature of technology. For artists it just means, you need to stop specializing in skills like storyboard artists, character designer and getting familiar with the entire production pipeline. Because there's a slow rise of a the small studio. Just like in the early days of animation with guys like Winsor McCkay and Walt Disney before snow white. The traditional model is dead and no one has figured out a way to monetize thenew model to replace the old revenues. So demand for specialized skills is not going to be economical anymore. Teams are going to be leaner, budgets smaller until a new business model can truly take hold. I would think Disney would have started a YouTube competitor because YouTube is emerging as the actual replacement for traditional TV, and actually set up better AD moderation weeding out scammers and finding a way to inject ads into the videos so no one can skip it, but I guess they thought Disney Plus made more sense than generating billions from Advertisement like facebook and google. So strap in guys, its going to be one hell of a bumpy ride.
The only artist complaining about a.i. are just with lack of skill and get insecure.
Yeah I think there dream of working in such big studios is over, in this new era of AI the only possible way I see for newcomers is working as indie, creating their own stuff and hoping it reaches the audience 😅
I’m also a classically trained animator and also believe he’s 100% correct. When I was in the fully in the industry it was always seasonal work. Working in animation is working on a fixed term contracts. You can’t expect studios to hold on to people when they have nothing for the artists to do. From the outside it looks like ai is taking over but from the inside it’s just how it’s always been and the numbers are high because there’s a higher number of creatives in the industry. The only issue with this system is that the quality of that show is dependant on the team working on it so if you let them all go you end up with a different team and a completely different vibe for the next project. I don’t believe ai will ever replace artist but I see it replacing or assisting artist in preproduction so that the team involved no longer need to be so many. What I’d hope to see in the future is Ai replacing the jobs of the business people ie producers and project managers and all that.
AI is just about greed and managers' disrespect for art and artists
That sounds so stressful not only is being an animator super competitive and you have this pool of very talented people but you have to spend x amount of time managing all of your work and then you probably get feast or famine period not to mention Disney is cutting cost and benefits. It sounds like they are keeping Stateside animators for freelance whereas a lot of shops go out for overseas Talent
original things cant be made with AI
Lion King and 2D Stich came out nearly 25 to 30 years ago, why are they talking like these films came out 5 or even 10 years if we stretch it? The west has long passed the hand drawn torch to France and Japan.
Thankfully there have been so many indie creatives doing their own thing with success. That's the only way forward. Although the creative landscape will look different thanks to Gen AI, there will consequently be more of a craving for things that are real and human. Let the corporations sink in a sea of their own generated slop.
Ai is built on blatant theft. I’m not interested in anything coming from people who are ok with that. There’s also the environmental impact. And the soulless result. So no… There’s a good 200 years worth of reading and shows, that were actually made with care. I’m not at all interested in Ai slop or those who produce it.
This is a great opportunity right now to make your own animation studio.
Misleading title, and misleading chevron title. By 38 seconds into the video the answer was no, and a minute in it was outsourcing. Reminds me of the panic with CGI and digital art. Or just digital art period. It’s just a tool. Get a grip. And this is coming from someone who is an artist, and start with physical media.
Artists are also responsible for their own problems. They never unionized, they are selfish and only care how to grab a job for themselves, they never showed to the system that they can be united, and now they are too weak, too fragmented and are been attacked by the same system once were so keen on serving without asking any questions. Sad, but they have made their own bed.
It's not a "tool". It's a service built on theft. And you can't protect an potentially valuable IP, if it's all ai-slop. Even the American copyright office dictates ai-generated-slop cannot be copyrighted, and can't get an Oscar. Also the growing backlash against ai is growing, and ai-free art is becoming more valuable as a premium. Animation that is completely free of ai-influence through the entire pipeline, or with some extremely limited exceptions, like pre-2021 ai services. "It's here to stay" means absolutely nothing to those value human art in a meaningful way.
studios needs to lose all their artist assets!, artist should leave studios in mass and get together! and build their own! massively
Nah, fuck AI. Disappointed to hear he's in the 'use it as a tool' group..