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These AI tools are getting really powerful.

I generated this experiment using on-set photos I took from a short film I directed a while ago called Epoch. Recreated the locations, the vehicle, sets, props, and wardrobe from a photo archive… everything except our actors. It took about two days to create this. It’s not perfect, performances are def a bit funky in places, but man…the visual quality…

I’m a little shook tbh.

I’ve been in the entertainment industry for over 30 years, worn a lot of hats from a sculptor and fabricator on Broadway to previs supervisor on blockbuster movies, VFX, directing commercials, music videos, tv shows, virtual production and entrepreneurial endeavors. I’ve spent weeks, months, years doing work that this tech can now do in minutes.

It definitely feels like a bit of an assault on what I’ve spent my entire life training to do.

I love shooting. I love being on set. I love working with talented people and friends. But now, with a few minutes in sweatpants and a cup of coffee, I can conjure up something that would normally take a small army of said people, weeks of prep, and a lot of money to do.

I can see how powerful this can be in the hands of one person or a small team with taste and vision.

I can also see how some of the people with all the money use it to gut the industry.

My mind is racing with everything that’s suddenly possible and everything that might disappear. Getting out on set/location and getting my hands dirty with the crew and actors and getting alternate points of view from them is such a fun and important part of this gig for me…so much magic there.

There has to be some middle ground.

Crazy to think that today is the worst the Ai will be.

Curious to know where you all land on this from a practical sense, embracing it, indifferent, or just wanting to kill it with fire?

#ai

It’s all about the prep.

We only had two days to shoot the Resident Evil: Requiem short film. We started with a great script from the team at @nomadicagency, and the more we talked about it, the more ambitious it became. That meant careful planning was critical.

So we previsualized the hell out of it.

@weezhb and I built the entire previs in Unreal Engine. I performed/motion captured the characters using a Rokoko suit and MetaHuman Animator, then used VCam on an iPad along with some rigs I built to replicate my real life handheld and dolly configs. That let me design every shot exactly how I planned to shoot it in the real world.

The goal was for the previs to become the roadmap for the live action shoot. Everything from actor and camera blocking, set design, Virtual Production and even lighting. It took about 3 weeks to create, the time was well worth it. We were able to experiment creatively with what the short wanted to become without the ticking clock that comes with experimenting on a shoot day.

Because everyone, the crew, the agency and the client, could clearly see the vision via the previs ahead of time, we were able to move incredibly fast once we were on set. What could easily have taken three or four shoot days fit snuggly into two..

#filmmaking
#residentevil
#residentevilrequiem
#virtualproduction

Here’s a BTS video from our Resident Evil Requiem short film. What a crazy, fun project. Huge thanks to everyone at Capcom, Nomadic, Framestore Pictures, Framestore, The Lift, Synapse, and Simplemente. Such a great group of humans to collaborate with. Can’t wait to do it again!

Starring: Maika Monroe @maikamonroe, Olivia Aray @olivia.aray
Production Company: Framestore Pictures @framestorepictures
Director: Rich Lee @hypothetical_monkey
Managing Director: Jennifer Siegel @jensiegelnyc
EP: Brittney Walker @brittskywalker
Head of Production: Julie Hershan @hangryjulie
Line Producer: Laura Morris
Production Coordinator: Emily Silber @em_silbs
Director of Photography: Christopher Probst @probstdp
1st AD: Andrew Coffing @andrewjohn1
Client: Capcom @capcomusa @re_games Tak Inoue, Karim Chaoui
Agency: Nomadic Agency @nomadicagency
ECD: Lucas McClain @lucasmcclain
Senior AD: Jonathan Marques @jonimarques
Senior Copywriter: Rob Atkinson
Senior Producer: Andrea Abbott @andreapabbott
Production Designer: Fernanda Contreras @fernandacontrerasr
Stylist: Paola Alfaro @lajapo
Make Up FX: Roberto Ortiz@maquillajefx @robortiz_mfx
Production Service Company: The Lift @theliftmx
Executive Producer: Gabriel Stavenhagen @stavenhagen
LP: Aura Santamaría @aurasantamaria
Virtual Art Dept: Synapse @synapse_vp ,Hologen.io
Dir of Real Time: Louise Baker Lee @weezhb
Synapse Global HOP: @misschieveous
VP Stage: Simplemente @simplementemx
VFX: Framestore @framestore
Executive Producer: Brittney Walker @brittskywalker
Editor: David Checel @davidcheceleditor
Composer: Jon Natchez @jonnatchez
Audio/Sound Design: @mattyocumsound

#residentevil
#filmmaking
#shortfilm
#residentevilrequiem
#virtualproduction

In so many movies and games, the undead are just cannon fodder, mindless targets that you mow down.

