Ep. 74: How AI Is Making Human Creativity More Valuable

0:00:00Why are guests returning to Fast Hours?

Play from 0:00:01 8:88:88 0:00:01 What's up everybody? Fast Hours Podcast episode 74. Rory Flynn, Drew Brucker. Just us today, man. Feeling a little lonely. It's all right. It's how we got here doing this, doing this just one, two thing. But yeah, it's uh it's been nice having some guests on. We took a break from that for a while, I think mostly because our schedules are just too chaotic to manage someone else's also.

Play from 0:00:27 8:88:88 0:00:27 Now, now it's a now it's a little bit more even, a little more steady. So we're probably gonna have more guests coming on in the future. You've got a lot of good feedback. So everyone who's been giving us feedback on this stuff, guys are crushing it. And like, I think it's good to have We've been, you know, I think I've been liking this. We've been going sort of across the across the landscape. It's not just like one person. It's not just like filmmakers. You know, we have Salma last week is doing something different than Jay Boggs is doing or Tyler.

Play from 0:00:55 8:88:88 0:00:55 And then, you know, he was doing something different than everyone else that we have on. So we're going to try to keep it coming. Try to keep it going. And if you guys have any suggestions. Yeah. talking about that before the show. I think we've got some really good names with, to your point, diverse perspectives because we do have sort of like an angle here, but at the same time, I think when you build around sort of like those parallel adjacent things, it kind of gives you a better scope of how connecting.

Play from 0:01:28 8:88:88 0:01:28 some of these parts are and kind of get you in a more of a creative state in that sense. And it's also just inspiring to hear how other people are using AI that's different from you. mean, sometimes we're so trapped in our own echo chambers of what's happening, you forget and you're just like, shit, like that's cool. Never even thought of that. Yeah, there's, and like what I've been enjoying about the guests is that everyone's doing something different. It's not the same stuff.

Play from 0:01:55 8:88:88 0:01:55 It's like, they're all finding unique ways to use it in their own little places. I feel like there's just a lot of, like I've been taken away a lot too. Like this selfishly, I'm like, oh, know, like Salma's thing last week with the little skin, like the skin skill for Claude, that was like, oh, I can do that for a lot of things. I built a skill this week for Seedance, which is like a, like a camera operator skill to give me more like basically like giving personality and or like more life.

Play from 0:02:26 8:88:88 0:02:26 Cause I like to talk like when I'm prompting Seedance and stuff like that or Kling mostly where it started. I like to talk about the camera. Like it's a part of the scene, like where it's a, you know, it's got like stakes in the, you know, like in the generation where it's like, you know, it's racing to catch up. It's like struggling to, you know, get around the corner, like talking about the camera, like it's another character. So I built a skill around it it just like took the prompts to the next level where I'm like, this is sick.

Play from 0:02:53 8:88:88 0:02:53 Yeah. So there's like little things like the taking away and I hope everyone's getting that. And the other thing is here, look, I'm doing this early. If you got suggestions for people that you want to see on the show, pop them, pop them down there, pop them down. right down below in the breadbasket. know, if you want to see some people come on here, you want you're interested. Yeah. Please, let us know. think you are also saying you might do a post on this.

Play from 0:03:18 8:88:88 0:03:18 We've got our own short list of people that have at least verbally committed to being on. We're locking in some dates. But we also want to get some suggestions from you guys. Is there anybody that you follow closely or are inspired by or uh have learned a lot from? or just admire in general, this would be a great time to drop that name below.

Play from 0:03:44 8:88:88 0:03:44 We're going to be doing some outreach there. Hell yeah. Have you guys been having the smoke from the forest fire in Canada? Did it reach you guys or no? Is that just us? There's like uh massive forest fire going on in Canada. So like whatever the jet stream is doing, I think it's in, is it in Calgary or something like that, maybe? There's a big one, but like we had cyberpunk post-apocalyptic.

0:03:45Why does summer trigger nostalgia?

Play from 0:04:16 8:88:88 0:04:16 New York this week where it's like all the smoke is just hovering. It's like traveling in the jet stream and it's like making the making the light look orange, like coming through all the smoke is blocking out the sun. So it's you know, it smells like a forest fire in New York. It's like really, really, you know, it's like triggers something in your in your brain like danger, you know, weird like caveman brain. It's like, oh, I'm feeling right here.

Play from 0:04:43 8:88:88 0:04:43 It's smoky, weird. It's just been, dude, this has been a very weird summer so far. don't remember a summer here where there is like a pop-up chance of rain or pop-up rain literally every day. I mean, this is insane. I was just looking at the weather again today. Next seven, eight days in a row, like rain. It's like, what is going on?

Play from 0:05:09 8:88:88 0:05:09 I've never seen this much rain in the summer. Here's a dad question for you. This is a banter for your wife, by the way. Like having, does having kids now in the summer make you more nostalgic for summers? Like when you were a kid? Great question. don't know. I don't think so yet, but I do think it will be.

Play from 0:05:36 8:88:88 0:05:36 What I mean by that is I feel like they're still too young to really appreciate, like, summer, out. Their schedule is so, like, we're going to school. They go to the same school in the summer. So they're not really separating in their mind. mean, we do kind of the same stuff outside of just the pool being ready. You know what I mean? So I would say not yet. But I would say when they have summer off from school, and there's a legitimate break, probably I could see that.

Play from 0:06:08 8:88:88 0:06:08 It's just been like, I don't know, I've been getting more, I've been feeling it more where I'm like, all right, then we know we're going to the beach. But like, I'm not doing things that I'm used to doing at the beach. I'm not going there to like, you know, go to the beach bars and like go out to dinner. It's like we're going and we're like looking for sand crabs, or like, you know, going in our backyard in Brooklyn and we're like like you're getting more of those like childhood. You're reliving childhood memories.

Play from 0:06:34 8:88:88 0:06:34 Yeah, yeah. you know, entertain [name] the other day for like, two hours with a bucket and a hose, you know, like, it's like, don't need a lot. It's just, it's fun, you know, going out to get ice cream at night kind of stuff like that. It's like, you know, I want to watch the Sandlot now. It's epic. And what else do we watch? We watch something else where I'm like, I just get too excited about them seeing it it's probably too early, you know?

Play from 0:07:04 8:88:88 0:07:04 But we've done a bunch of like, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Honey, Shrunk Ourselves, we've done the Both of Those, we've done Jingle All the Way, we've done Kindergarten Cop, we've done... Kindergarten Cop, Gray One. reliving, because I'm like, hell yeah, this gives me a reason to rewatch this. Yeah, because it made me download. For anyone who's a nerd about this stuff, I downloaded this app on my iPhone.

Play from 0:07:31 8:88:88 0:07:31 I think it's called Rarevision. uh Yeah, and it records like a 90s VHS camera. And it's beyond just the overlay of the recording style. It muffles the sound a little bit. It has the weird, is it a, yes, rare. You get that one in there. Maybe I'll pull it up real quick. Let me see if I can find it on here.

Play from 0:07:59 8:88:88 0:07:59 Yeah, Rarevision VHS. Is this in? your point. It puts things in like this camcorder 90s aesthetic. It is super dope. I used it a couple of times after you mentioned it then I kind of forgot about it. But yeah, it's cool. It's cool. it's this one, if anyone who's looking for a Rarevision VHS retro cam. But I did a little research on the guy who started it, and he's like obsessed with like recreating it.

Play from 0:08:29 8:88:88 0:08:29 So he went far into the sound and everything like that. But I find myself recording on it more often now, because it also feels like a different... It feels like a different... way to create like I feel like when you do stuff in iPhone and vertical and like you know like what you're trying to create it's going to be fast it's not going to be like people's attention spans don't like last that long but now that I'm creating like these three four minute long videos where you got like the dad commentary like what are you doing over there you know like kind of stuff and uh and then like I'm playing it back for [name] and she's like loves it it's like family movie time you know it's like this is again there's like a lot of I don't know it's like triggering something in me though have you tried like the Snapchat filter thing with her yet?

Play from 0:09:15 8:88:88 0:09:15 That's fun too. That's like, like they have all those little different faces and stuff. We did a bunch of those videos, like where they turned us into aliens and then it changes our voices, you know, and then we record it and listen it back. They love that stuff. They love. that changes, that voice changes and it's hilarious. you know, super high, super low. Just hearing her like, hey, what's up man?

Play from 0:09:40 8:88:88 0:09:40 yeah, yeah, we had like a toy. don't know if we still got it. It was like that too. You could change the pitch. Yeah, tick tock tick tock sold me on that one. Thanks. Thanks, guys. You know, classic spontaneous buy that now I love probably more than her. It's uh you're hitting your stride now. There's like gonna be so many more of these like fun things. And I think to your point, like reliving things from like that second, you know, that second part of your life, you know, it's like you're going through all those kid moments again, but in a different time, you know.

