AI Redefines Filmmaking Landscape, Expert Says, Unlocking Creativity and Sparking Ethical Debates

The filmmaking industry is profoundly transforming, with artificial intelligence tools rapidly democratizing production while raising critical questions about job displacement and creative authenticity. The generative AI in movies market is experiencing exponential growth, reaching an estimated $0.4 billion in 2025 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 24.3%, driven by demand for faster post-production, AI-driven recommendations, and increased interest in AI-generated visual content.

I spoke with Yulia Gushchina, Head of Sales and Business Development at Filmustage and an expert on how AI products are transforming the filmmaking industry, who says these advancements are breaking down long-standing barriers, especially for independent creators.

“Tools like Veo 3 and Runway ML now make it possible to generate high-quality visuals, storyboards, and even video clips that were once only accessible to big-budget productions,” Gushchina said. “These tools reduce both cost and time, which gives indie creators something they’ve always lacked: the ability to dream bigger without logistical compromise.”

Google’s Veo 3, launched in May 2025, is a new video generation model promising 4K video creation from text or image prompts, with features allowing control over cinematic techniques and camera movements. Google’s approach to allowing access to Veo 3 is also markedly different from many, with the text-to-video tool appearing as an option in Canva, Leonardo, and other genAI platforms. Runway ML continues to innovate, with the recent introduction of Gen-4 in March 2025. Midjourney announced its video creation model this month after gaining significant critical acclaim for its text-to-image platform.

Gushchina pointed to independent filmmaker Paul Trillo, who created the short film “Thank You for Not Answering” entirely using Runway’s Gen-2 video model. “With minimal crew and no elaborate sets, he was able to bring surreal, visually rich scenes to life,” Gushchina said. Similarly, Corridor Digital used AI to reimagine a “Spider-Verse”-style short film, exploring unique stylistic aesthetics that would have been previously unaffordable.

Gushchina’s work at Filmustage, an AI script analysis tool, illustrates the early impact.

“I’ve seen indie teams use our AI script analysis to streamline production prep, allowing them to visualize shooting schedules and budget implications from the earliest creative phase. This kind of early insight is game-changing,” Gushchina said.

Beyond individual tools, AI is fundamentally reshaping the creative workflow.

“AI is turning the linear filmmaking process into a more fluid, dynamic cycle,” Gushchina said. “In traditional workflows, pre-production was a bottleneck. Now, tools like ours at Filmustage or Autodesk’s ShotGrid (with AI integrations) allow teams to iterate faster and make smarter decisions earlier.” Autodesk’s ShotGrid, now known as Flow Production Tracking, has integrated AI-powered scheduling capabilities to optimize resources and streamline project management.

Gushchina highlights how AI-driven scriptwriting tools such as Sudowrite and CoWriter, which continually evolve with features like Sudowrite’s “Canvas” AI critique partner introduced in 2025, can assist writers in exploring more narrative paths. Furthermore, AI tools like NVIDIA’s Omniverse enable directors and cinematographers to pre-visualize and iterate entire scenes before stepping on set, fostering greater collaboration and creativity during production. However, managing the sheer volume of AI-generated options requires caution. “Learning to curate and filter outputs is becoming a vital new skill,” Gushchina said.

The conversation around AI’s impact on employment in filmmaking remains heated, with significant concerns about job displacement.

“There’s no sugarcoating it: some roles will evolve, and others may disappear,” Gushchina said, citing tasks like rotoscoping and background cleanup that are already being automated by tools such as Adobe Firefly for video. Adobe Firefly, which launched its video model in February 2025, allows for text-to-video, image-to-video, and generative video extensions, accelerating many manual processes.

Yet, new opportunities are emerging. “We’re already seeing the rise of AI cinematographers, prompt-based visual designers, and data-driven story developers,” Gushchina said. For example, Lucasfilm’s Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) team uses machine learning for previsualization and performance capture, evolving their artists into creative supervisors of AI-enhanced workflows.

“I believe the biggest employment shift won’t be ‘less work’ but different work,” Gushchina said. “Skills like creative direction, emotional intelligence, and multi-tool fluency will be more critical than ever.”

Ethical concerns, particularly consent and creative ownership, are at the forefront of discussions. The 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike, which saw a tentative agreement reached in June 2025 for video game performers, highlighted demands for protection against AI’s use in synthetic performances and digital replicas without consent or fair compensation.

“We’re seeing actors’ voices and likenesses recreated without explicit permission,” Gushchina said. “The SAG-AFTRA strike in 2023 highlighted this issue – one of the core demands was regulation around AI use in synthetic performances. And rightfully so.”

The issue of bias in AI training data is also a concern. “If an AI is trained predominantly on Hollywood scripts or Western-centric narratives, its ‘default storytelling’ might exclude diverse cultural perspectives,” Gushchina said, citing past instances where OpenAI’s GPT-3-based storytelling tools favored certain tropes until retraining was introduced. The potential for deepfake technology to create inauthenticity at scale also raises alarms, despite its creative applications, such as de-aging characters in “The Mandalorian.”

“Transparency — labeling AI-generated content, clear actor rights, and ethical AI governance — will be the foundation of audience trust going forward,” Gushchina said.

While AI tools are often lauded for democratizing filmmaking, Gushchina cautioned against the risk of homogenization.

“AI has the potential to democratize storytelling,” Gushchina said, citing examples like a teenager in rural India using tools such as Pika Labs and ElevenLabs to create animations and voices, or the YouTube short “Scary Fast,” made entirely with AI by indie creators.

“But there’s a flipside: AI tools often optimize for what has already worked. They replicate patterns, which risks flattening creativity if users rely on them too heavily,” Gushchina said. “This could lead to ‘AI sameness’ where everything looks polished but emotionally hollow.”

Gushchina advocated for intentional use, encouraging creators to view AI as a conversation partner rather than a shortcut. “Democratization doesn’t just come from access to tools; it comes from education, curiosity, and support for new perspectives,” Gushchina said.

Looking five to ten years ahead, Gushchina sees AI in filmmaking akin to a “teenager — powerful, unpredictable, brimming with potential.”

“Over the next 5 to 10 years, I believe we’ll see AI begin to ‘grow up’ becoming more integrated, more context-aware, and hopefully more responsible,” Gushchina said. 

This maturation could lead to faster greenlighting of projects through AI-driven script assessments and a surge of diverse storytelling from underrepresented creators. The future might see deep personalization of content, building on current practices like Netflix optimizing thumbnails for individual users.

However, the negatives include a potential flood of generic, over-optimized content that is technically perfect but emotionally flat.

“Too much content without curatorship could make it harder for audiences to connect with meaningful stories,” Gushchina said. “That’s why the future role of critics, festivals, and human tastemakers will be more important than ever to help us find the films that still touch something real inside us.”

“AI has already changed the film industry. That’s not a question anymore,” Gushchina said. “The real question is: Will we raise it well? Will we invest in the kind of guidance that helps AI grow not just smarter, but more aligned with human values — with creativity, nuance, and empathy?”