S2 EP27 | Navigating the AI Revolution in Filmmaking with Jon Cheney
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
all right.
Welcome everybody.
Hey, Garrett.
How are you?
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Daren.
I'm doing all right, man.
It's good to see you.
It's a
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Hey.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
recording day than normal.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Yeah, you know what?
There's something interesting
that we should announce today.
We just crossed our year, mark.
Dude,
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
What is this episode?
52, right?
One.
One a.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: is,
I think, so I think we're at episode
52, or maybe we're recording 53, but
this next week is like the overlap of.
Our first episode in 52,
so that's kind of fun.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Congratulations.
And to kick it off, we have an amazing
special guest right to, to mark
the the year one year anniversary.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
John Cheney is joining us today.
John, thank you for being here.
I'm excited to talk to you today.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Yeah, I'm honored to be here
on the one year anniversary.
That's a one.
One a week is not easy work.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
This is true.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
planning this episode for a year, John.
We've been planning,
we're honored.
Well, no, we're, we are
thrilled to have you.
Thank you so much for
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah,
so today our topic is AI and film, and so
that's why you're here joining us today.
John, you are the founder of Gen Ai PI.
I'm gonna let you kind of tell people
why we're talking to you about AI today.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Well, awesome.
Hey, you know what?
Excited to be here.
I don't know if, if I'm the
most qualified to talk about AI
in film, but here's the thing.
I'm really good at AI and know a lot
about it, and I really like to watch
movies, so maybe that does qualify me.
Right.
No, I yeah, so I, I've been in AI for
a while and I can go into my background
later, but, but yeah, I'm currently the
founder of the General AI Proficiency
Institute and really focus on helping.
Train employees, you know, and
employers and everybody in between.
Really focusing on the business
world and making sure people
are ready for ai, right?
Making sure that they don't get left
behind and, and you know, smashed against
the rocks when this big tsunami hits.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
That right there.
I think nails why we're
talking to you today.
'cause if you're helping prepare
people for this onslaught.
Then we wanna be able, we wanna be
in that mix as well as filmmakers.
So I think that leads into a perfect
first question, which kind of encapsulates
what everybody is talking about
today, at least what I see online.
So if AI can write, I.
Shoot and edit film.
What's left for filmmakers?
What's happening to our industry?
What should we be looking out for?
I know that's like three questions wrapped
in one, but we're already seeing just
in the last few weeks, Google VO three
released and it's very realistic and a
lot of people are even more concerned and
freaked out than they were two weeks ago.
So if the tools exist, then
what happens to filmmakers?
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah,
it's a, it's a great question, and I
don't think filmmakers are going anywhere.
I, I think that that the pattern that
technology has always followed is, is
that it, you know, every time there's
an advancement in whatever it is.
Right.
Video's actually a big one that
I've, I've been in for a long time.
you know, I kind of
joked, I, I actually have.
You know, I, I'm not in filmmaking
necessarily, but I've always
loved video editing, right?
And I've, I have, you know, 20
GoPros and five drones and several
DSLRs and super nice cameras and
all the tripods and my, you know,
I, I'm sitting in a studio, right?
I'm a creator, right?
And so I really, really have loved that.
But part, part of the thing that, that I
just get excited about is as technology
advances these things that used to
only be available to people that had
tons of money become available to all.
Right.
it lowers the barrier to entry.
We all now have phones in our pockets that
literally are used to film movies now.
Right?
I mean, movies that are ending
up on the big screen, right.
The phone is capable of
taking incredible shots.
And you know, of course Apple goes out
of its way to show, Hey, you can do this.
And they have people make films
exclusively with the iPhone, right?
so, you know, that's an example of,
hey, we're putting technology that is
professional quality in everybody's hands.
Now we're jumping into AI
where you can now, you know,
have a soundtrack written in.
30 seconds and you can have a you know, a
a, a wardrobe put together in 30 seconds.
And, you know, all of, you know,
the makeup and everything, the
lighting, the editing, the post,
like everything can be done with ai.
And so I, I think it's going to
just lower the barrier to entry.
You're gonna have more creators.
I still think that the big best
movies and the best creators
are gonna float to the top.
And those who are, that, that's
who we're gonna watch, you know,
in the theater on the weekend.
But, but you know, the, the
quality of content potentially
will, will increase over time.
That's a, a very positive
way to look at it.
I have negative ways to look
at it too, I really do believe
that you know, this technology
will lower the barrier to entry.
So that anybody can, can jump in and
create really amazing things, but just,
you know, needing to be able to vocalize
or verbalize what what they wanna see.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
yeah, I agree.
And I think I, I, I mean, I think it's
super it, it's repeating itself, right?
When, when we say, oh, well, cameras
are getting better and better
and better, or, now A-D-S-L-R-I
could shoot a movie on A-D-S-L-R.
that, is that gonna destroy
independent film or, you know,
destroy a good quality storytelling?
No, I think you're right on.
It's only gonna improve it.
So as a filmmaker, I want to figure
out how to embrace to use it as a tool
to be able to help my storytelling
or audience building or distribution
and then also there's this very much
now that we can all be filmmakers.
We still have to be able to figure out
how to get a film to an audience, like
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
as far as build an audience.
Right?
And I think that that's something
that hopefully an ai, you know,
AI can even help us do that.
Am I, am I wrong in that or what,
what are your thoughts on that?
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
You know, it's, it's
distribution is, is key.
Right.
You know, one thing that I teach a lot
of business leaders is how to build
software, you know, in hours, right?
Something, you know, you can rebuild
Caly, for example, in about 30 minutes, I.
At this point, right?
So if that moat is gone of the,
on the creation side, right?
Well, that doesn't mean that
everybody's using my, my, my
new Calendly clone right now.