Play from 0:10:16 8:88:88 0:10:16 water balloons. I want super soakers. You know, like all the all the fun stuff from being a kid. what else is great is having kid food again, like goldfish around the house, things like that. Yeah, like things I just never buy for myself. And it's like, all right, I got goldfish. got, you know, ice pops, things you never have. And you're like, all right, there's some benefits. There's some benefits to the to this age.

Play from 0:10:44 8:88:88 0:10:44 It is fun. Segwaying probably into AI stuff. We've been told we should do more banter. Yeah, you know. Here we go. ah No, but I think there were like a few things that you know, I think immediately caught my eye this week that we could sort of jump into one being Netflix. um Maybe it's a bigger conversation outside of just Netflix in terms of AI, but I'd like Netflix.

0:10:49How is Netflix using generative AI?

Play from 0:11:13 8:88:88 0:11:13 I don't know. They're in an interesting spot in general right now. um And I say that because like you're starting to see more bigger events come into Netflix and then some people, you know, I guess still don't have Netflix or don't want to have Netflix. And I don't know. think I have no idea what's going on internally with Netflix in terms of like their line items and their, you know, their budget, their expenses like. But this kind of caught my eye.

Play from 0:11:41 8:88:88 0:11:41 I related. I'm sure some people saw this, but. They basically came out and said that roughly 300 programs across Netflix library have used Gen.ai across their production process this year. So, you know, first reaction to that, if you're a doomer, an AI doomer is like, oh my God, I'm not watching AI shit. We're not talking about full end-to-end AI work here. We're talking about AI being integrated into the production process, which feels like a no-brainer now.

Play from 0:12:10 8:88:88 0:12:10 You're starting to get like these other names like George Lucas came out and said something recently about this. He's like, yeah, like this is inevitable. We need to be adapting. This is what change does. Change happens. We have to adapt to it, right? But basically they just said, hey, look like we we increasingly leveraging these tools to deliver higher quality output for more quick or more quickly at a lower cost than traditional methods.

Play from 0:12:35 8:88:88 0:12:35 Right in some cases again, this is another key line in some cases productions would have had to leave out key shots and sequences in absence of gen AI technology. That's what we're talking about, right? Like. So much doom and gloom of I hate AI. Or I want to use AI for everything when in reality we're talking about all these like middle layers where it's a dual process.

Play from 0:13:04 8:88:88 0:13:04 This is a tool. Right? This is there are plenty of use cases that are low risk that don't affect you. So this is these are kind of the situations that I think like I love to hear validated from things that we've all kind of like all of us that have been in this space for a while, just been kind of insane, you know, which is just like, hey, look like you would have had to leave out shots in sequences without this.

Play from 0:13:32 8:88:88 0:13:32 Now it's possible. Right. Same with photography side. Maybe you wanted additional camera angles for a photo shoot and you just didn't shoot them. Or you wanted to make one variable change or a few variable change after the fact. You're gonna fly that person back out or get all the logistics together to go redo those things? I don't think you have to, right? So it's like these smart decisions. So I thought that was interesting.

Play from 0:13:58 8:88:88 0:13:58 Yeah, there was an interesting, you know, this is a sidebar, but we'll come back to the Netflix shortly. I'm talking to a client of mine who did a celebrity spot, right? Like they did a 30 second commercial with a celebrity endorser and something happened in the product development process that they got a sort of like legal notice on maybe something, you know, a patent or whatever the hell they had.

Play from 0:14:26 8:88:88 0:14:26 might have not been, you know, it getting challenged. So like whatever they just shot with the the celebrity, couldn't they couldn't use because the product was getting challenged in some way, shape or form. Sorry for being very vague, everyone. have to be I have to keep, you know, names and things under under wraps here. But regardless, they used the combo hybrid of, you know, AI and 3D and VFX to recomposite that, you know, the correct product that they could use back in because they could not afford to go and get the celebrity again, reshoot it, pay for everything, insurance, all the other things that go on.

Play from 0:15:00 8:88:88 0:15:00 So in a world of non-AI, that would have been a massively expensive hit for them. Something they probably just wouldn't have produced. It would have been out there. And they would have wasted time, just spent money and got nothing. So there's certain things. But going back to the Netflix stuff, you read this headline, right? This is classic RageBait, right? Like roughly 300. programs across Netflix's library have used generative AI across their production process.

Play from 0:15:29 8:88:88 0:15:29 So it's not 300 fully made AI pictures, right? That could be a little bit a, you know, that could be a little bit rage baity there. Because Netflix has, have you ever seen Netflix's GitHub? They have like a, they have open source tools that they've released, you know, which I think is kind of cool that they've done that. um Here, I'll share their. I'll share their repo real quick if anyone's interested because they do some, they're doing some, uh, here, let me share this real quick.

Play from 0:16:01 8:88:88 0:16:01 Screen. Well, listen this Roy. So they said Netflix told shareholders that usage expands across every level of programs production process from its concept and previs to post production and release. Because it's all useful. mean, like, you can use it, and you can be more, you can be creative with it, you can be fast with it, you don't have to be like, this is just gonna cut time and cut expenses, right? Like, there's more than that.

Play from 0:16:28 8:88:88 0:16:28 There's... highly complex scenes that included enhanced crowd sizes, battle sequences. It's VFX. I think that's what lot of the main, you know, like Peter Jackson, like you said, he also was just like, this feels like VFX to me. when it, know, CGI and VFX, when it came on, like this is what, like we're just going to move in that direction. But uh there's, you know, like one of their tools, what is this? Void is a video and object interaction or deletion, right?

Play from 0:16:58 8:88:88 0:16:58 So it's like, basically it's a VFX tool where you can isolate something and either remove it or... change something with it. Right? It's not like if anyone's seen what a post-production on anything looks like, you know, there's a lot of doctoring that goes on behind the scenes of this stuff. And there's a lot of editing that goes on, a lot of VFX, CGI. It's not just, you know, I type in, want this scene, enter, and then there you go.

Play from 0:17:25 8:88:88 0:17:25 There's your raw output. And that's what we're going to show you, everyone. Here's your slop. I would venture to assume everyone has watched a Netflix show this year, and they've probably seen a portion of where AI was used and had no idea. So, like, that's... so that's the point. Like if you don't see it, Rory, do you care? No, I don't care at all. And which is which is also like one of those things that is a good reminder on.

Play from 0:17:52 8:88:88 0:17:52 You know AI imagery. Photorealism is different than any other style, right? mean, just like you're probably not gonna notice it with illustrations. I mean, you would have to be looking for it to see those things most of the time. Whereas like photorealism feels like maybe the tightest of that, right?

Play from 0:18:17 8:88:88 0:18:17 Because you're really trying to force real. You're trying to convince real. And real is what we live in. This is like everyday world. So that's all we see most of the time unless we're looking at different styles on purpose. And, you know, when you lean into sort of like these other styles or the imperfect or something like that, it's just like you don't even notice. Yeah, yeah, that's it's very like to me again, that this is this is like a if this is Netflix is PR team, like this is great.

Play from 0:18:50 8:88:88 0:18:50 Great move. You know, just like let's let's rile everyone up while also saying, you know, we're using it, but not really generating full films, but just using it, but also get everyone. You know what I mean? Yeah. why, right? So to your point on timing, let me read these last two paragraphs. So the disclosure came as Netflix's second quarter revenue hit 12.5 bill up 13 % year over year with a net income of 3.4 billion.

Play from 0:19:18 8:88:88 0:19:18 On average, blah, blah, the streaming giant has been vocal about adopting AI for various sectors of its business, including helping users find new titles. So again, nothing that you're going to see. fueling its advertising business and building an AI animation studio. Netflix in March also acquired that Ben Affleck's company, InterPositive, which said it would help provide filmmakers with AI tools to use throughout film and TV production.

Play from 0:19:44 8:88:88 0:19:44 ah let's see if there's anything else in here worth mentioning. believe it takes great artists to make great to make something great. And AI is not changing that. There you go. There's your standard company line. um Movies being made by people who make movies. AI provided them with better tools. mean, you know, almost two years late on that comment, but like, you know, that's the general idea.

Play from 0:20:10 8:88:88 0:20:10 I'm sure everyone is tired of this argument at Nausium, but I kind of like the play. Like someone needs to be, and Netflix has done this, right? Netflix has sort of been like, we're just going to do what we want to do. And like, if it's wrong, like people probably won't, won't remember, right? Like there's been a lot of Netflix stuff over there. They've been, they've been definitely on the bleeding edge of like, we don't care.

Play from 0:20:37 8:88:88 0:20:37 We just do what we want to do. And, uh, you know, you guys will either, yeah, like the, the roasts and stuff that they've put up and like, universe where Blockbuster never got faded and Netflix just went into the darkness? We just had another nostalgic moment for me there with that mention. was just, their road ended at the mail-in little CD disks.

0:20:39Could Blockbuster have become Netflix?

