Today, Lionsgate – the studio behind films such as John Wick And Hunger Games Franchises – announced that it is partnering with Runway to develop a new customized video generation model designed to “help filmmakers, directors and other creative talent elevate their work.”
In a statement on the deal, Lionsgate vice president Michael Burns described it as a way to create “capital-efficient content creation capabilities” for the studio, which sees the technology as a “great tool to expand, enhance and complement our current operations.” Burns also stressed that “several of our filmmakers are already excited about the potential uses in their pre- and post-production processes.”
Cristóbal Valenzuela, co-founder and CEO of Runway, echoed Burns' sentiments about the new model's usefulness as an augmentation tool, saying the company's goal is to provide filmmakers with “new ways to bring their stories to life.”
Concrete details about the deal – such as whether creative teams will be compensated if their projects are used as training material for the model – are currently scarce. But since The Hollywood Reporter As he notes, the prospect of being able to keep production costs low may have been one of the big selling points for Lionsgate, a studio known for working with smaller budgets compared to other entertainment companies.
Those concerns were one reason California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two SAG-AFTRA-backed bills earlier this week that give artists and their estates more control over how and when their digitally created likenesses can be used by studios. And later this month, Newsom may well sign SB 1047, another hotly contested bill that would hold AI developers liable for the “critical harms” caused by their products.
(We reached out to SAG-AFTRA for comment on the Runway-Lionsgate partnership but did not receive a response by the time of publication.)