I'm still gonna have to go build a brand.
I'm gonna have to really
connect with people.
I'm gonna have to show them why I'm
better, why they should trust me.
You know, a lot of these words,
connection, trust, humanity,
like those things are gonna mean
a lot more in this day of ai.
and so I, I, I think it's gonna be, aI can
certainly assist in distribution in terms
of, hey, can we automate, you know, email
outflows or can we automate, you know,
social media posts and things like that?
Sure.
Right.
But, but ultimately, you know, I
scroll past AI written content, like
I teach ai But I scroll past it.
I could spot it in an instant
and I just, I'm not interested
in what the AI has to say to me.
I am interested, however, in
people that use AI to express
their real human opinions.
That's what I really care about.
I want to connect with somebody, and
if AI's going to help enhance that,
that's fine, but you have to be careful.
You have to be careful to just
let AI take over for you, because
people are gonna see through it
and they're not gonna wanna engage.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah,
what I've, what I've tried to think about
is like we've gone through plenty of
times where technology has democratized.
That ability to participate.
Right.
And what has happened in the past is
it hasn't replaced the existing things.
It's in addition to.
So it's like, we started with, I
think we started with radio right?
And that was probably the earliest one.
And then we added silent films
and that radio didn't go away.
And then we added.
And then we added color, and then we
added tv, and then we added streaming.
And we still have movies and theaters.
We still have TV that's happening, right?
It might be shifting, it might be
changing and adapting, but every time
a new technology has come out, from
what I, under my limited knowledge,
it just means that there's more.
And so that's.
And that's not a question, that's
just an interesting context because
I think what happens then when
it's democratized is it gets noisy.
There's more content.
There's, I mean, you look at the
difference between pre-social media
and short form video and now, and
we have a lot more content that's
coming out every day that is you
know, vying for our attention.
And we only have so many hours in the day.
And so what's happening is
that it's in addition to.
We have more noise and it's harder to
get the signal, but I think that goes
back to what you were just talking
about, which is that ability to connect
with an audience is really what's
gonna be the most valuable asset or
attribute for filmmakers going forward.
Do you agree?
I guess this is my question.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Yeah, I mean, because content can
be created so easily today, right?
Bad content just doesn't cut it.
You can't fake it.
Right?
Even good content creators
struggle, you know?
Now, now in order to say you
made it, you know, on a piece of
content, you went viral, right?
You have a million views, 2
million views, 10 million views.
If you just get 2000 views on something.
You know, that's fine.
Maybe a few people saw
it and that's great.
But the reality is, you know,
you're still, you're still
at the bottom of the barrel.
And, and you gotta, you gotta really,
you know, step up your game in order
to, to come through that sea of noise.
Right?
And if you wanna be part of the signal,
you, you gotta, you gotta really stand
out and, and whether it's created with
AI or not you know, that that's not
going to, that's not going to change.
I think it's going to get,
harder, of course to stand out.
But another, another thing that, that
is kept, you know, crossing my mind here
is, you know, a lot of this talent that's
worried about like, where am I gonna go?
Right?
What, where am I gonna,
where am I gonna make money?
How am I gonna feed my family?
You know?
Right.
From the makeup artist to the, to
the wardrobe wardrobe designer to,
to the actors themselves, right.
If they can be replaced, potentially.
I think that live entertainment
actually, you know, just from, you know.
Plays, musicals, live
comedy, you know, whatever.
You know, I think that live entertainment,
real human connection there is going to
go through a new kind of renaissance.
I think we're gonna see a huge uptick.
A lot of talent that's been in
Hollywood is going to be forced
to find new ways to make money.
And I'm, I'm guessing they land on
that physical, real life experience.
That's gonna be where the premium
starts to, starts to live.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Interesting.
Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
John, what are some things
that you wish general kind of.
Those adapter, maybe it's not
late adapters, you're saying,
Hey, this tsunami's going to
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
It is still early
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Okay,
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: still.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: so
what are guys like me who are like,
okay, all I wanna do is make movies.
Like that's my goal.
That's how I want to feed my family,
and I'll continue to do that.
AI or iPhone or whatever else.
New technology comes out and
helps and enables me to do that.
should I know?
What
you know, today that could help me in,
know, the next process of, of production
or, or gearing up for a next movie.
Is that, so is that a fair question?
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: It is.
It is.
And I think, I think the easy answer
is you know, and it's not an easy
process, but it's an easy answer is
you just have to be trying everything.
Right?
I mean, best way to know what's out there
is to just go out and, and play with it.
Right.
Pay for Veo three, you know, it's, it's.
You know, 250 bucks right now
is about what you gotta pay in
order to really start playing
with it at any type of scale.
But you know, play with that.
Jump into Midjourney, jump into
cling, jump into, you know, all of
these different tools that are out
there and, and see what you can do.
See what you can create.
See, say, Hey, you know what, I'm
gonna create a little short film.
You know, you see a lot of stuff.
I see this on YouTube and Instagram
and X and whatever, where people were
sharing, Hey, I made this, you know.
92nd trailer, or I made this,
you know, four minute short and
I did it all with ai, right?
I, I, I designed the characters.
I, you know, and it's very
well thought out stuff, right?
It's like really cool,
really cool content, right?
Well, they'll, maybe they'll start in
chat GPT and they'll, they'll build
a, a script and a plot and all this
thing, and they'll work through it
and, you know, it's not just Chad c
PT writing it, they're just using it
to organize it and put it together.
And then they'll use something like
Chad CPT as well to then build prompts.
They can successfully create
characters maybe in mid journey
or scenes in mid journey.