Play from 0:21:02 8:88:88 0:21:02 I still don't know how that worked. Like, I still don't understand how that worked, like how we actually did that. gone so far. is there like, is there another universe out there where Blockbuster has just been the one that basically pulled off what Netflix did? And, man, imagine if it was, we would be we would still love that that brand would be one of the best brands in America. It would have been around so long, and it would have been around for so such a crucial period of time for its demographic, like we all grew up with that.

Play from 0:21:34 8:88:88 0:21:34 And Not only did we grew up that like our parents were the ones that would take us to the video stores and stuff too, right? Like that was a dual generation brand that if that were if they were Netflix now, Blockbuster would be one of the best American brands. I think like top. Top five. Yeah, and it probably has an effect on a lot of things, right? Like how many times you go into Blockbuster and just like, you know, book cover searching, right?

Play from 0:22:05 8:88:88 0:22:05 Like what catches my eye? Like when I'm not looking at a new release and you just someone's gonna catch your eye. And it was always the... Yeah. are they going to have that in or is it rented out? And when is the next when is the next one coming back? When is supposed to be back? And. having the movie sized treats, like the big sized, like, you know, you never like parents never let me buy him. But I was always like, I want that. oh And they used to do like video game tournaments at my blockbuster too.

Play from 0:22:34 8:88:88 0:22:34 I played in a Donkey Kong tournament. I got third out of like, I don't know how many people, but it was like a big deal. It was a big deal. It was like eight years old. I was amazing at that game. And I have memories playing that game in a blockbuster in a tournament. I was just like, yo, this is crazy. what's turned into me watching Netflix trailers for like a night, like I feel like I have a Netflix like trailer night when I don't know what to watch.

Play from 0:23:00 8:88:88 0:23:00 I'll just watch trailers for 30 minutes and then I can watch anything but any of them, but you're like, OK, I wasn't going to watch that movie, but that trailer like take the box for me, you know. that was like, that's like my trip to Blockbuster where it was like, I don't know what I want, but I'm going to get something. Yeah. I'm just going to walk through the aisles and then like see if something catches my catches my eyes. Something I haven't seen before, whatever. But Blockbuster was a Blockbuster was a hell of a does anyone have like speaking of Brandy's, anyone have a bad memory of Blockbuster?

Play from 0:23:30 8:88:88 0:23:30 not not not single memory, but does anyone not feel good about Blockbuster in the past? Blockbusters was worst thing ever. yeah. I mean, I feel like if you did, it was because you just never returned the movie. You know? Yes, and rewind, please rewind. Be kind, whatever that would be kind, please rewind. If anyone doesn't remember that. Yeah, I never used one.

Play from 0:23:55 8:88:88 0:23:55 But now I remember them. There's a- a time to be alive. What an evolution of where we've come from. Just let me, before we move on from this, let me just share if anyone's interested and they want to check this out. Here's the, if you just search on GitHub, Netflix, you'll come up with, know, Void is one of their models. You can download it.

0:24:04What AI tools has Netflix open-sourced?

Play from 0:24:21 8:88:88 0:24:21 Netflix is their repo page. though? Like what do they have on here? So they have a few things. They have, let's see, well, let's go back to Void for a second. It should say in the, let's see, models. Where is the quick description? Leroy Sun, dental pricing. Where is it? Where it just says what it does in plain English.

Play from 0:24:50 8:88:88 0:24:50 These are the input formats. Let's try Void and the Hills models now. Where's the read me? Void removes objects from videos along with all interactions that they induce in the scene. if you have like, you know, a soccer ball and it's like, you know, getting kicked by a bunch of people, but also that means that it's, you know, the lighting is catching it. It has, you know, it's, hitting the grass and making indentations, things like that.

Play from 0:25:19 8:88:88 0:25:19 It's going to work through all of that and remove it. So not just secondary effects like shadows and reflections, but physical interactions like objects falling, right? So built on top. Let's see if we have a, let's see if this is a little demo that they have here. Void. Yeah. So that's interesting. If you remove the ball and the people. huh. So this is, know, this is the stuff that you're not, are you upset that people are using this?

Play from 0:25:46 8:88:88 0:25:46 I mean, VFX artists, if they have, I'm guessing. If they have access to this and it works and it's not a pain in the ass, if it's 95 % of what they can do, I'm sure they're happy to use it. If it takes that much, if it's that simple as it's laid out here. But they do have a couple of products. I haven't actually gone through every single one, but they have, let's see, Client Metrics Library.

Play from 0:26:13 8:88:88 0:26:13 to roast myself here. GitHub is still confusing to me in many ways. alright. I mean it's probably 90 % Claude and you know, GPT now, just like pumping things in here. just like all the different like I don't understand all the different sort of like structural categories. The UI is confusing to me. I mean, I don't know. I think I've yeah, I've like created some stuff, but Claude Claude helped me so he was was nice about that.

Play from 0:26:44 8:88:88 0:26:44 I don't know what I'm doing here. You know, that's the like, I didn't even know what a GitHub repo was two years ago. What is GitHub? Why is it important? All right. Sorry, everyone. it was just like, unless you're like one of those, like, you know, unless you were like one of those people that were doing code, I mean, you had no real reason to be on there. I mean, it's just like one of those things I knew about, but it was like, I would never spend a day trying to.

Play from 0:27:13 8:88:88 0:27:13 But now it's like my source of truth, right? Like now it's like we're some of my backup for, there's about everything outside of the local files and other backups I have. It's like, I treat that thing like it's gold because it is. It's like my whole, my whole life is sort of like invested and tied into it. So I think a lot of people probably have like a every bit of context that you've provided?

Play from 0:27:39 8:88:88 0:27:39 I don't know. This is an interesting one because I was talking to, uh, talking to some of other day that was like, I was trying to edit like my code from 15 years ago. And like it was having like Claude was having a really hard time with it because it's just like, it's almost like so foreign older, you know, whatever you were writing in the past for whatever medium you were writing that it wasn't like recognize it. It built it from scratch faster and easier than like editing the old code, which I'm like, huh, interesting.

Play from 0:28:07 8:88:88 0:28:07 But yeah, they're, you know, I'd be the one thing I did like when I started Claude, like Claude Code was I just fresh accounted it. So it was just like, I'm just going to start this with nothing here. Like I want to, I don't want to have all the previous context of what I used. Um, you know, in there, not just Claude Code, but Claude in general, cause I, I had migrated to GPT for a long time. thing actually.

Play from 0:28:32 8:88:88 0:28:32 Like I ended up like doing the whole data migration download and then just never did anything with it. um Cause I was kind of thinking the same thing as you. I like, maybe that's a good thing to start fresh in that sense. um Let's talk about Suno for a second. So did you see this? There was. I scanned it. There was, okay, so for anybody that's not familiar, I'll read this, give you the Cliff Notes here.

0:28:36What did the Suno breach reveal?

Play from 0:29:02 8:88:88 0:29:02 So a hacker breached Suno and they basically released the source code that showed how their training set was made. So they did a whole breakdown of 113,000 hours. of YouTube music, 62,000 hours of Pond5, 12,000 hours of Deezer, plus Genius Lyrics and a plan to download roughly 1 million hours of podcasts.

Play from 0:29:34 8:88:88 0:29:34 The same intrusion reached customer emails, phone numbers, and Stripe payment data for what the hacker says is hundreds of thousands of users. Suno dates the incident to November, calls it limited, and says individual notifications were not warranted. Nothing to see here. not to have been informed by the breach. Yeesh. to see here. Just your personal data has been leaked.

Play from 0:30:00 8:88:88 0:30:00 So I guess my personal data has been leaked. It's interesting because I think music is a lot more, from a generative AI standpoint, because it's so math focused. A lot of it is math and lot of it is, should, you know, yeah. Yeah, it's like, know, like, producers can do all this stuff. Everything is sort of...

Play from 0:30:27 8:88:88 0:30:27 I'm not saying everyone I'm not saying it like they just do this stuff. It's like you can there is a rhythm or repetition a math to it where it's not like, you know, let me dream this thing up and then I have to connect a million dots. There's you know, you could code like that platform. I don't know if it was a hell it's called the vibe coding platform for music. God sent you remember I remember I sent you those videos. There was this girl on TikTok.

Play from 0:30:54 8:88:88 0:30:54 I can't remember. I've never been like super into the music thing. I mean, it is kind of fun. I could see it, but like, ah I don't know, man. Call me, call me old. This is where I'm like, I feel like music is one of those things ah where when it comes to the music itself, I would not, would rather not have AI involved. uh this one's called, it's called, I just remember it's called Strudel. It's like a, hold on.

Play from 0:31:20 8:88:88 0:31:20 It's like a vibe coding platform for music where you're like, you're actually like writing the music, but you're writing it in code. So like you can write the beats and the repetitions and like everything. It's super cool. Here, I'll still share this real quick. I found it, found it. But everyone who's, know, if anyone wants to like really nerd out on this stuff, it's like, You can see people, they're like writing the code and it's like writing the waveforms and the music and you can add filters and you can, you know, change the notes and the harmonies and the melodies and stuff like that.

