An AI knockoff of El Empleo went viral, then sent viewers to a $49 monthly course

Cinematographers at Camerimage push back on greybox shoots, where AI adds the lighting after the shoot

At Camerimage, cinematographers say greybox shoots, where actors are filmed on plain sets and AI adds the sets and lighting later, move the look of a film into post. The Bitcoin detail rests on one IndieWire line.

Asked whether he enjoys greybox work, cinematographer Bartosz Nalazek didn't hesitate: "Totally not. It's horrible, I'm brain-dead." For people whose craft is light, the fear at Camerimage this week is that the job shrinks to setting up a blank frame for someone else to finish.

Greybox is the word the festival keeps returning to. Actors are filmed on a plain, neutral set, and AI adds the production design and the lighting afterward. IndieWire reports it was used on Doug Liman's upcoming Bitcoin and is spreading to other projects, and Nalazek says a major TV show he just wrapped shot 40 percent of its scenes that way. Cinematographers describe directors asking for the softest, most generic light on set, not because it looks best but because it leaves the cleanest canvas for changes later.

Nobody in Toruń is pretending the method is useless. It takes weather and locations out of the schedule, and speakers who have worked on these sets point out that the productions still hire hundreds of crew. The festival has drawn its own line, too: Marek Żydowicz, its founder, told The Hollywood Reporter that Camerimage does not accept films generated entirely by AI and favors hybrid films where the live actors decide how far AI may change their images.

Our take: greybox doesn't remove lighting, it moves it to post. Whoever sets the look there owns the image, a seat open to cinematographers and AI creators alike. What nobody at the festival has answered yet is whether the people who light for a living will be the ones sitting in it.

Source: IndieWire, Nov 9, 2026; The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline, Nov 8, 2026. Camerimage runs in Toruń through Nov 14.

Disney names Adobe its AI partner, with private models trained on Disney characters

Adobe will build Firefly Foundry models on Disney characters, environments and styles that only Disney staff can use. No value, term or film title was disclosed, and the parks sketch tool dates from June.

Disney has decided how AI gets near its characters: inside models it owns, and nowhere else. For independent creators that means studio-grade tools behind a locked door, while Disney keeps suing the open tools that trained on its films.

On Monday Disney named Adobe its Official AI Innovation Partner in a multi-year deal. Adobe will build private Firefly Foundry models trained on Disney characters, environments and visual styles, and Reuters reported they will be proprietary to Disney. Neither company disclosed a value, a term or a film title.

The sketch-to-concept-art tool getting the headlines is five months old: Imagineering announced it in June. What is new is the partner title, work with StudioLAB, the Walt Disney Studios innovation hub whose first projects are custom models for post-production and VFX, and projects with the ESPN archive.

Disney's quote came from its head of Corporate Alliances, the team that runs brand partnerships, and Adobe will grow its presence across Disney's media platforms. It reads as much like a sponsorship as a technology choice, though nobody has said which way the money moves.

It also runs the opposite way to Disney's last AI deal. The Sora license pushed characters out to fans until OpenAI shut Sora in March. This one pulls AI inside, where only Disney staff can touch it.

Our take: this is a template for control, not access. Fan work with Disney characters is no safer than it was last week, so build your own visual library and style, because nobody is licensing theirs to you.

Source: Adobe newsroom and Reuters, Nov 9, 2026.

Read the full article: thegenerated.com/stories/disney-adobe-ai-partner-private-models-20261110

Ellison calls AI a creative unlock while Skydance's filing counts it only as savings

Skydance's CEO told investors AI could matter more than CGI for original films. The shareholder letter filed the same day books AI only as cost cuts and merger speed, and he named no tool.

Skydance's chief made the indie AI filmmaker's pitch to Wall Street on Monday, then his company wrote AI down as something else. For makers hoping studios will fund cheaper original bets, the gap between what was said and what was filed is the story.

On Skydance's first earnings call since it bought Warner Bros. Discovery, David Ellison said AI "really has the potential to be the biggest creative unlock in modern history," bigger than the CGI wave of the early 1990s. His example was The Terminator: made for $4 million, and by his estimate "$60 million-$70 million" to shoot shot for shot today. Cheaper tools, he argued, make the risk of original stories "more digestible."

The shareholder letter filed with the SEC the same day is narrower. AI appears three times, all as savings: back-office AI inside an overhead cut of at least $2.2 billion, coding tools inside a $1.4 billion technology cut, and the reason Paramount+ and HBO Max can be folded together in about a year. Ellison said Skydance is developing AI tools but named none, and the AI question was picked in advance and read out before the live Q&A.

His own math needs a footnote as well. The Terminator was budgeted at $4 million but finished at about $6.4 million, and Skydance's two Terminator sequels cost $155 million and $185 million.

Our take: Ellison is right that AI lowers the price of a risky idea, and it matters that he says so out loud. Until a budget line or a named production carries that unlock, read it as a pitch to investors rather than an open door for filmmakers.

Source: Skydance Q3 2026 call transcript and shareholder letter (SEC Form 8-K), Nov 9, 2026.

Read the full article: thegenerated.com/stories/ellison-ai-creative-unlock-skydance-filing-20261110