And then they'll take those beautiful
scenes that have been created and they'll
pull it over to something like VO and say,
all right, let's now bring this to life
and let's, you know, have this character
consistency and things that, that are
now, now, you know, capable or possible
with AI that weren't even, you know, three
months ago, Where so, so the reality is.
If you wanted, if you want to be a
filmmaker, then go be a filmmaker, right?
And use ai.
You gotta figure out how to do it.
If you don't know how to do this, and
your competitors are doing it, they're
going to, they're gonna build their
amazing, you know, blockbuster with
a $40,000 budget and you're still
spending, you know, 4 million, And
or 40 million, or 400 million, right?
Depending on the scale.
Obviously this is all, you
know, depending on who.
You know, now for a few hundred
dollars, maybe a few thousand dollars.
'Cause 'cause video is actually
one of the most expensive, you
know, use cases of AI right now.
It really, it eats a lot of credits
and, and you gotta, you gotta
pay a little bit of money, but
comparatively speaking, right.
You know, I did a, I did a shot,
I created a shot, I went to see
the new Mission Impossible movie.
Right.
And you know, Tom Cruise had just.
A genius, right?
The goat.
And, and so I came home and I said, I'm
gonna recreate one of his crazy shots
where he is on the plane, whatever.
I'm gonna do it in Veo.
And, and I did it.
And, you know, it took me maybe
four tries to get the prompt, right?
But now here's this
guy, super action scene.
You've got music in the background.
I made it raining.
He jumps from one plane to another.
And you know, I created that scene
all on my own with a few prompts.
And, and I'm not a, I'm not a filmmaker
and I'm putting out a Hollywood studio,
you know, a Hollywood quality, you know.
Now granted it's only eight seconds.
I.
So an eight second clip, but you know,
piece together enough, eight second
clips, and you've got yourself a movie.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah,
I'm thinking about the, the filmmakers
that are just getting started.
Who constantly ask, how do I
raise money for my short film?
What's the best way to, to
get crowdfunding or equity or
donations or whatever it might be?
And the idea of waiting for
permission or waiting for
financing, I think has to go away.
People can literally, like you said, get
on one of these platforms, make their
short film for a few hundred dollars
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Mm-hmm.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: and time.
And like if you're a writer or if
you're a director, like I think
you're gonna be so much better off.
So much farther ahead.
If you have done 5, 10, 20 AI
generated short films as in
5, 10, 20, I have a vision.
I understand timing and you're,
you're just gonna have more chops than
waiting around for that same amount of
time for someone to give you a chance
to get on set and do it with humans.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Well, you hit a critical point that
I want to I wanna hit and then keep
going, but you know, I teach, I
work with a lot of entrepreneurs.
I'm an entrepreneur and, and
that's really where I've kind
of made my mark in the world.
I've raised tens of millions of dollars.
I started a company back in 2016, sold
it a few years ago, and, it was in
the augmented reality space, actually.
Right?
So it's been in, I, I'm in this kind
of tech, you know and visual space
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Mm-hmm.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
and and really have always
loved, loved those things.
But but the thing that I'm teaching
right now is I, I teach a course
that, that I, I do quite often.
That's called How to Build a
Business with AI in a weekend.
And one of the things that just blows
my mind is the type of things that you
can create now with almost no risk.
Right, in order to just get your, you
know, even just a pilot episode for a
TV series or something like that, right?
It, it has historically cost, you know,
at least tens of thousands of dollars, if
not hundreds of thousands of dollars or
millions if you're really going all in.
But but now you can do that
again for a couple hundred bucks
in, in the same way, right?
You can, you can now
build a piece of software.
You can go get your customers, your
first customers, literally by next week.
You build, you come up with an
idea, you build the software, you
have your first customer by next
Thursday, and, and that eliminates
all, almost eliminates the risk.
And I love that.
I love that MVP an MVP can be, you know,
I, I raised a ton of, I raised millions
of dollars for my startup back in 2016
because didn't know how to write software.
I had to go hire really expensive
developers and then we had to work
on it for 18 months to build it.
Then I got my first dollar, and so
I'm already several million dollars.
My investors are at
risk, all of that stuff.
It's, there's a huge amount of
risk and stress by the way that
goes along with that when you're
taking other people's money and you
don't know if it's going to work.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
and now you can just, Hey,
let's get that proof of concept.
Let's, let's put the pilot episode, let's
put whatever the trailer together and do
that with, again, a couple hundred bucks.
And boom.
Now you know whether or not
this, this concept is gonna land.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: I
imagine that if you're a director, for
example, and Garrett, I'm curious your
thoughts on this, but like you could,
you could create the trailer for the
movie you want to fund and produce.
With AI in a couple of days or a
few weeks and a few hundred dollars,
like how much easier would it be
to go in and say, this is the movie
we're making, this is what it's gonna
feel like, sound like, look like.
You know, we're obviously, we're gonna
do it with humans and we're gonna make
it more realistic than it already looks.
But like that compared to a pitch
deck or a sizzle reel, or an
animatic, or a storyboard, to me,
seems like a huge opportunity.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Yeah, I agree.
I mean, I think any, anytime, and we've
seen this Daren in pitching, anytime we
can eliminate that gap between, imagine.
Nation and actual, that's a good thing.
So for the investor that says, you
know, if you go and say, imagine this
and say, okay, well that didn't work.
Well, let's show them a, a drawing.
Imagine this is a movie.
And then, no, that didn't work.
And now I've, I've actually done
pitches where I've, you know, obviously
these are these rip reels where
you're stealing scenes from other
movies and cutting 'em together.
And I've put the investor's name on as
the executive producer, like, imagine.
And they go, oh, okay, I can,
that's easy for me to see.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: So yes,
I think this is the next level of that.
Which is a great idea to try to
put together this a, a trailer.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
I, I think it's going Daren to I
think it's going to elevate what
is expected in the pitch meeting.