Play from 0:31:53 8:88:88 0:31:53 But there's this one, there's this one girl, I think her name was like Switch Angel or something like that, who I first saw doing it live and like building music while like typing, you know, with this code and stuff. It was sick. And then I found out that she spoke at Config and I didn't get this and I didn't know she was there. It was like, it was like, You can have a giant nerd come up to you and ask a bunch of questions about this thing, because I thought that was just so cool to see how they create music like this.

Play from 0:32:18 8:88:88 0:32:18 And everything is just like, you know, let me just do this. No way. I don't like this. you your take on music and AI? Um, I kind of love what I get to do with it, you know, like I don't like, there's so much like weird like stuff around music licensing and like being able to use it and like, know, stuff gets taken down and you get notices and I'm like, I just want to create what I want to create. And like, it doesn't have to be this epic production.

0:32:21Should AI be used to make music?

Play from 0:32:46 8:88:88 0:32:46 Like I just need background music for my, you know, stupid AI video that I'm putting up on social media. Like I love, I love going there and creating it. I like enjoy it. Um, but like I like that use case. I like certain use cases, but I don't like it from the standpoint of, oh, I'm going to be a producer and I'm heavily using AI for any of the sound effects.

Play from 0:33:12 8:88:88 0:33:12 To me, I'm so baked in and old school with just like, I love the real instruments. Give me the real instruments, the craft. of that and also just the the imagination and creativity that that is injected because of that, you know, it brings me back to that sort of like 90s era of hip hop and you know, uh Mobb Deep and Havoc making the beats like just doing crazy stuff to ultimately come up with this sound that is unique in its own way and is legendary and it's this like aggregation of you know, these different sources coupled with his creativity, coupled with like experimentation and just, it's so, ah it's so lovely, you know?

Play from 0:34:05 8:88:88 0:34:05 And I just feel like music is just uh one of those weirder circumstances for me. Like I think like that use case you brought up is a really good one. Also like sound effects, like there are some things where I'm like, yeah, no, like that totally makes sense, you know? But. I could push back on this a little bit, Like, do I want to hear the next Rolling Stones be fully AI?

Play from 0:34:30 8:88:88 0:34:30 No. I like how people use it. I think of it more so like electronic music and or like the origins of hip hop. No one would come up with that sound unless they used some of the old production tools. I was like, I found a drum machine. And then basically we only had that so we were limited and constricted by that and that's how we made like these repetitive you know drum tracks that ended up being like the origins of hip hop right so like i feel like this can be used in a similar way where it's like maybe i'm just like you know Like I just like bang two things together, make a weird song.

Play from 0:35:06 8:88:88 0:35:06 And it's like, all right, let me go chop that up and put it in a, you know, put it in a song. I feel like it's going to get to that version of like Jarvis. I, we gotta clip what you just did there. We gotta find a way to use that. You know what that reminds me of, Rory? That reminds me of those people that get hired for movies that just do like the sounds and they're like in a room and they have all these random items and they're doing the crazy shit. What are those people called? We gotta, we gotta find, are they, are they sound engineers?

Play from 0:35:35 8:88:88 0:35:35 I mean, we've got to, maybe that's who we call out for. for getting some subscriptions to this podcast this week. We gotta focus on those people. Chris, if you're in the comments, you got to tell us what those people are called. Cause Chris, feel like Chris knows the answer to that one. But, no, but that's what I'm saying. Like if I, if I was to take like things now and like, I, like I, I envision sort of like the production process being like talking to like Jarvis from iron man at some point being like, let me create this little like sound here.

Play from 0:36:07 8:88:88 0:36:07 The like, he's doing something like that and be like, all right, loop that this way. Let's add in like, you know, a four on the floor. Let's throw, you know, uh a filter on this. Let's add like, you know, the notes G, C, A, B, whatever it might be. You know, loop that. Foley artist. That's what it's called. everyday sounds for film using physical objects such as footsteps, clothing movement, punches, doors, gravel, or breaking bones.

Play from 0:36:36 8:88:88 0:36:36 Like the guys, know, like horse, it's like, you know, horse, horse stepping with like hollowed out coconuts. It's it's good. But see, that's like, like that. I like when people take stuff that's not supposed to be used in this way and then make, know, like the drum machine probably wasn't made for that, but they did something with it. Like how, you know, we do a lot of things that we have these tools weren't made for.

Play from 0:37:04 8:88:88 0:37:04 But that's how you get the good stuff out of it. That's how I see it as art. Again, sidebar, fun dad comment here. I saw the perfect... This would make it on Reddit, like LinkedIn cringe if I posted this. But my daughter was playing with... We were playing with paint outside, so she was doing... She has these little paint markers and a big canvas of paper, like big book.

Play from 0:37:33 8:88:88 0:37:33 It's canvas size. we do around here, Rory. Yeah. figures out on the markers, if she holds them down, it's going to bleed a lot of paint. And then like I saw it cause it was hanging off the edge and it dripped and it created like this, like the dripping effect. I just like saw it take hold in her brain. And then she was like, hold on, let me push this down again on the middle of the paper. Then when we take the other one and put it on top to like blend the colors. And then she took like one of her wipes and started like, and I'm like, all right, see like this, I like this, like this is yeah, yeah, yeah.

Play from 0:38:07 8:88:88 0:38:07 what happens if I do this? What happens if I do this? Let me push it a little bit further. Like that's how I feel like my brain worked with the AI tools. It's like, what if we did it like this or how we mashed these two things together? So there's a lesson in that somewhere. Reddit, LinkedIn, cringe. That would be a top post right there. If I put up the picture. Yes. Just like do that kind of stuff. That's that is a cool thing about parenthood.

Play from 0:38:32 8:88:88 0:38:32 That is really cool. I love those moments. um Also, I think like before we move on, I'm curious. Let us know like what do you think about the music? Space coupled with AI, what what do you? What are the best use cases that you guys have seen for it or what are the things that maybe you are using for it? I'm curious there because we really haven't talked a lot about audio on here or music rather, but I think it's an interesting point nonetheless.

Play from 0:39:01 8:88:88 0:39:01 I'm not even sure. I haven't been keeping up with that specifically to know how that's. I feel like I haven't heard much from Suno and Udio, like those early ones lately about new. advancements or features. Have you? mean, maybe it's just my feed, but think Udio got acquired either by like Warner Music Group or something but Suno... Suno... involved with Udio?

Play from 0:39:27 8:88:88 0:39:27 I it's either that or soon. I know Timbaland is on the Suno sort of like, I don't know if he's a paid spokesman or but I know he uses it, it's probably one of the tools I use most without talking about it. I think the people that love music and just like want to create stuff and make their own music, I think there's a lot of people probably doing it.

Play from 0:39:53 8:88:88 0:39:53 I've seen it, some of the things I've seen that are really funny, like in the performance marketing space. You know, people are making like these custom songs for their ads, but they make them like ridiculous and funny because it's like a hook, you know? So it's like it's a way to sort of like inject some clit and then the video is showing you before one of the podcasts. They made this dumb song. It's called Comment of the Week. Yeah. I mean, they crush like I would say that there's like a lot of uses.

Play from 0:40:19 8:88:88 0:40:19 The performance marketing one has been really funny. Like I've seen people tell like stories through like ads with the song. And it's like a very, very creative way to use it and to play with it. I just don't think it gets talked about that much. think there's like a very unique sort of angle to it and it can be used. There was one viral video. I don't know if you saw it while back. It was like a guy made an emo song with all of his like pregnant wife's texts, you know?

Play from 0:40:46 8:88:88 0:40:46 So was like this whole emo song. It's like, I'm so hungry! Getting into like, but... Yeah, there was, I've done that. I've done a lot of stuff for my family and my friends, like just making like dumb songs about them and things like that, or like editing videos with songs about them. I think it's great. Like think it doesn't have to be serious. You don't have to be the next Mozart on there.

Play from 0:41:13 8:88:88 0:41:13 Yeah. I'm more so concerned about the serious nature of it. Like what are those best use cases? And I think we talked about a couple of them, but it's like I wouldn't want to hear AI music on a radio or I wouldn't be listening to probably I don't know. I may be in the minority here, but I wouldn't be finding myself listening to a playlist of AI generated songs knowing they were AI generated.

Play from 0:41:42 8:88:88 0:41:42 If I stumble into something and it's nice, it's like, okay. So it's almost like maybe if I don't know it going in, it's maybe that disclosure bias. I brought that up in a previous whole thing with a post and whatnot. But it's like that idea of if you know something is AI, you view it differently, know, versus experiencing it and then backing into it and right, either figuring it out or you have no idea. It's just an entirely different experience.