But behind every zombie is a human who once loved, had a family, had a home.

In Resident Evil: Requiem fragments of that humanity remain.

This short film is the tragic backstory of one of them.

I have such fond memories of playing the original game in the 90s, so it was a blast getting to work on this and recreating that very era for this short.

Huge thanks to Capcom and Nomadic for the trust and massive support of the vision. And, to everyone at Framestore Pictures, Framestore, Synapse, The Lift, my wife and creative partner Louise, and the entire crew who helped bring this to life. Love getting to work with so many of my friends and long time collaborators on this.

Excited to share more soon about how we used previs to develop the story, recreated 1998 Raccoon City in Mexico City and built and shot the post-apocalyptic Raccoon City on a virtual production stage.

Seeing the reaction over the past few weeks has been incredible. Pushing 5M views across YouTube reposts alone, and so much positivity from fans.
Really proud of this one.

Starring: Maika Monroe @maikamonroe, Olivia Aray @olivia.aray
Production Company: Framestore Pictures @framestorepictures
Director: Rich Lee @hypothetical_monkey
Managing Director: Jennifer Siegel @jensiegelnyc
EP: Brittney Walker @brittskywalker
Head of Production: Julie Hershan @hangryjulie
Line Producer: Laura Morris
Production Coordinator: Emily Silber @em_silbs
Director of Photography: Christopher Probst @probstdp
1st AD: Andrew Coffing @andrewjohn1
Client: Capcom @capcomusa @re_games Tak Inoue, Karim Chaoui
Agency: Nomadic Agency @nomadicagency
President: Dawn Bates
ECD: Lucas McClain @lucasmcclain
Account Director: Tiffany Jacques
Senior AD: Jonathan Marques @jonimarques
Senior Copywriter: Rob Atkinson
Senior Producer: Andrea Abbott @andreapabbott
Senior Project Manager: Jaclyn Blanchette
Motion Designer: Kara Powell
#residentevil #filmmaking #visualeffects #virtualproduction

As a winning campaign, ASSUME THAT I CAN will become part of MoMA’s permanent collection. @themuseumofmodernart @theaicp

As a winning campaign, ASSUME THAT I CAN will become part of MoMA’s permanent collection. @themuseumofmodernart @theaicp

What. A. Week. #AssumeThatICan

What. A. Week. #AssumeThatICan

What. A. Week. #AssumeThatICan

Inclusion will never be possible if the decisions that shape the world are made only by a few, for a few. From having a say in everyday personal choices to being involved in writing laws and policies, people with disabilities demand a seat at the table where the decisions are made. So that everyone’s opinion is heard and the world is finally shaped by all. For all.
#NoDecisionWithoutUs #WorldDownSyndromeDay #WDSD25
.
@downs_syndrome_association @fondazione_cariplo @ndssorg @downsyndromeaustralia @cdndownsyndrome @togetheracademy_ie @globaldownsyndrome @the_nzdsa @wnfcreative @downsyndromeinternational @fondazionecompagniadisanpaolo @abmauriit @ecodemolizioni @synapse_vp

#HistoriasDeInclusión2 @culturainquieta @iberdrola

For the second year in a row 🙌🏻 @eurobest_festival

For the second year in a row 🙌🏻 @eurobest_festival

2x Grand Prix at @thecrestaawards #AssumeThatICan

MTV VMA nominations are in. We did good!

VIDEO OF THE YEAR
BEST HIP HOP
BEST DIRECTION - RICH LEE @hypothetical_monkey
BEST EDITING - DAVID CHECEL @davidcheceleditor
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS - SYNAPSE VP, RICH LEE, LOUISE LEE, FLAWLESS, METAPHYSIC.