I.
Right.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Hmm.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: if I
had, if I had some, you know, I invest in
startups and other things and whatever.
If I had a startup come to me
with some software and they
said, I've got this idea, I'd be
like, you're not getting it done.
Like, have you built it yet?
Like, do you have any customers yet?
Like,
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: to me.
Come back to me.
It sounds like a good idea.
Go prove it.
Go build something, go get your first,
because I don't care if you have 10
customers come back to me after you've
built it and you've proven that people
actually like this, they wanna pay for it.
And, and then I'll, and then I'll
really look at, but, but, but now, yeah,
you're gonna have one guy that walks
into a pitch meeting for this movie and
says, Hey you know, here's my script.
Here's my ideas, and
they're like, okay, cool.
Do you have a, you know, do
you have anything to show me?
no, we haven't, we haven't
raised any money yet.
Okay, well, can't you invest a
thousand dollars in maybe a few
nights, you know, to figure this out
and try to show me something, right?
I mean, that it's, it's really
just gonna elevate that process.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
One of the, one of the things you
said John, that's really kind of
resonated with me is you know, I
asked about what, what do we need?
What do I need to know?
And as you talked about the different
opportunities and solutions,
you, you, you kept coming to the.
Back to the concept of it being
well thought, well thought out.
Right.
And I think that that's one thing
that isn't going to be replaced at
by, by is not gonna replace the person
creating the, the, the film or the art.
Right.
And you're saying, Hey,
here's an idea, right?
We're gonna initiate this idea
and I'm gonna think through it.
I might.
CR different examples on
AI and things like that.
But John, you, you said it has
to be well thought, whether it's
a business or a film or a story.
And you know, an actor, an actor on
set, I don't know, isn't gonna respond
to a cleverly written Chad g PT prompt.
Like you have to really kind of think
through what you're doing and be
able to communicate that very well.
I.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: I
just imagined you on set putting in.
I want to tell my actor to do this.
Please create the prompts
that I can tell my actor.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
hashtag image, you know, you know.
Yeah.
Maybe they'll, maybe, maybe,
maybe I missed the point.
Maybe they, you, you're saying,
Hey, you don't get it, you're not
gonna be on set with actors anymore.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
No, I think you will.
I think you will.
I, I don't think that's going away.
I think there's gonna be big
actors, there's gonna be superstars.
There's also gonna be AI superstars.
There will.
Right.
you know, there's, there, there are
now, you know, singers out there that,
that, that are completely AI generated.
Their music is, you know, completely
AI generated their, all their social
posts are completely AI generated.
They do not exist in the real world.
Right.
But but they have, you know, 1.7
million followers on Instagram
and they're publishing music and
they have hit, you know, hit, hit
songs that are, that are now out.
Right.
I mean, it's, it's crazy
what's happening there.
But,
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
John, sorry to, sorry to interject
there, but like there's still a
human behind all of that, right?
There's still someone.
Prompting every single aspect of that.
And so while they may, may be behind
the scenes, like they're still
getting the benefit of having 1.7
million followers and instead
of, you know, videos about pizza,
it's just an AI generated image.
And, you know,
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: yeah,
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
there's still a, like, correct me if
I'm wrong, but there's no like fully
autonomous agent AI that has set up
its own Instagram account, gotten
followers, created stuff on its own right.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
actually there are,
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Oh no.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: And, and,
and we're just at the beginning of that.
It's been done now.
Now listen, everything, anything, at
some point you can track it back to
whatever human created some prompt
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
To do that.
But there have been, you know, basically
challenges that said, Hey, you know,
set up an agent to run a Twitter
and to do this and to do whatever.
Like, there's one, there's one one,
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
case study or agree.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: on, on X.
That, that, that is completely,
you know, and, and by the way,
they're very transparent, even.
They're like, yeah, I'm an ai and they're
tracking and following crypto, you know,
meme coins and things like that, right?
And they've made over a million dollars.
from that X account, right.
By posting things about meme coins.
' cause it can constantly scrape and find
the latest UpToDate stuff and it finds,
you know, finds things that are kind of
hidden gems, you know, all over the place.
And so lots of people follow
it because they wanna, they
want to be in there, right?
And they also accept
donations in crypto, right?
And there's just a little link there that
they created that anyone can just send
to this wallet address and, and they're
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Geez.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
millions of dollars doing this.
And it's completely autonomous now,
obviously a human set up, that agent.
Right.
now one thing I want to, I want to
go back actually to something that
Garrett mentioned a second ago.
You know.
of the things that I think is, is
really important to understand about
how AI works, at least right now.
And it may, it may, you know, cross this,
you know, into the A GI world, but right
now really AI is pattern recognition
and pattern regurgitation, and so I.
I dunno about you guys, but I'm kind of
sick of the same old, same old, right?
I don't want to go to the movies and see
the same story told over and over again.
Although there are the classic storylines
that everybody's gonna get behind.
but I like the originals, right?
And ai, I.
Might, you might think it's
capable of doing the original,
but when you really dig down, it's
patterning it off of something else.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
have the distinct ability to
create something truly novel.
I read an article this morning that
said that a lot of AI models are
running out of training data and they
don't, almost don't trust anything
that's out there from 2022 on.
Because they're afraid that it's ai.
And then you have this thing that's
called self or you know, recursive
a recursive down spiral, right?
Because it trains itself on data
that it made, and it just gets worse
and worse and worse in order to
truly improve an LLM and to have it.
You know, become more human-like
it needs human content.
But almost all of that content has already
been sucked up by all the LLMs and used,
used to, you know, illegally or not which
is another discussion, but then used
to train to train all of those LLMs.
And so, so the reality is
humans still have the edge.