Play from 0:42:08 8:88:88 0:42:08 I think there was a story a couple months ago, it could be totally off on this, there was like this, maybe it was in Asia, I'm gonna have look this one up, that there was like this band that got really popular and like it was AI and they had like a ton of streams on Spotify. So like when it came time for them to go on tour, they just hired a band to play covers of the songs.

Play from 0:42:33 8:88:88 0:42:33 They like filled in the band, it's like the opposite way. You know, like they they filled the band because the songs were so popular. Like that one. Remember that one being interesting because it was like, people can like it. But the the other one I've I've always appreciated for the content value is like when they make, you know, still like a Kanye West song with like a 19, 19, like 50s blues singer like, you know, kind of thing.

Play from 0:43:01 8:88:88 0:43:01 And they are 50, the 50 cent one that went wild a couple of months ago. Like that to me. I find it interesting as like an angle because I think it's cool if you really like the music and you want to hear it from a different perspective. um know, there's. Music's also hot button for people like mute people will like come for your throat, you know, music might be worse than music, might be worse than art in that sense.

0:43:31Breaking down Runway's lamp film—hy does it work?

Play from 0:43:31 8:88:88 0:43:31 Yeah, I think so. I anyway, let's uh let's let's switch it up. Let's go to I want to talk about. Actually, can you can you pull it up in the that runway video? um I think this would be something good because the reason I'm having you bring it up is because when you break it up, you're doing things right with the audio where the listeners can hear it. And I don't think I figured that out here yet.

Play from 0:43:58 8:88:88 0:43:58 So um pull that up because. There's this video in case you guys have not seen this that Runway posted within the last week since we were on here. And it's probably, I don't want to go hyperbole here, but I think it might be one of if not the best AI videos I've seen, me personally, this is just my opinion, because of the concept itself.

Play from 0:44:31 8:88:88 0:44:31 the way in my opinion way IMO. way in my opinion. way in my opinion. And it feels like something that would actually live in the real world. Like this feels, it feels that way. Also, the story itself has this emotional tie-in that they absolutely nail that I don't think any other video that I've seen that's tried to do it has really gotten there all the way. This one gets there all let's put it on.

Play from 0:44:58 8:88:88 0:44:58 I actually have to stop sharing real quick and share again because I have to make sure the audio is clicked on. Alright, we're good. Let's get this one... Audio on. See what you guys think of this.

Play from 0:45:28 8:88:88 0:45:28 this is for like a. think it's the wrong one. This is not their... Good podcasting, everyone. Wrong video. I'm going to I'll cut it. Hold on one second. Let me let me send you the let me send you the right link here. OK, all right.

Play from 0:47:45 8:88:88 0:47:45 I gotta know who did that. I gotta know who did that. It's so good. So I just wanna say a couple things. I love that one, it's this inanimate object. And then immediately you get life from it. It's limping around, right? It's obviously got this like broken, scarred, chipped leg and...

Play from 0:48:14 8:88:88 0:48:14 I actually have this lamp. I can't show it on here because I'm using my camera. It's literally right there. um It looks just like it. Yeah. So it's limping around. It's limping around, right? You get these clues of, you know, just giving it life. No one wants it, right? Sort of like this this lost and found. It reminds me of that movie that the the toaster.

Play from 0:48:41 8:88:88 0:48:41 Remember the toaster? um The Brave Little Toaster. that movie wrecked me as a child. That movie destroyed me. um God. God, that just that really messed me up. ah That's right up there with like seeing Bambi as like a five year old and then Air Bud when he throws the ball. And just don't even, don't even get me started on Homeward Bound.

Play from 0:49:07 8:88:88 0:49:07 hill. I can't, if you don't cry at some of that stuff, you don't have a soul. my God. So this is the limp. It's the kid tugging the mom's shirt asking for something. All these like relatable moments. you know, brings it home. Memories are being made. There's the highs of the memories. There's the lows of the memories. You know, and then you get to this pivotal moment where there's the downfall. You know, the lamp falls, breaks, and there's this real, you know, everybody's sad.

Play from 0:49:35 8:88:88 0:49:35 There's this realization where it's like this might be over, right? It's just going to be a sad, sad thing. And then you get the the thing at the end with the second life. And I don't know, it's just for the length of that video, everything was very intentional. uh There was nothing about it that even going in, knowing it was AI, that felt obviously AI, right? Like it was just very well curated and done and props.

Play from 0:50:06 8:88:88 0:50:06 I don't know who to say props to, but I just think that. That is really good and I saved it and I almost never watched it. And I don't know, just hit play and I was like pleasantly surprised. here's the one thing I'm hoping. I'm really hoping that that was written by a human and not by AI. Because you can see like the Pixar storyline to it, where it's like, you know, sort of like damaged goods, like total arc sort of thing, you know, outcast or whatever they might do most of the time.

Play from 0:50:40 8:88:88 0:50:40 There's always like some sort of like main character damage, right? Like that happens and then it's like in the beginning and then like it... shows its head towards the end and then there's a redemption or whatever. like that that to me felt like classic boy and his dog sort of trope, you know, like where you immediately make the connection to like, you know, they're always there like the dog showing up at night when like the mom walks in kind of thing. And it's like a fellow felt very familiar.

Play from 0:51:08 8:88:88 0:51:08 And I hope it wasn't just like a AI came up with that concept because it's like, oh, pick up all these things from, you know, Disney, Pixar, like storytelling. like, I agree. I hope it wasn't, but I feel like that is maybe something that has been, that could be codified because there are those like basic plots, right? Where it's like, I've seen this plot in a hundred movies. I've seen this plot in a hundred movies.

Play from 0:51:34 8:88:88 0:51:34 You know, and it's like, I know, I know. Yes, I agree. I agree, right? Like there's the, okay, so I was just looking this up too. um think like ChatGPT thinks there's roughly seven to 20 fundamental story patterns, right? I don't uh know if I'll read all this here. Let's do this actually. That way people can listen. They can also kind of check this out on their own.

0:51:43How many movie story arcs exist?

Play from 0:52:00 8:88:88 0:52:00 Can I zoom in? There we go. Let me hide this. So seven basic plots, overcoming the monster, Jaws, alien, diehard, rags the riches. Yep. The quest, Lord of the Rings, Voyage and Return, Wizard of Oz, Finding Nemo, comedy. That seems very broad. Tragedy, very broad. Rebirth, very kind of very broad, guess.

Play from 0:52:27 8:88:88 0:52:27 Well, rebirth, Groundhog Day, Christmas Carol. Like, what was the other one with Matthew McConaughey, the ghosts of... Oh man, but yeah, that one here are the sort of, guess, plots. Hero's Journey that's used in like, I don't know, like every scene, like everything. Yep. 36, 36 dramatic situations.

Play from 0:52:53 8:88:88 0:52:53 Like again, this is what I, this is what I get worried about was like, was that, was that just fully AI? mean, I'm sure there's a lot of human touch that went into that. I'm not, I don't want to disparage anyone who did this and did it really well. Um, cause it's just like, to me, like from a market, I might push back on this one a little bit again too, right? Like from a marketing standpoint, like to me as a technical person, that's not like I'm like, that's awesome, but it's also marketing the agent.

Play from 0:53:20 8:88:88 0:53:20 like meaning like did the agent do all this and you just said like I want a story about a lamp and a boy like and that's what it did because if it did that that's incredible but also then I'm like damn it you know it's good it's like really good now OK, so to your point, right? Like this is how you get into these. Skills are like, you know, like codifying something. It's just like look at my simple query, right? I'm just like.

0:53:32Does AI increase the value of human craft?

Play from 0:53:46 8:88:88 0:53:46 How many story arcs are in movies? I feel like because I would have been better, but I'm. But the point is, there's a lot of raw material here. I could dig really deep into this and exhaust all these different avenues. And now I've got something that could be leveraged in a repeatable fashion. And I think that's what's cool, but also scary about all this, right? To your point, it's like there are great reasons that you would maybe want to have something like this in your arsenal if you're doing a bunch of video work.

Play from 0:54:20 8:88:88 0:54:20 Also, it does take away from the value of it. I don't know. think that's also maybe this is a one-off thing now, it just feels like, remember when photographers were really scared of AI images and then we got the video people really scared. I think everything is gonna, that pendulum's gonna swing back. I think you can make a point now that photography is more valuable now than it's ever been.

Play from 0:54:50 8:88:88 0:54:50 There are just some things you need photographers for. And now when everybody can technically, I mean there are lot of variables here, but technically create the same things and you can achieve the same output. I can go to the same store as you and get the same item in that store and bring it back home versus if I made that item by myself or I hired somebody to make that item for me. Right, it just, that value, the intangible value of that.

Play from 0:55:20 8:88:88 0:55:20 goes drastically up. It holds more meaning. It holds more uh sentiment. And I just think photography, uh there are reasons to use AI images, obviously. mean, this is the business we're in. Also, there are reasons to use photography. And then there are reasons to use a hybrid approach.

