Innovative Dreams is pioneering ‘Realtime Hybrid Filmmaking’, which combines performance capture, virtual production and VFX accelerated by genAI
At NAB 2026, Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced its partnership with production house Wonder Project and AI company Luma to launch Innovative Dreams, a filmmaker-led production services company, R&D lab, post-production and visual effects firm.
It was founded by Wonder Project’s Jon Erwin, who will also serve as Innovative Dreams’ CEO.
Innovative Dreams is pioneering something called Realtime Hybrid Filmmaking, which combines performance capture, virtual production and visual effects, accelerated by generative AI at every stage of production.
Generative AI creates the early concepting and pre-visualisation, and plays a key role in the production and post too.
Innovative Dreams says this approach “pushes the frontiers of human artistry and storytelling while giving more time and focus back to human performance”.
The Realtime Hybrid Filmmaking model enables actors to see and react to developing digital environments as they evolve. It removes the delays between shooting, rendering, and editing, shortening the distance from creative idea to final pixel, says Innovative Dreams.
The first project to utilise this new workflow, shot entirely on a virtual stage, is The Old Stories: Moses, a three-part companion special from the world of House of David, starring Academy Award-winner Ben Kingsley (Gandhi, Schindler’s List and Wonder Project’s forthcoming Young Washington) and Emmy Award-nominee O-T Fagbenle (The Handmaid’s Tale, Presumed Innocent).
Written, directed and executive produced by Erwin, the project is produced by Wonder Project in partnership with Amazon MGM Studios and will debut exclusively on Wonder’s subscription service on Prime Video in the US this spring. It will then be available on Prime Video in the US and globally at a later date.
As well as supporting Wonder Project’s slate, Innovative Dreams will provide services to third-party studios across different genres.
Innovative Dreams operates a dedicated R&D lab and virtual production stage at the MBS Media Campus in Manhattan Beach, California. The facility is designed to support in-person collaboration and hands-on experimentation, and will serve as both a production space and an education hub for filmmakers, showrunners and producers.
The collaboration with Luma focuses on developing production-grade AI tools, like Luma Agents, that are tailored to the needs of filmmakers and designed to elevate actor performance.
The collaboration focuses on technologies designed to preserve and elevate actor performance while enabling large-scale digital environments and ambitious visual storytelling.
“We are excited to pioneer what we believe is the industry’s first final pixel, gen-AI-enabled, production-ready workflow applied at scale,” said Jon Erwin, CEO of Innovative Dreams. “We’re passionate about human collaboration and creativity, preserving the brilliance of actors’ performances, and bringing jobs back to LA. I cannot wait for other filmmakers to experience the magic of what we’re building.”
“The production landscape is evolving, and filmmakers are looking for more ways to take creative swings. Innovative Dreams is that opportunity,” adds Luma CEO Amit Jain. “Together with Jon and team, we are building a new hybrid production process that brings Luma’s powerful generative AI technologies into high quality production. Realtime Hybrid Filmmaking is an efficient, enjoyable, and human-centered approach. This process will liberate filmmakers to do their best work and make things people want to watch.”
AWS cloud and AI infrastructure power R&D and virtual production tools for Innovative Dreams and Luma, enabling breakthrough generative tools to help filmmakers bring their vision to life.
“The entertainment industry is at an inflection point, and the most exciting part is that technology is finally catching up to the imagination of filmmakers,” said Samira Panah Bakhtiar, general manager, media & entertainment, games and sports, AWS. “What Jon Erwin and the Innovative Dreams team are building — with AWS cloud and AI infrastructure at its core — shows that AI, when used responsibly, can expand creative possibilities without replacing the human performance and artistry that make stories resonate.”
“I’ve spent over two decades watching technology transform storytelling,” adds Kelly Merryman Hoogstraten, CEO of Wonder Project. “At Netflix, it was removing appointment-based viewing. At YouTube, it was removing the gatekeeper and empowering the rise of the creator economy. What’s happening right now in production, the convergence of performance capture, virtual production, and generative AI, is the next big shift. And by investing in this infrastructure here in Los Angeles, we’re making a deliberate bet on Hollywood, on local crews, and on the future of American filmmaking.”
Innovative Dreams will begin collaborating with filmmakers and studios in the coming months and launch education and training programs designed to expand access to this approach across the industry.
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