Thanks for having me again @kkangsta I wouldn’t be doing a lot of this stuff if it wasn’t for your incredible support over the years and of course big thanks to the whole @interscope family + @eminem @rosenberg

15 year anniversary of working with Team Shady coming up! Still haven’t figured out how to make Em’s nose less pointy tho. Will dev some Ai to do that on the next one.

Also so rad that we shot almost the entire video on our virtual production stage at @synapse_vp the whole team there def pulled off a major magic trick to make this video happen! 🪄

#filmmaking #musicvideo #eminem #houdini #mtv #mtvvma
#synpasevirtualproduction #virtualproduction #unrealengine#epicgames

A quick little bts of our Omega Olympics spot. They should make film production an Olympic team sport!

We had a rad global team on this. 400 crew members hailing from 7 different countries. We spent 13 days shooting across 3 continents, 4 countries, and working with 7 spoken languages.

Awesome bts work by @margheritaleofanti there is a much longer version of this coming that I’m excited for you all to see.

@omega
@olympics

Credits:

Agency: @trashadv
Executive Creative Directors: Carlo Capella, Marco Linguanti @tongloves

Director: Rich Lee @hypotetical_monkey
DP: Christopher Probst, ASC @probstdp
Executive Producer: @karimbartoletti
Senior Producer: @silvia.berga
Head of R&D: @gipo_reds
Production Manager: Antonio Mastellone
Assistant Producer: @lukebetti
1st AD: @andrewjohn1
Editor: @mars_editor
Cover Music: ‘Born to be a Legend’ by SDM, Manafest, Liv Ash e Otto Blue.
Colorist: @danilovittori_colorist
Post Production Audio: Effetto Note
Senior Post Producer: Alga Pastorelli
Visualization Supervisor: @weezhb

VFX Company: @22dogstudio
Executive producer: @antonellagalassi
VFX supervisor: @losputafuoco
Comp Supervisor: Luca Bellano
CGI Supervisor: Jinseok Park
Producer: Janet Cornacchia
Flame Artist: Francesco Bianco

SERVICE COMPANIES
Full Moon Films - Paris France fullmoonfilmsprod
@phdugay

Means of Production – Toronto Canada @meansofproduction.ca
Clay Welters
@jillsartore

Vivi Film – Barcelona Spain @vivifilmproductions
Carlos Soms @carlos_soms

Phantasipro Films - Shangai China
@pptsai613
@joyceshen914

©️Pierre Bideau, Lighting Designer, for the golden lighting of the Eiffel lower.

#OMEGA
#OMEGAOFFICIALTIMEKEEPER
#OLYMPICS
#PARIS2024
#FILMMAKING

Challenge: How do we create a dream-like spot for Omega where our Olympic athletes appear as giants or miniatures, competing amidst Paris’s most iconic landmarks?

Answer: It’s all about the prep!

The easy route would have been to shoot everything locked off, allowing us to place the athletes easily in the frame in post. Our lives would have been much simpler for the shoot in this scenario…

But for this concept, lock-offs felt boring.

I wanted shots that captured the athletes and Paris in visually dynamic ways.

Regular storyboards wouldn’t suffice. So we created a 3D previs to art direct the framing of Paris and the placement of each athlete and sort out the technicalities of each shot.

Using Unreal Engine, we brought in a 3D model of Paris via the amazing Cesium plugin. Which basically brings Google 3D maps into Unreal. This was incredibly helpful during pre-production, not only for previs, but also for location scouting. We used another plugin, Ultra Dynamic Sky, to dial in sun placement and cloud cover. We created Metahuman stand-ins for each athlete, and used Wonder Dynamics to convert footage of our athletes into mocap data for realistic animations.

Using the previs as a foundation we were able to communicate our ideas with the client, agency, production, athletes, and the global crews from 8 different countries that would at different points be putting their hands on the project. It was a vital part of our planning and became in a way our production bible. I had an iPad slung around my shoulder at all times to be able to reference it.

I’m constantly blown away by the tools we have today to support our creative, we’ve come a long way since my previs supervisor days on movies like Pirates 1, 2, 3, I Am Legend, Constantine, and many others where even just adding textures to 3d models was a bit of a chore.

#filmmaking
#cinematography
#olympics
#paris
#unrealengine
#epicgames
#omega