Only decades ago, the single biggest barrier to becoming a film editor was money. Film editing equipment was cumbersome and far too expensive for most people to afford. The invention of desktop video editing software in the late 1990s and early 2000s, coinciding with computers growing faster and less costly, created a seismic shift towards greater accessibility in filmmaking and film editing.

Suddenly, far more people were producing content—and editors could work faster and with more precision than they’d ever imagined possible. The advent of the internet and smartphoness, which effectively gave billions of people handheld cameras and publishing platforms, increased this accessibility and quality even further.

Generative AI could be the next great leap forward in the advancement of film as a medium—one that is uniquely transformational. This emerging technology could empower filmmakers and editors of all backgrounds with the ability to work faster and extend their imaginations. Imagine instantly developing storyboards from scripts, automatically organizing different takes of a film sequentially, and reducing tedious work—or even eliminating it altogether. And perhaps most importantly, generative AI in filmmaking could broaden accessibility like never before.

This is personal to me. I grew up on film franchises like Star Wars and Indiana Jones. As I got older and became interested in filmmaking, I started with a VHS camcorder. The image quality was bad (although good at the time, I guess) and it was impossible to really edit—let alone create any kind of visual effects. Now, as the Senior Director of Adobe Pro Video Marketing, I get to share our suite of incredible tools that allow filmmakers of all ages, origins, and backgrounds to create anything they can imagine.

The Importance of Diversity

On-screen storytelling has a unique ability to entertain and inspire; it also has the power to affect change. By sharing diverse stories and new perspectives, films let you walk in the shoes, or see through the eyes, of those who are different from us. It transports us to places and into situations we wouldn't normally be able to experience.

Generative AI, when thoughtfully applied, expands the creative possibilities far beyond what young filmmakers have today. Much like the invention of digital video cameras and desktop editing software, generative AI can give young, diverse filmmakers even more ways to express themselves and create films that change the way we see the world.

Creating New Opportunities With Generative AI

One of my favorite parts of my job is the constant dialogue with creative professionals. While generative AI has created a lot of excitement, I’m well aware that it has created concerns, too—particularly in the entertainment industry where actors and writers are striking, in part, over the use of AI tools—with ethics and job security due to automation at the forefront. “If AI is used,” the thinking goes, “will my job cease to exist?” For three key reasons, I believe the answer is, unequivocally, no.

First, the way filmmakers and editors do their jobs could change, but the demand for content just keeps getting bigger. We’re in the midst of a content explosion, thanks not just to generative AI but to digital technologies in general. Yet despite anyone being able to make a film on their phones, audiences worldwide still choose to watch movies made by professionals because of their artistry and entertainment quality. New capabilities for creating content haven’t overtaken traditional film, they’ve just created new content streams.

Generative AI can never replace human creative talent. Editing tools powered by generative AI respond to human-directed prompts and can’t distinguish between a good cut and a bad one, much less a good cut and a great one. These tools are even less capable of making original, nuanced creative choices that elicit an emotional response. That’s not their job. On the contrary, AI tools are designed to put the power back in creative professionals’ hands, giving them more time to spend on their craft. And when it’s easier and easier to achieve technical excellence, the filmmaker or editor’s unique artistic choices become what makes them stand out.

Lastly, generative AI may in fact create even more opportunities. As this new technology makes filmmaking and film editing more efficient, it stands to reason that more people will start projects—and great editors will be needed more than ever. This isn’t just wishful thinking. There’s a direct precedent for it within Adobe. When Photoshop was first released 33 years ago, there were fears among creative professionals that their skills would no longer be needed. Instead, these professionals have used Photoshop to continuously become more productive, make higher-quality content, and expand both their creative and professional opportunities.

Using Generative AI Responsibly

There’s no limit to what generative AI can do, which means we all need to do our part to ensure it’s used responsibly. For creative professionals, this is sound business practice. For society at large, it is a cultural imperative.

Without guardrails, content generated by AI can infringe on artists’ intellectual property or contain potentially harmful stereotypes or biases. For creative professionals whose livelihoods depend upon producing commercially safe and appropriate work, using unsafe content could be risky. And the potential impacts of uncontrolled generative AI on the greater community are exponentially worse—think the widespread dissemination of hateful content and misinformation.

At Adobe, we are guided by our AI Ethics principles of accountability, responsibility, and transparency. Our first creative generative AI family of models, Firefly, was trained only on images from Adobe Stock, openly licensed content, and public domain content where the copyright had expired. To guard against bias or harmful output, Adobe teams perform continuous testing and human evalsuation, as well as providing open channels for community feedback. To create transparency, we will automatically attach Content Credentials, which act similarly to nutrition labels—embedding metadata to show how work was created and when generative AI was involved. This enables artists to demonstrate ownership of their work while empowering viewers to understand how a piece of content came to be and whether to trust it. Content Credentials is an open-source technology, and we’re partnering with other companies and groups to encourage wide-scale adoption as an industry standard.

Connecting More Deeply With Audiences

As filmmaking technology has grown more sophisticated, so have audiences. Dazzling visual effects without emotional resonance or cultural relevance are no longer enough to captivate viewers.

And while generative AI can expand opportunities for more creators than ever before, it will never replace human stories or storytellers. If vendors, industry leaders, and artists hold themselves accountable to responsible practices, and to each other, this powerful technology can provide a range of benefits to everyone—from the most experienced professionals to brand-new artists still waiting to be discovered.

This story was written by Paul Saccone, Sr. Director, Adobe Pro Video Marketing, and edited by WIRED Brand Lab.