We still have the edge in
creativity and originality.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
So what do you say to people who ha
are taking kind of the moral stance.
Or the moral frame on this whole thing
where the argument is, well, AI is trained
on human art and you know, we even have
Disney and NBC Universal suing Midjourney
right now for copyright infringement.
I, my understanding is that
every single AI company has.
Been sued and is currently being sued
and it is under litigation for copyright.
But that's one side of the moral
argument, like, well, it's trained
on human art and so I'm not
gonna use it and perpetuate that.
The other one I hear often is
the environmental impact of ai.
It used to be people who were
concerned about crypto and the
environmental impact it was having.
Now it's ai.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: what's
kind of the, what's your stance on that?
How do you not justify it?
Because I don't know that it
needs justification, but how
do you reconcile that aspect?
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
The reality is that AI uses a lot
less energy and water and all those
things than people actually think.
The reason why it's consuming a lot of
energy right now is because it's being
used so much by so many people, right.
when you look down at the, you
know, the per prompt, right?
It's, it's tiny, tiny fractions
of a drop of water per prompt
that are being, you know, used
in, in tiny amounts of electricity
per prompt that are being used.
And, but yeah, people look at it in
the aggregates and they're saying,
ah, we, you know, we can't even,
and, and the reality is we don't have
enough power being produced right now
in the US to, to power what we will
need just in the next five years.
We're, we're actually at, at about
20% of what we will need, right?
So we're gonna have to
produce a lot of power.
Now here's the cool thing.
will solve that for us, right?
They'll help us make these breakthroughs.
One of the things that AI is able
to help us do, whether it's in
software development or movie creation
or whatever, is discovery of new
technology and being able to just
increase the speed of new discovery.
I.
Right.
You take, you take, you know, millions
of articles and research and all these
things on a certain topic, and a, a
human could go through it and try to
identify and try to find patterns.
But AI can do that way faster, right?
They're taking human work, but
then they're saying, Hey, have
you identified this pattern?
This is actually how you
solve cult fusion, right?
Or cult fission and, or, you
know, nuclear fission or whatever.
And being able to create new types of
energy that we'll be able to hand this
better batteries, better, whatever, right?
And so.
AI is a tool.
It can be used to point at something
good, which is, Hey, let's.
Let's save the planet.
If that's what your, you know, your
cause is and you're trying to do, Hey,
we wanna make sure we do this and be
good stewards over our planet, which
I believe in, then, then yeah, let's
use AI and point it towards that.
If I want to use AI to go and, you
know, cause chaos in, you know, the
news, then you know I can do that too.
It's really, AI is going to amplify.
It's gonna speed up, amplify and
whatever other word you want to
enlarge or aggrandize something,
it's gonna do whatever that human
wants to do at a greater scale.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Wow, that's a big idea right there.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Okay.
Going back to, I mean, not going back,
but taking what you've said now and
saying, how do we, how do we tie that
to our independent filmmaker audience
and, and probably more for selfish
interests, like, how do I use this?
I feel like, what you're, what
you've done is you've introduced
me to my, my dad's workshop.
And I walk in and I'm a kid and
there's a million tools on the shelf
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: and
I've got the keys to them, but I have no
idea what they do or what they're for.
Where can I go or what should I do
as a filmmaker to kind of learning
basics like or know, what tool does
what and what do I need to use when.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
You know, I learn, I learn a
lot, honestly, just hanging out
on Instagram and on X, right?
I'll just find AI accounts.
You just search for the hashtag AI or you
look for video AI or Veo, or you kinda
just find a few of the things that are in
that place and, and just start scrolling.
I.
And you see what other
people are doing, right?
That's, that's what I like to do when
I see other people doing something
that inspires me and says, oh, wow.
Hey, I could do that.
What if I did my own twist on this
or my own spin on this, right?
And hey, oh, I didn't
know that could do that.
And then I go over, the thing that I
also do is I see what people are doing.
I see what they used to do it,
and then I zip over and I, I.
the tool, I subscribe to it.
Lots of 'em have free
trials, whatever it is.
And I try it and I say,
okay, this is awesome.
And now I've got my own opinion.
I've got some experience.
If I like it, I keep it and I
keep working and I keep going.
And I'll usually take what I try and
I'll share it on LinkedIn or I'll
share it on Instagram or Facebook or
wherever it is that, you know, I share.
I share a lot out there.
And and I see what the feedback is.
And if people are like,
wow, this is crazy.
This is awesome.
Well now I'm just kind of starting
to figure out what's working right.
But another thing that I like to do
when I'm trying to figure out how to use
something new that I haven't done before
is I'll use AI to teach me how to use ai.
And so you can use, you know, whatever
your preferred, you know, AI is, whether
it's GR or chat, GPT or Anthropic
or whatever it is, perplexity go
in there and say, Hey, I want to, I
want to create a short, you know, I,
I, I wanna try creating a cohesive,
you know, one minute, you know.
Scene, right?
With, you know, using AI tools.
I'd like to use, you know,
Google's, you know, Veo three.
I'd like to use soa.
I'd like to use, you know, whatever
it is that I want to do in terms of,
you know, audio and all this stuff.
Although if you use Veo three,
you can just do it all in one.
But the point is will then
help you build the prompts.
That's really what it comes down to.
You have to understand
how to, how to talk to it,
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: But if you
don't know how to talk to it, that's okay.
Just ask ai.
Just say, Hey, how can I,
how can I talk to this?
And it will build this beautiful prompt,
and then you can just adjust the prompt.
That's the cool thing.
You just talk to it.
You're the director.
You get to be the director.
Right?
When I'm building a piece of
software, again, I'm not a software
developer, but I'm the director.
I say, Hey, I want this button to do this.
