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a blog of links related to computer animation and production technology Sponsored by ReelMatters.com
Category: ves
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Canva acquires Leonardo.ai
https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/29/canva-acquires-leonardo-ai-to-boost-its-generative-ai-efforts
The financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but Canva co-founder and chief product officer Cameron Adams said it’s a mix of cash and stock. All of Leonardo.ai’s 120 employees will be joining Canva, including the executive team.
“Leonardo will continue to run independently of Canva with a focus on rapid innovation, research and development, now backed by Canva’s resources,” Adams told TechCrunch. “We’ll keep offering all of Leonardo’s existing tools and solutions. This acquisition aims to help Leonardo develop its platform and deepen their user growth with our investment, including by expanding their API business and investing in foundational model R&D.”
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Autodesk acquires Wonder Dynamics
This strategic move supports Autodesk’s goal to democratize creative tools and foster innovation in the media and entertainment industry. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
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Ridley Scott Wants to ‘Embrace’ AI for Post-Production
Despite embracing technology, the “Blade Runner” and “Alien” director has long incorporated the fear of AI in his stories onscreen and knows better than most about its ramifications. Scott previously told Rolling Stone in November 2023 that when it came to his concerns about artificial intelligence broadly, he said that AI was “dangerous” and akin to a “technical hydrogen bomb.”
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David Cahn – AI’s $600B Question, is it a sustainable bubble?
https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/ais-600b-question
The expanding economic impact of AI, highlights a significant gap between AI infrastructure investments and actual revenue generation. Despite easing GPU shortages and increased investments by cloud providers, AI-related revenue, particularly dominated by OpenAI, remains insufficient to justify the massive capital expenditures. The analysis reveals that this gap has grown from $125 billion to $500 billion, posing challenges for the AI industry while emphasizing the need for realistic expectations and sustainable value creation.
OpenAI training and inference costs could reach $7bn for 2024, AI startup set to lose $5bn – report
AI: Are we in another dot-com bubble?
The power of AI will transform every facet of our society, from the micro changes in our day-to-day lives to the macro changes in global geopolitics. It will challenge our values and assumptions and make us reconsider what it means to be human. It is inevitable that some capital will be wasted getting there. We may even experience a bubble or two. But this is part of the growing pains of advancing humankind. Society, like our individual lives, seldom take the shortest route. As to the argument that we are in a bubble right now, we think it deserves some reconsidering.
https://kelvinmu.substack.com/p/ai-are-we-in-another-dot-com-bubble
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SAG-AFTRA Calls Strike Against Major Video Game Studios
SAG-AFTRA has called a strike against major video game companies, set to begin on July 26, 2024. This decision follows a vote by union members, with 98.32% in favor of authorizing the strike. The union has been negotiating with companies like Activision, Disney, EA, Insomniac Games, and others since October 2022 to renew the Interactive Media Agreement.
The core issues leading to the strike include demands for wage increases to combat inflation, protections against the use of artificial intelligence, and basic safety precautions. SAG-AFTRA seeks an 11% retroactive increase in rates for video game performers, followed by 4% annual increases, similar to their demands in the film and TV industries
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Canada is no longer one of the richest nations on Earth
“… the problem with Canada’s economy is not cyclical, but secular; not one of utilization, but capacity. It is not so much that growth is temporarily below potential as that potential growth has slowed to a crawl.
More to the point, the economy is now growing slower than the population, which is why per capita GDP is now falling. And it’s per capita GDP that really counts, as far as living standards are concerned.
They are no longer one of the richest countries on Earth. Among the richer countries, they are on course to being one of the poorer.
The economist Trevor Tombe has shown that Canada’s richest province, Alberta, would rank 14th among U.S. states. The poorest five provinces now rank among the six poorest jurisdictions in North America. Ontario ranks just ahead of Alabama. British Columbia is poorer than Kentucky.”
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Luca Rossi – How to Help Underperformers
https://hybridhacker.email/p/how-to-help-underperformers
- Understand Performance is Systemic: Recognize that culture, systems, management, and individual traits impact performance.
- Address Underperformance Early: Use consistent feedback and the accountability dial (mention, invitation, conversation, boundary, limit).
- Provide Balanced Feedback: Reinforce, acknowledge, and correct behaviors.
- Use an Underperformance Checklist: Evaluate issues related to culture, systems, management, and individual traits.
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GoldmanSachs.com – GEN AI: TOO MUCH SPEND, TOO LITTLE BENEFIT?