Play from 0:55:46 8:88:88 0:55:46 People are just so entrapped in that it's got to be one way or the other. It's got to be this or that. And we're just in this hybrid world. We're all just trying to figure this out. But I do think the point is the human, the made by human, the touched by human, you hear it a lot. I think that value, you're going to see if that were a chart, it started going like this. And then it's going to be on this sort of trajectory of a hockey stick.

Play from 0:56:14 8:88:88 0:56:14 I just really believe that. Do you find yourself when you're retouching your own photos now? Do you have a little bit of a different preference? Like with what sort of, you know, what directions are going in the post-production of them? Like have you done it recently? Have you like done any of your photos? not to like the full extent. The full extent being like this is something I would maybe print out, you know, or, uh you know, when I was before I was posting AI stuff on Instagram, for example, I was posting photography stuff.

Play from 0:56:49 8:88:88 0:56:49 Like if I'm to post it on Instagram, I'm going to do the full edit, you know, like I'm going to go through all of it. I just don't think I've really gone through that full thing now. Like, I mean, it's like even when I do shots of like I had a The vacation like I didn't take that many photos, but like I didn't fully edit those like I added those just on mobile. You know when I'm talking about like a full edit, I'm doing that on desktop.

Play from 0:57:14 8:88:88 0:57:14 I'm you know. I'm touching Lightroom and Photoshop like you know, like all of the stuff ah I used to spend hours on a single photo. I could spend an entire day with one photo, you know. um But. You know now it's just like that that it's that mindset is shifted for all for a lot of us where it's just like. more, more, more, more, more. I catch myself doing that with AI images still where it's like, I'm creating all these different things when I really should just take this one direction and focus on that and go super deep.

Play from 0:57:51 8:88:88 0:57:51 Less is more, right? Like in that sense. The reason I asked is because I found myself preferring cooler tones now when I'm editing. it's like, because everything with AI is so warm and typically tends itself to more the yellow-green side than the blue-purple side, I've been doing a lot more. I notice myself, I'm going to the cooler section when I'm doing my sliders, or at least on the tones section, going cooler.

0:57:53Why are creators rejecting AI perfection?

Play from 0:58:23 8:88:88 0:58:23 And then skewing towards, I typically would skew towards green on the hue, and I'm going more towards purple. I'm like, is this like an overcorrection because I'm so tired of everything I generate? Yeah. I feel like we're on this quest now where we are purposely going, we are trying to find things that haven't been done yet. We're trying to find unique things.

Play from 0:58:49 8:88:88 0:58:49 And now that like these floodgates have opened, before it felt like those unique things were infinite, now it feels like maybe they're finite, like in a sense. Like I know mathematically, maybe not, but I do feel like there is this end of the rainbow kind of thing with this technology now. mean, how many deviations can you get where it doesn't make you think of something you've already seen before?

Play from 0:59:23 8:88:88 0:59:23 It's interesting is like, first off, some of the tools that Figma has dropped recently have like gotten me back into like, I want to design things in layers again. Like I just want to do it. Like I just like I want I was doing it the other I was sharing it on X got minimal to like no engagement. I loved it. Everyone can see all of our, all of our, what's it called? Their thumbnails, but like being able to being able to go and sort of create in layers again, and everyone can see the chaos that is my Figma board, right?

Play from 0:59:58 8:88:88 0:59:58 Like where I'm, you know, I'm able to add, I don't know if this is the one, maybe it is, maybe it's not. Yeah, there's one, there's a bunch of things here with the layers. this it? What is this? Nope, that's not it. But regardless, yeah, like I was able to, you know, add stuff. have... You know, these shaders now where I can go and build like the sort of the aesthetic that I'm looking for instead of having to go manually edit that feather it add the scan lines, right?

Play from 1:00:24 8:88:88 1:00:24 Like these are the things that I love playing with now. So like I can really get it to a certain point where it looks like it's on, you know, it looks like it's on my like an old monitor. Like I want all these imperfections. I want the blur amount. Yeah. you like to dial it in, right? And I think that's that's sort of like we've been taken on this journey, right? It feels like a journey, but like also.

Play from 1:00:52 8:88:88 1:00:52 It's a good reminder of how much fun it was like sure there were painful parts and I always think about you on that episode. We were like talking about like masking out like the hair, you know the stray away hairs, so she like that. Like yeah, no, but like. to dial in a drop shadow or this pixelation like you're mentioning or like some of these other like things that are actually just fun. Like they make you feel more of the process and it becomes more distinctly yours, which kind of goes back to what we were talking about last week, right?

Play from 1:01:21 8:88:88 1:01:21 When Salma was here, just like you were talking about that color grading idea. then I went and talked about like the post editing AI photos, but it's like that need to make it more yours and customizable beyond just what's taking the output of a model and then rolling with it. And that's a really interesting point because I think that's going to come back.

Play from 1:01:47 8:88:88 1:01:47 It's like you don't want to spend the extra time, but at the same time, it's like that journey is actually the most rewarding part. It's not the destination. It's Yeah, that's what I'm like, you I wanted to go add. I wanted to go like actually write the, you know, I had GPT write some code for me, but based on this image and I wanted to be in C++, right? Like see, so it's, let me see if I have, if it's in here.

Play from 1:02:14 8:88:88 1:02:14 Yeah. So it's like, write some code based on this image and then you use that as a copy and paste to throw in here and use it as a design element. Nasty. I like that stuff. I want, because now I don't have to go and really, really play with it to get it in Photoshop or whatnot. Everyone can say this, design sucks. I like it this way. I dropped in two layers, changed the blurring. They're overlaying over top of each other.

Play from 1:02:41 8:88:88 1:02:41 But I'm adding a shit ton of noise. I'm adding all these different elements to it, where I love what I'm able to do now. Look, I just love that I can play like that, and I can create my own filters now. This doesn't have to be just one thing. Create like 17 different shaders and use 10 of them. But like I was saying, I found myself skewing towards a blue or cooler tone with a lot of these, and not that yellow, like I think maybe some of the originals I have here, where it's like, I want to cool this thing down.

Play from 1:03:16 8:88:88 1:03:16 I don't want it to be so yellow-green. Right? Like I want it to be, I want it to be a little bit more blue. I wanted a little more texture. I want a little more noise. Um, cause everything's so perfect. I maybe want a little darker, a little more vignette, like things that I normally wouldn't do because I'm looking for, I'm looking for color. I'm looking for like vivid pop. Like I want this certain thing, but you know, I think like design, like my design preference is now changing or my visual preference is changing because I see so much yellow green golden hour.

Play from 1:03:51 8:88:88 1:03:51 perfect lighting. Like, like I want this gritty non like, I want things to look like they they're intentionally bad now again. Yeah, it's like, I miss I'm tired of seeing too much perfection now. you know, I think like we've seen that too with some of the brands we've worked with. You know, uh they don't want these.

Play from 1:04:18 8:88:88 1:04:18 Perfect shots that look like they were shot by a photographer. Right, like they they want more of this like candid photography looks like someone shot it on an iPhone and maybe the composition isn't perfect, but it feels real. feels relatable, feels like intentionally unintentional. yeah, I think that's, I don't know, this conversation we're having though.

Play from 1:04:52 8:88:88 1:04:52 we're in this pretty deep. So are these the listeners here. We're we've sort of seen this pattern where we start to sort of feel things before sort of the rest of people do. And I think this also could be one of those things that we're seeing is just like, yeah, AI, it is faster. It is cheaper in some things, right? Like it does allow you to do some things. And I think we can say objectively, AI is helpful in some things, no matter your view on it.

Play from 1:05:20 8:88:88 1:05:20 Like there are just too many possibilities. But are we gonna see the swing back to where there are things that clearly take longer, clearly maybe are a little bit more expensive, but we choose that direction anyway because it satisfies something internally for us as creators.

Play from 1:05:47 8:88:88 1:05:47 I couldn't agree more. think we've said it on this podcast. Maybe if we go back like 20, 30 episodes, there was definitely that where we were like, look, you know, it's the same way everyone feels about, you know, when you saw CGI the first time and it's like, yeah, it's cool. But then like, I still want Jurassic park and it's like the original Jurassic park, like Jurassic park one, like in as opposed to Jurassic park three, where every dinosaur CGI versus like the real ones they made of the animatronics, right?

Play from 1:06:15 8:88:88 1:06:15 Like I feel like that goes the same thing Lord of the Rings like when when everyone got used to, like they used all these humans and makeup and then they used CGI in the Hobbit movies. It was like, I kind of want the other ones, even though it's cool that they can do it. Like I want the other ones. This also brings me to this this post I had saved, which I was looking for while you were talking, which is this like this is a great concept for some of these ads, right?

1:06:16Why is nostalgic design returning?