I want, you know, when I, when I do this,
it'd be really cool if an email was sent
over here and a notification was sent over
here, and then there was this animation.
Okay, I'll build that for you.
Oh, I don't like that.
You know what, let's change that.
You know, it's, it's just a matter
of, of, of being the director
and saying, yeah, that was good.
Or, Hey, let's take another shot.
And, and so it, it's not.
It's not rocket science.
Like I have, I have four kids ages seven
to 13 basically, and they are all using AI
to build video, to build audio, to build
you know, little software games, right?
To, to do all kinds of stuff because
I've shown them how easy it is
all they have to be able to do.
Is describe what they want if they don't
like it, they just have to describe
what they don't like and move the next
one and move through that process and
iterate until they say, Hey, I like this.
Now
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Look what I built Dad.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
That's awesome.
I've, I Garrett to kind of answer
your question too, I think it's
different depending on where
you're at in the industry.
If you're a designer of some kind
on set, that's a very different
job than a producer or an editor
or a director or an actor.
And so as a producer, I'm thinking
I really need to understand prompts.
I don't necessarily need to be
able to get the best output.
I need to understand why it's not
working or, or how to communicate
with it, because that's my job as
a producer, is how to get a desired
outcome by communicating with people
who are responsible for that outcome.
And so I had my first experience,
you know, vibe coding the other
day on Ript and going, okay, cha
EPT, here's what I wanna make.
Please create a prompt that I can put
in a rep that gets me this outcome.
And I did exactly what
you said, John, and.
Five minutes later, I had a
working app and it blew my mind.
And so you apply that to film?
I haven't actually done it yet,
Garrett, but you apply that to,
Hey, I, I need a one minute sizzle
teaser trailer for this movie that
I'm gonna go and get financing for.
You know, whether it's me doing
it or working with an AI trailer
artist, you know, I need to
understand how that, how that works.
So as a producer, it's more understanding
of the communication, the interactivity
of it all, and how to get the outcome.
Whereas if you're a technician,
if you're a designer, if you're an
editor, you really need to understand
and be in that tool every day and
understanding how to use it as a
tool, not as a voice to replace you,
because we want your human element.
But if it makes you more effective
and gives you more a, a greater
output in shorter time and with
less money, that's a good thing.
So that's how I'm like
looking at it as a producer.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Yeah, that's a great way to look at it.
And in my mind then, putting on that
producer hat, or even the director
hat, I have to ask at what point
do I need to, and maybe there's,
maybe there's input on this.
John, at what point a filmmaker,
as an indie filmmaker, do you,
do I have to pump the brakes?
And he says, look, I've got three
projects right now, you know, between
this, you know, 50,000 to $2.5
million range, right?
And they're kind of on
the track running down.
The scripts are written.
We're now raising money for it.
AI hasn't been a part of that plan now.
And at what point do you say, okay,
pump the brakes, I'm gonna now
implement AI at the risk of disrupting
this pattern that I already have
kind of this, this model that works.
You know, how, how do I make
a smooth transition into that?
Or do I just need to start a
new project from the beginning
and have four projects going?
And this one is AI involved.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
There's no question that if you
start with AI from the beginning,
you're going to do it differently.
Right.
You just will.
The work is gonna be a
little bit different.
To try to inject AI in the middle of a
project is certainly going to disrupt
things, but I think it has to happen, and
the reason I think it has to happen is
because your competitors are doing it.
Right.
They're gonna be able to get
much higher quality shots.
They're gonna be able to do better
quality, you know, lighting and
wardrobe and, you know, have the,
have the plane scene, you know, that,
would be very, very expensive to do.
And now they can throw that in because
they know how to prompt, right?
And so maybe you don't need
the plane scene to get your
message across and that's fine.
I think I also think there's
going to be, and I think this is
probably an important point I think
there's going to be an appetite
by the general public as well for.
Things made without ai.
You know, like I think that
will be a genre, right?
And I don't know if it'll be huge, but it
will be, there will be this subset, right?
Because, you know, nobody today, I
mean, well, not nobody, most people
today can just kind of generally
accept that, you know, visual effects
are made with computers, right?
And, you know, there's computer
graphics, but, and not off,
that's computer graphics.
I'm not gonna see that movie,
you know, like I, that, that.
know, there are probably some purists
maybe that are still like, ah, you know,
I really, I really want to be the, you
know, Steven Spielberg approach Star Wars.
Let's make it as real as possible.
And people will appreciate that.
People will still do that.
Steven Spielberg will still do that,
but then he'll fill in the gaps
with AI and the visual effects and
where, you know, whatever it is.
And, and the reality is,
it's just another tool.
It's another tool in the, in the basket.
And so if you're an indie filmmaker, you
gotta, you, you can't ignore the tool.
You gotta dive in.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
I that's so a coincidence that
you just mentioned Star Wars.
I just.
Just read an article this morning
that says the original print of
Star Wars is nearly unwatchable.
Is the opinion is that they had did a
screening and it was basically unwatchable
because we are so accustomed to George
Lucas's iterations of it in tweaks
that we're very comfortable with that.
And now when we go back and
watch the original organic
Star Wars think, wait, what?
What movie is this?
I don't even recognize this anymore.
So Interesting.
There to be made about the
concept of will non cg, non AI
films, you know, be of interest.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Yeah.
I mean, I'm sure it's,
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
tangent.
But anyway.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: but
yeah, I mean, George Lucas really
stood out for his, his decisions there.
And many of the great people,
like I mentioned, Steven
Spielberg as well, right?
The, and, and, and many others.
They're just like, I, I'm,
I'm gonna try to stay away.
From computer graphics
as much as I can, right?
Doesn't mean I won't use them, but I
really just love capturing a real moment.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Sure.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
that matters.
That matters.