Tech giants and beyond are set to spend over $1tn on AI capex in coming years, with so far little to show for it. So, will this large spend ever pay off? MIT’s Daron Acemoglu and GS’ Jim Covello are skeptical, with Acemoglu seeing only limited US economic upside from AI over the next decade and Covello arguing that the technology isn’t designed to solve the complex problems that would justify the costs, which may not decline as many expect. But GS’ Joseph Briggs, Kash Rangan, and Eric Sheridan remain more optimistic about AI’s economic potential and its ability to ultimately generate returns beyond the current “picks and shovels” phase, even if AI’s “killer application” has yet to emerge. And even if it does, we explore whether the current chips shortage (with GS’ Toshiya Hari) and looming power shortage (with Cloverleaf Infrastructure’s Brian Janous) will constrain AI growth. But despite these concerns and constraints, we still see room for the AI theme to run, either because AI starts to deliver on its promise, or because bubbles take a long time to burst.
Local copy below
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Johnny Grilo – What is the role of the VFX Supervisors and what are their responsibilities in a production pipeline?
The role of a VFX Supervisor in filmmaking is multifaceted, encompassing pre-production planning, budgeting, team management, on-set supervision, and post-production oversight. They collaborate with directors to understand the creative vision, plan VFX sequences, and ensure seamless integration of digital elements. Their responsibilities include guiding actors, capturing on-set references, maintaining quality control, and overseeing the final VFX integration during post-production. Effective documentation and reporting throughout the process are crucial for successful project completion.
Full breakdown here: https://squarezeroone.wixsite.com/home/post/the-vital-role-of-the-vfx-supervisor-in-filmmaking
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Planning to move jobs? These cities are now so expensive they’re considered ‘impossibly unaffordable’
https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/14/business/house-prices-impossibly-unaffordable-intl-hnk/index.html
Top 10 “impossibly unaffordable” cities
- Hong Kong
- Sydney
- Vancouver
- San Jose
- Los Angeles
- Honolulu
- Melbourne
- San Francisco/Adelaide
- San Diego
- Toronto
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Study finds a quarter of bosses hoped Return-To-the-Office would make employees quit
https://www.theregister.com/2024/06/09/rto_quit_study
A study by BambooHR found that about 25% of executives and 20% of HR professionals hoped return-to-office (RTO) mandates would lead to employee resignations. Despite some staff quitting, the exodus was insufficient, prompting some companies to undertake layoffs. The study indicates that RTO policies have fostered a distrustful and performative work culture, negatively impacting productivity and employee happiness.
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Joseph Bell – VFX Studio Growth 2022 – 2024
Color represents whether they’ve grown over the past 2 years (blue) or downsized (red).
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Ashton Kutcher Says Soon ‘You’ll Be Able to Render a Whole Movie’ Using AI
https://variety.com/2024/film/news/ashton-kutcher-ai-movies-sora-hollywood-1236027196/
“I have a beta version of it and it’s pretty amazing,” Kutcher said of the platform in a recent conversation with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt at the Berggruen Salon in Los Angeles.
“Why would you go out and shoot an establishing shot of a house in a television show when you could just create the establishing shot for $100? To go out and shoot it would cost you thousands of dollars,” Kutcher said. “Action scenes of me jumping off of this building, you don’t have to have a stunt person go do it, you could just go do it [with AI].
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Adobe scolded for selling ‘Ansel Adams-style’ images generated by AI
https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/3/24170285/adobe-stock-ansel-adams-style-ai-generated-images
Adobe responded to the callout, saying it had removed the offending content and had privately messaged the Adams estate to get in touch directly in the future. The Adams estate, however, said it had contacted Adobe directly multiple times since August 2023.
“Assuming you want to be taken seriously re: your purported commitment to ethical, responsible AI, while demonstrating respect for the creative community, we invite you to become proactive about complaints like ours, & to stop putting the onus on individual artists/artists’ estates to continuously police our IP on your platform, on your terms,” said the Adams estate on Threads. “It’s past time to stop wasting resources that don’t belong to you.”
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Daniel Parris – The Broken Economics of Streaming Services: A Stats Explainer
https://www.statsignificant.com/p/the-broken-economics-of-streaming
This report examines the financial instability in the streaming industry, focusing on the unsustainable economic models of platforms such as Paramount Plus.
Content Costs and Subscriber Retention
- Expenditure on Content: Streaming services invest heavily in content creation and acquisition to attract subscribers.
- Diminishing Returns: The escalating costs lead to diminishing returns as subscriber growth plateaus.
Competitive Landscape
- Continuous Production: High competition forces continuous, expensive content production to retain subscribers.
Future Projections
- Cable TV Model: The industry may shift towards models resembling traditional cable TV, incorporating advertising, subscription bundling, and higher prices to achieve financial sustainability.
NEWS TV NEWS
Hollywood’s Top TV Execs Are Happy About The Death Of Peak TV – Here’s Whyhttps://www.slashfilm.com/1593571/peak-tv-dead-hollywood-top-tv-execs-happy/
- Streaming services weren’t required to reveal their subscription numbers or actual viewership
- Shows just needed to look good on paper for investors and stockholders.
- Creators and actors soon learned they weren’t getting paid beyond an initial flat fee; royalties were now gone.
- 600 shows at once wasn’t good for anyone
- Thanks to the strikes, it all came crashing down
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