The three-day event saw a number of AI-enabled comedy films being scripted and developed by humans and produced with the aid of algorithms
Hat Trick Productions has held a three-day ‘AI Jam’ where writers and comedians were paired with AI/VFX studios to create several short comedy films that were produced with the aid of AI and generative AI tools.
The AI Jam was held in November and involved AI/VFX studios including Territory Studios, Dimension, Wonder Studios and Storybook Studios.
Hat Trick has now released a behind-the-scenes documentary to showcase the work involved in making the AI-enabled productions.
You can watch the documentary below.
Liam Stout, creative AI Lead at Hat Trick Lab, was behind the experiment and spoke exclusively to AI Media News to explain the thinking behind AI Jam and what Hat Trick got out of the event.
“Our mission is always to find ways that this technology can enhance the creative possibilities of the artists we work with. And this is what informed the Jam.
We invited comedians and writers into Hat Trick to be partnered with AI/VFX studios – Territory Studio (UK), Dimension Studio (UK), Wonder Studios (UK) and Storybook Studios (GER).
We gave them three days to simply create something funny. Some of the comedians came in with pre-conceived ideas, others started from scratch.
We stipulated that all approaches had to be hybrid, built around the voices and performances of the artists – nothing pure-gen. And no use of text generation tools – everything written by humans.
Some explored animation, while others looked at live action hybrid approaches.
With the support of the AI specialists, the teams crafted short comedy films, all screened internally on the night of Day 3. The results were brilliant and elicited genuine laughs from the audience.
We proved to ourselves (and hopefully viewers of our behind-the-scenes documentary) that great content needs great storytelling, regardless of the tools being used.
Writing, performance, timing, chemistry – these elements are all still vital to conveying story, particularly in comedy.
The Hat Trick Lab sits within the Creative Innovation team here, which was set up at Hat Trick by Jonny McCausland in 2023 with the goal of exploring new opportunities and expanding the areas we work in across the creative landscape.
The Lab itself has a focus on AI and trying to understand what impacts this technology might have, both positive and negative. The potential risks of this technology are undeniable and so we see it as vital that we work actively to experiment and establish ways of working that always keep writers and performers at the heart of the conversation.
We have tried to spread this message where we can. We have spoken on lots of panels to this effect and we have organised and hosted a range of cross-industry events to capture thoughts from an incredibly broad range of partners, which we have then fed into policymaking callouts.
Jonny now also leads the National Film and Television School AI Protocols and Practices for Film & TV course and was also part of the CoStar Copyright ACCCT working group.
The broader Creative Innovation team is developing projects across a range of mediums including video games, VR, live, digital and animation. Much of this work, though not all of it, is underpinned by advances in creative technology. However, as we made clear with the AI Jam, we are always committed to centring writers, artists, actors and creators at the core of whatever we do. Our mission is to put these tools in service of them, not the other way around.”
Liam Stout, creative AI Lead at Hat Trick Lab
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