And it comes through.
It comes through.
You can tell there's, there's
robotic and I, I, you know,
can only approximate humanity.
It cannot replace it.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Yeah, for now.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Give
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: so
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
years and it still can't replace it.
It still
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
no, I know, I know
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
mimicking right.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
being face.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
gonna get better.
It's gonna get better.
10 is gonna be gonna
blow your mind, right?
You won't.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Well, I
need to, I need to, it sounds like I need
to check out IL three 'cause I've got a
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
that I'm putting together with this
this dog movie that I want to do.
And I'll tell you, nice to
have a trailer that could, that
I could show people and say,
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Well, and with your skillset,
Garrett, your ability to craft shots.
Edit trailers put together
a compelling imagery.
And like you are a talented
trailer editor, you've done
most of your own movies.
So being able to do that now before any
footage is captured to show an investor,
this is what it will look and feel like.
This is what we're aiming for.
I see that as hugely valuable.
Maybe one last topic that we could
dive in on, John, is the economics.
We touched a little bit on the economics,
how that's gonna be impacted by ai.
The first obvious thing is that yeah,
it's gonna cost less to do more but
how do you see it impacting people's
ability to make money in this industry?
'cause I don't see, just because
you made it with AI and put it on
YouTube, that you now have a career
that's not a direct line, right.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
Again, you have to stand out.
You have to, you have to be
the cream of the crop still,
whether you're using AI or not.
What you create has to connect
with people at whatever level.
Whether it's adventure or action or horror
or comedy or whatever it is, whether it's
maybe they are or not, it still has to
be really, really good content, right?
I'm a musician.
I have, you can see a piano behind
me here and a saxophone there.
And actually if I pan the camera
a little bit, another piano back
there and more guitars and another
piano over here against the wall.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
at that.
Wow.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: With
Eric Go's, know, sword right there.
So anyway, I love movies and I so
in, in another life and maybe in,
not in another life, in this life.
So I'm a composer.
I, you know, I, I I write a
lot of music and it's all over,
you know, all the Spotify's and
Apple music's, all that stuff.
But, but.
I'm going to score film, right?
That, that's what I'm gonna do, is
I continue to continue to grow up.
I, I love that.
I've always been a pianist and composer.
And, and, and that's part of why I love
movies so much is the music itself, right?
I, I can tell you this,
this is what's scary.
A massive percentage.
It's something like 35% of all music
today on a daily basis that is submitted
to Spotify, is created by AI today.
June 20th, 25.
25, over a third is, is AI generated.
Right?
And so how do I as a mere
mortal compete with that?
Right?
And, and the reality is the music's good.
It's really good.
It
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: AI can
write music as well as, you know, that
at least approximates as well as John
Williams and Thomas Newman and, you know,
Han Zimmer and these, these great people.
Because, because it learned by mimicking.
Right.
And that's, and that's why, right.
But does that mean John
Williams is out of a job?
Well, he's retired at this point, but
does that mean Han Zimmer's out of a job?
No, I don't think it is.
I still believe that originality,
the human touch, there's just
things that AI can't quite do.
But, when you, when you
dive into costs, right.
To, to bring it back to
this, this element here.
I'm an indie filmmaker.
I want a John Williams level score.
can do that now.
I can do that.
And, and you, you'll hear it and you'll
be like, wow, that's a really good score.
That's awesome.
Right?
That sounds like John Williams, you know?
Cost me $14 to make that, you know.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
Yeah.
My, the follow up, I guess to that
is on the revenue side, right?
It comes down to, yeah, you still have
to have an audience of people willing
to exchange their time and attention
and capital for whatever it is you made.
And if you don't know how to do that, you
know you can be the best ai, generative
ai, create filmmaker on the planet.
I.
If nobody wants what you're
selling, you make $0.
And I think that requires an audience,
and I think it requires that connection,
those relationships of like, oh, it's
the new Chris Nolan film, it's the new
Ryan Coogler films, it's the new Greta
Gerwig film, whatever it is, I'm gonna
go see it because of the relationship
I have with the films that they've
already made in the past that I've loved.
And so that becomes even more important.
As we're leaning into and expanding
our experience with using these tools,
if we ignore the humans that are
ultimately gonna buy the stuff we're
making, then it's not gonna work out.
I.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: It
comes back to the humanity, right?
It comes back to the, the real
connection, the connections
that we, you know, that we, I.
Desire as humans, right?
We want to talk to
people that are like us.
We want to see things that
remind us of ourselves.
We want to, you know, see how that
character gets through this trial.
You're like, oh my gosh,
I've been in this situation.
How did, or I'm in this situation?
How's he gonna get through it?
And, you know, we wanna be
inspired by other people.
We really do.
And I, I truly believe that.
that AI can, you know that AI can
be used as a tool to create films
that accomplish those things, in
the end, they're still all being
done with humans at the at the helm.
Yes.
There are the examples, and there
will be more and more examples of
autonomous agents maybe on a, a
completely autonomous movie studio.
that just says, Hey, we're gonna come
out with a movie every three months and
you know, I, we have, you know, unlimited
budget for, you know, for, for running
these GPUs and all of these, these AI
models and, you know, we're gonna test it.
We're gonna, you know you know,
build, do the same process that you
would do, you know, screen testing,
all those things that you do in the,
in the process of making a movie.
But it's gonna be done at hyper speed.
And we have 10,000 autonomous agents
working together on it at the same time.
And, you
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Hmm.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
just imagine the possibilities
of what will happen.
That what I just said right there is
probably already being done somewhere.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
in the work somewhere.
Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Putting
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: and,
and getting ready to make that happen.
And, and we're gonna like it or we're not
gonna like it and they're gonna adjust.
And, and, and the cool thing about an AI
is it really doesn't have any feelings.