Play from 1:06:42 8:88:88 1:06:42 Like this one, I think this is awesome. Look, this goes against everything that advertising. reminds me of that Polaroid campaign as well. Correct. I mean, the copy is exceptional um for Facebook marketing, but like this down here is amazing. Just this visual dark with like the Nokia screen. That's genius. Like if you have any sort of nostalgic memory that like clicks something right there, like I remember what that used to look like.

Play from 1:07:13 8:88:88 1:07:13 This unfinished stuff. Love it. pause on the ad copy of the the top right? That deserves a full pause. It's crazy. Yeah, but you're you picking up what I'm putting down though. Okay, yeah. All right. Just making sure. if human wrote that, again, copywriting not dead.

Play from 1:07:38 8:88:88 1:07:38 That is you pay the big bucks for that kind of stuff. um That's that's outstanding for, you know, many reasons. But it's. I mean, that's the that's the thing. And you know, I also saw um man, I want to bring it up, but I'd love to watch the video. But then I'm gonna have to have you pull it up. There's there was some post that I saved, though, but it's this brand basically, that they've basically designed all of their products, their marketing.

Play from 1:08:15 8:88:88 1:08:15 And it looks like it was from the early 1900s. It's got all ornate stuff. It's done with the right materials. Everything um is set up in that way. then, you know, so like there's obviously that's a trend I think will take off is the vintage nostalgic piece, which you kind of mentioned. That's what got me thinking about it, which was like you see the Nokia phone, you see like we talked about this before, like with somebody showing like copy and paint, Microsoft Paint, and these things that take you somewhere, they bring you back.

Play from 1:08:51 8:88:88 1:08:51 And I think that old school design, while it's not new, but I think from a full marketing standpoint is new. I could see that being a future lane. And then I also saw something very interesting on Instagram I got hit with, ah which was for a car, and I think it was like a Bronco. Here it is, here it is.

Play from 1:09:17 8:88:88 1:09:17 This will be interesting just to kind of make the point here. But their whole, I had never seen people lean into this before either. But it's something you and I have always, and other people have thought about, which is modernizing vintage. So basically, they recognize that people want these old school Broncos or these... cool cars, but there are problems with it, right? They're not under warranty.

Play from 1:09:42 8:88:88 1:09:42 They have issues. They can be expensive. They're not comfortable. They might not have seat belts. Who knows what the air conditioning, you know, right? Like they could be, there's a lot of issues with that. They custom build these cars to bring them up to modern standards with the old school thing, right? So it's the vintage vehicle, but with all the modern aspects of And I got hit with this targeting and I'm like, okay, first of all, I just bought a car, so I'm good.

Play from 1:10:12 8:88:88 1:10:12 But this is, I was just like, I haven't seen people leaning fully into that into a business where it's like vintage, modern vintage. Yeah, restomods. mean, it's a big, it's a big thing. But they're like the this stuff like for more consumer and not like hobbyist, like not you know, I'm a Porsche collector, and I want to, you know, like, not a rest of my like that. Yeah. there were obstacles.

Play from 1:10:37 8:88:88 1:10:37 It's like you would need a lot. mean, let's be honest, this is probably still expensive, but there were just a lot of variables that you would have to account for. The safety, uh the problems that would occur. And you have to have a tolerance for that kind of thing. And I had that niche group, like your point, but for this to be brought to a wider TAM, a target audience here, is very, very interesting.

Play from 1:11:04 8:88:88 1:11:04 There was a very, you're starting to see it a little bit like this heavy want for, it's not just nostalgic, but it's like the old design patterns. I've seen a lot of cars that are getting boxy again. It's like, because again, every car got so round and then all the data that everyone's pulling. Everyone wants these round looking cars.

Play from 1:11:29 8:88:88 1:11:29 Then it's like, everyone does the round looking cars. It's like, I kind of just want something that's boxy again. You know, it's like. goes certain. There's like a threshold. There's like this imaginary threshold that takes place where once it's happened too far, it goes the other direction. People start zagging from the zig, you know? Let me see if I can find it. I think it's Renault maybe. Was it Renault?

Play from 1:11:56 8:88:88 1:11:56 The car con... Yes, this one. Like, everyone loves this design. Or at least it's got a lot of positive feedback here. Like, this looks like a car, a modernized version from like the 70s or the 80s. Right? Like, it looks like that, but it's... yes, it does. It's like a perfect hybrid.

Play from 1:12:22 8:88:88 1:12:22 right. And it's like a like a brownish. don't know the best the best way to describe it. It's like a brownish pewter. Yeah. But it's it's so cool. Again, like back then everyone's like, you know, you look at maybe like 10 years ago, you look at a brown car from the 80s. And you're like, that's just ugly. Now it's like, I want this. It's just so different, you know, and it looks really cool. um And I've seen a lot of people sort of like, think it was.

Play from 1:12:53 8:88:88 1:12:53 Hyundai's also bringing back a, where was it, the, yeah, something like, was it this one? No, this one. Like straight out of the eighties. will they start making them again with actual like not plastic because that would also be one of those things where it's like if we stop caring about every little margin for making money like people would eat that up like if I if I could buy like I don't know an 80s 70s no 70s Mustang 60s 70s Mustang and I didn't have to worry about all that.

Play from 1:13:29 8:88:88 1:13:29 You know the stuff with. safety, warranty, cost, know, like problems. I would buy it in a heartbeat. Like, I would buy that in a heartbeat. It's like you missed it. Like if you didn't live in that timeline, you just missed your shot. But people today would still want that. Like that's a whole nother thing, bro. Like this is... Totally.

Play from 1:13:54 8:88:88 1:13:54 this is what I'm saying. It's like, in the moment, in the moment, you're not like, like maybe if you've seen this style, like a perfect example, like when every car looked like this, you know, like every car looked like this, you're like, I want something new. And now that you don't see it anymore, you're like, that's awesome. It's like, it's the same thing that's going to happen with the AI stuff.

Play from 1:14:21 8:88:88 1:14:21 You know, it's the same thing that's going to happen. you know, we've been saying this for a while, where it's, you know, as soon as everyone it's it's so ingrained, it's not cool anymore. And it's not different. It's not edgy. It's like when you know, when rock gets on the you know, gets on the radio, rock and roll gets on the radio, and then you get you know, like the Backstreet Boys, and like the out of it spawns that by the time it gets to the Backstreet Boys, it's no longer like counterculture, it's no longer cool.

Play from 1:14:48 8:88:88 1:14:48 But then again, now we're the age where you look back at the Backstreet Boys, you're like, I love that. But in the moment you're like, I'm tired of this. I don't like this. You know, like, it's a it's a very we're very picky. Correct. Yeah. It's a good way to put it. It is. it was? I mean, I'm sure there's even a better label for it, I just, somebody drilled diminishing returns in my head when I was a kid with the peanut butter example.

Play from 1:15:14 8:88:88 1:15:14 They're like, if you ate peanut butter sandwich every single day, you would love it for the first few days. And then after a while, you wouldn't love it so much anymore. But I'm like, yeah, but you could have used a better example. I probably would eat peanut butter every single day, to be honest. almost do eat peanut butter every single day. My roommate in college used to work at a pizza place. it was great to have pizza all the time.

Play from 1:15:41 8:88:88 1:15:41 But his clothes, he couldn't get rid of the pizza smell. at a certain point, I'd in his car, smelled like pizza. I'd go in his room, it smelled like pizza. I was like, it's unappetizing now. Because I just think of it as like, you're dirty ass. It smells like pizza. Yeah. an even better connection. That brings me back too, because I had a roommate, it wasn't pizza. He worked at this restaurant called Cheddar's. It's like this chain, I think in the Midwest.

Play from 1:16:07 8:88:88 1:16:07 he worked in the kitchen. Dude smelled like grease all the time. And he was a stoner too. mean, was a white boy with dreads, smelled like grease. Great dude. I mean, he was one of my best friends for a while, but. It was the same thing. He walked in to a room, to a place. It was like in the walls. mean, it's all you smelled. mean. just doesn't go away. And then it gets triggered so easily if you smell it again.

Play from 1:16:35 8:88:88 1:16:35 It's like, god, all the emotions, feelings come back. You're like, all right. But it's a, that's right. the second part of this podcast in the connections that we just made, like we didn't plan any of that, like there are those threads that we're pulling on, I think are going to be, they're going to get louder and louder. I really feel strongly like what we were talking about today is going to be more experienced here in the near future.

Play from 1:17:04 8:88:88 1:17:04 It just feels that way, you know? Like, here's another example, right? Last one and I'll stop with this. I spend a lot of time analyzing this stuff, like subconsciously, because I'm just like, why does this feel different? Like, have you watched Ted Lasso? Okay. they do a new season? Is that out or? last one was out a while ago, but I remember the first time watching it, I'm like, is this just a happy show?

1:17:09Why do simple stories feel better?