It doesn't care if you don't like it.
It's trying to just get an outcome.
Right.
And it's going to, it's gonna create,
it's gonna create cool content.
Some of it you're gonna be like, wow.
I, I don't want to like this because
I'm against this, but I liked that.
You know, I mean, that's, that's
gonna be the, the transition.
The transition's going to be painful.
I think the biggest pain in all of this
guys is going to be, the transition.
Right?
You skip ahead.
Even just 20 years to now, and I
think we've kind of balanced out and
figured out and gone into this next
kind of age of technology, right?
But the next five to 10
years are gonna be painful.
There's, there's gonna be pain.
You're gonna, if you want to, if
you wanna avoid that pain, learn
the tool, stay ahead, you know,
keep, keep yourself at the top.
But but the reality is
it's gonna be tough.
You gotta, you're gonna have
to work hard to navigate this.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Yeah, well.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Well, I'm encouraged and terrified.
But but you know, it's, as an
independent filmmaker and our
audience would certainly understand
this, there's no, there is no path.
We're, we've always, always
been covering our own paths.
And so, yeah, to look at this and
say, Hey, here's another tool that's
gonna help my, storytelling improve
and help me reach my audience better.
Seems like someone can
embrace and not be afraid of.
It's awesome.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
I'm not, I'm not afraid of it.
I, I really am not.
And that's because I understand it well.
Right?
I, I, I see.
But what I'm afraid for, this
is really what I'm afraid for.
I am afraid for those that haven't.
Taking the time to start really diving in.
That's, those are the people that are
really gonna be like, whoa, what the heck?
That person just zoomed past
me and I'm sitting here.
I haven't even started my engine yet.
know?
And so that, that's, that's the plate,
that the people that are gonna be, you
know, that are literally getting let
off by big tech companies and by other
companies, whatever, it's because the
people that learned AI have figured
out how to replace their team with ai.
Right.
So, so be the one that learns
it, be the one that learns
it, be the one that drives it.
Be the one that, that creates that first,
you know, big time blockbuster with ai.
Or maybe not, maybe not completely
ai, but heavily AI assisted and
the big scenes that were, you know,
maybe were out of your budget now
they're in your budget, right?
I mean, there's, there's really
cool opportunities there if you
just know how to put it together.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah,
I think those filmmakers that are, that
are in my audience, that, that forties
and fifties and sixties we've seen with
every revolution, those that resist
the change and try to fight it are the
ones who get left behind the fastest.
And so that's not the answer.
It's not like, well, I'm just gonna ignore
this and fight it and complain about it.
It's like, that's not gonna help you.
Get ahead or have a sustainable,
resilient career in this industry.
So
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
I think you're right.
I think it does come down to, well,
you know, get on chat GPT and ask
it to teach you how to use it, and
you can do that, and a week later
you're gonna be 90% of the way there.
I think it's not, it's not a huge
first step but if you ignore it or
if you fight it or you resist it, I
think it's gonna be at your detriment.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Amazing.
This has been thoroughly fascinating
and I'm, I'm learning a lot.
I've taken some notes.
And right after this I'm gonna go just
to see how I can implement some of
these tools in, in my current project.
That's awesome.
Thank you.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: look
forward to seeing what you make.
Be sure to share that with obviously, the
audience and, and, and with me, right?
I want to, I wanna see what
you're doing and, you know,
those little experiments matter.
I, I talked to just in closing
here, I talked to another
a, a big YouTuber, right?
Won't, I won't say his name, but
big YouTube, and I said, Hey, I,
I wanna work with you and do some,
you know, AI training and stuff.
And he's like, you know,
I'm really interested in it.
But any like I, I posted a
couple things about it and I lost
like 20,000 followers, right?
I mean, this guy has, you know, 10 million
followers, like big, big time, big time
YouTube guy you know, been in the film
ministry for a long time and really
the, the YouTube film industry, right?
That's, that's really, you
know, where he started, but.
But man, some there, there's some people
that are really against it, right?
And so I, I just think that, I
think that's just shortsighted.
I think you gotta just
say, all right, it's here.
Let's understand it, right?
And then let's make a decision.
Do we want to use it?
Do we not wanna use it?
But it's just another one of, it's
another creative decision that
you're making in your process.
And I don't think it's to be feared.
I think we just all move forward and, and
go, go into this brave new world together.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146: Yeah.
I like it.
That's a good summary.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
I get too.
John, if people want to learn more
about you, learn about your gen
ai PI follow you online, where,
where should we send people?
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145:
You know what?
I'm on every platform,
most of my platforms.
I'm at Cheney Piano.
Instagram, Facebook, X, whatever.
I have a pretty, pretty solid
following and presence on all of those.
Think on LinkedIn, if,
if that's your as well.
Just look me up.
John Cheney and then jen ai pi.org.
Jen with a g Jen i pi i.org
is if you wanna, if you wanna learn
AI and you know, do it, do it with,
with me and, and my, processes.
Then.
Jump on in.
I'd love to, love to chat.
We'd love to help you guys.
But really grateful, really
grateful to be here today.
You know, both Daren and Garrett,
really, really a pleasure to
discuss to discuss film and ai.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146: Awesome.
Awesome.
Thank you so much for coming on,
sharing all your insights with us.
I'm sure we'll get lots of questions.
We may do a round two for this one.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
we'll follow up with you.
Yeah.
For season
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: I'm ready.
garrett-batty_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Year number two, John, you're,
you're consider yourself booked.
jon-cheney_1_06-20-2025_090145: Perfect.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Once we hit the two year anniversary,
one year from now, let's do it.
I'm ready.
daren-smith_1_06-20-2025_090146:
Boom, done.
Thanks, John.
I.