Play from 1:17:33 8:88:88 1:17:33 Like, is the show just happy, like inherently? Like, am I supposed to feel happy all the time? Because I feel happy. It's so, like, silly, goofy, and just, like, uplifting. Like, does anyone make a show like this anymore? Like, where it's not, like, serious or artful, or there's got to be a big message or, like, whatever. It's like, every character's happy. Every interaction's silly and stupid. But, like, I feel better watching it. You know, it's like, people get, it's not... It's not great television. I don't care. I feel good when I watch it.

Play from 1:18:00 8:88:88 1:18:00 It's like, don't think of why. Yeah. It felt like how stuff in the 80s, 90s was where it was just like, feel good, like naked gun kind of thing, know, like movie naked gun. It is not a cinematic Marvel. It just is funny and it's stupid and it makes me laugh. And every time I turn it on, I feel the same exact way. Right. You know, is it like there's we got too much into the. the technical and to the art and some of these things.

Play from 1:18:27 8:88:88 1:18:27 doesn't, not everything has to be Casablanca. Not everything has to be, you know, the, the Titanic. doesn't, not everything has to be all these crazy cinematic feats. Like sometimes people just want to feel a different way, I think. And that's it. is getting ready to come out today, I guess. It's like that's going for the. You know the feet, you know that's going for, you know the the I I've actually heard that like that pictures.

Play from 1:18:57 8:88:88 1:18:57 Incredible, but you know what I mean? But to your point, it's like that's that's one Avenue. That's Christopher Nolan's Avenue, you know. um But there are plenty of great movies that don't follow. and have been done on shoestring budgets, for that matter. Like Obsession, I didn't see it, apparently, you know, whatever was made for like $10 million and it's made like $800 million or something like that. That horror movie.

Play from 1:19:23 8:88:88 1:19:23 with um... the girl in that? Damn. I haven't seen it. Is it good? Oh, okay. it along as people were loving it because it's just like someone made something that people like, and it's good and it didn't have to be a blockbuster. Was that the girl from Ozark that was in that? I don't know, man. I feel like I just saw that on my screen and I was like, yeah, I haven't seen that, but it did give good, good feedback.

Play from 1:19:52 8:88:88 1:19:52 those. But yeah, I mean, like, again, we're just we're we're waxing poetic about nostalgia. But I think there's there's something like you said, there's something to it. I think there's something to it. I think a lot of people I think overall, think a lot of people not just in our space, think a lot of people are feeling a little bit more nostalgic as of recent because everything is moving so fast and it doesn't feel as good as it used to. And, you know, it's weird out in the world and it's weird.

Play from 1:20:21 8:88:88 1:20:21 at your job and it's weird. Like, you know, I talked to a freaking robot all day. I think people just want some simpler stuff. this also that's a there's your angle. Like people want to feel like they used to. They want to feel the, you know, like maybe how they were as a kid because it was simpler. Yeah. also there's the idea too of how good was it? Because when you retroactively think about. Things that have happened, you think about the past.

Play from 1:20:47 8:88:88 1:20:47 We do romanticize the past too. We fill it. We fill in details. That that maybe aren't necessarily there too, so it's like it's it's like a weird thing, you know? ah Because I agree like I mean like the past always seems great. But it's like in that moment too, like how much of that is like the grass is greener or like I'm romanticizing the past or I'm forgetting some particular elements or details that are giving this skewed view.

Play from 1:21:17 8:88:88 1:21:17 I don't know, dude, that's an interesting conversation too. I don't know. mean both things can be true. It's not like they have to be one or the other. Yeah. My favorite, I still remember this commercial to this day, probably from 10, 15 years ago, maybe ago, maybe um it was, it was this guy and he was calling his mom from a payphone. And it was, it was when you used to have to call collect.

Play from 1:21:42 8:88:88 1:21:42 So she goes, hi, it's Bob. We had a baby. It's a boy. It's like when it's like, cause he used to do that all the time. When it's like, when you say, say who this call is from and he'd be like, mom, that's cool. me up right now. You know, hang up before you had to pay for it. Right? Like a perfect tie back to what we all did. But it's I think it was for Verizon, maybe. And it's like things are easier now. But like you still remember that that's really funny. Like that's a great little tidbit.

Play from 1:22:10 8:88:88 1:22:10 It's like, it's like time. Like that's the modern version of like, this was cool. I mean, this wasn't cool at the time. But you look back on it. And it's funny. And it's still like a part of like something you'd probably bring up with your friends to laugh about. But we moved on. It's easier now. uh I keep thinking there's this bridge somehow. And if you can make it, you're really successful. Yeah, yeah, I think that's what it is, That's what it is.

Play from 1:22:36 8:88:88 1:22:36 that bridge but I there was a again that took a wild turn this whole this whole second half here yeah I like to turn. ah Hopefully you guys found some value in the turn as well. I think also Roy, we should probably give a shout out to the Folly ours out there. We need y'all subscribing. Oh, I you know what I saw an awesome. Comment as well. Hopefully this person is still listening.

Play from 1:23:02 8:88:88 1:23:02 I want to bring this up to you because it was a great question on the last video that we had. And it's. particularly well done. somebody at bat, bat them, mat bat. I have no idea how to say this handle. You're going to love this if you haven't seen it already. He goes, fellas, my dog walker has a question about consistency and continuity.

1:23:09How do AI projects maintain consistency?

Play from 1:23:31 8:88:88 1:23:31 Or how do you deal with consistency, especially in larger projects or client product work? always, my dog walker, always runs into the same problems. And when he starts creating multiple shots of the same scene or product, that the little details start changing. All of a sudden the table has different legs. The character has different emblem on them, on the hat. The length of the skirt changes. No matter the tool, even if you take specialized product shot, Agent from Luma, even if you give a reference sheet with every prompt consistency, never really holds up.

Play from 1:23:58 8:88:88 1:23:58 Sure, most of it won't be spotted by the casual observer, but knowing it is there drives me, well, yeah, me and my dog Walker crazy. I just thought that was like, that was great. Play, well played, sir. Well played. Exceptional comment. We got to start reading more comments on here from when people give us solid stuff like that. If you want a real answer, it drives me up the wall.

Play from 1:24:23 8:88:88 1:24:23 If I'm doing a video or something, I find stuff all the time. if I'm doing it for social, I just let it go. I'm just like, got to let it go. um If it's for a client, then it's like, I'm going into Photoshop. I'm like, getting in there, changing things. Some of the things like some of the micro things I've done, like I had food inside of a glass container and the reflection wasn't correct. And like I had to go in there and like really go back into retouching days and like make the reflection the right way.

Play from 1:24:51 8:88:88 1:24:51 And it was like, I'm not going to be able to generate it. It's not going to work. It's not, it doesn't, it's not doing it. And I had to go do it. like, yeah, it, it pisses me off a lot. And we could probably do like a whole episode on consistency and like how to really drill into it. That also kind of plays into what we're talking about. It's like there are certain parts where you wish AI could just do that. Because if you do that manually, you should do that, but it sucks.

1:25:00Who should Fast Hours interview next?

Play from 1:25:18 8:88:88 1:25:18 It's painful. It's time spent that you don't want to spend versus what we were talking about where it's like creative application on top of. Maybe we want to spend more time there. Even though we know AI could do some of these things, it's like it makes us feel more part of the process for us to intentionally do those. And we don't mind spending the time doing that. Yeah. even if it's not the most efficient way, right? It's like, that's the trade-off. It still feels good to get your hands dirty every once in a while. I think I still got it, you know?

Play from 1:25:44 8:88:88 1:25:44 100%. Yep. All right. So, Foley Artists, we're looking at you. Also, drop us a comment. We had the thing on what were you asking for? We wanted insight on the Suno thing. I think there was maybe something else. any anyone you want to see come on here, anyone you think would be bring value to the show to the audience. You just let us know. And if you got a personal trainer, maybe tell them or any of you like someone who works at your gym, like those people re racking weights because you don't do it.

Play from 1:26:12 8:88:88 1:26:12 You know, tell them about it. Right. That's what that was a spotter. Tell you tell your spotter tell you know, tell someone at the gym. There's there's enough people. guy taking the towels from the locker room, the sauna. Get that guy. guy, the person filming themselves in the corner, they know doing, doing reps for whatever reason. Um, yeah. Gym talk, whatever, whatever that, that subculture is called.

Play from 1:26:40 8:88:88 1:26:40 There was a, someone, someone I think left a comment on our page on LinkedIn about they listened to us at the gym that that spawned that. So, you know, again, if you're here, where this is coming from and you're not, this is your first episode. You make it this far. gotta do one thing. I don't know what it is. If it's a like, it's a comment, it's a tell your grandmother, whatever. Just something. Or take something we did and then go do something with it. Just do something. That's it.

Play from 1:27:06 8:88:88 1:27:06 That's the only rule. Bye. right, well, we'll see you guys in the next one. Thanks for joining us, and we'll see you guys next week. See ya.