Netflix Used AI on 300 Titles; Up to 40% Budget Cut — SkimNews
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- Netflix's Lee Sung-gyun said at Busan that AI has been put to use on roughly 300 of its titles, spanning previs, production design, set-dressing concepts, editorial, and VFX.
- 'The Outlaws' director Kang Yoon-sung said AI workflows can shave 30-40% off a feature film's production budget, citing his 'Gulf of Aden' fundraising calculation and a test clip rendered entirely with Kling, a Chinese AI tool now capable of 4K at 10-bit or higher.
- Netflix's Eyeline Studios screened hybrid-production footage including AI/VFX crowd scenes for the India title 'Glory' that Lee said would normally have been cut for budget reasons.
- Kang cautioned that AI's emotional delivery has 'actually gotten worse' due to its 'mechanical coldness,' and Netflix's Lee agreed: 'a human touch is absolutely essential.'
- Kang predicted a split: short-form content will optimize for productivity—he pointed to China where some projects run AI from planning to distribution—while film and drama will pursue credibility.
- Both Kang and Wētā FX CTO Kimball Thurston said AI will not replace actors; Kang sees AI's role mainly in stunts and stand-in work, while Thurston described his award-winning denoiser as 'assistive AI' barred from changing creative intent.
Why it matters: The 30-40% production-budget cut Kang cited makes Korean genre and sci-fi projects previously killed at the financing stage viable again, at a moment when the Korean industry is struggling to grow. The counterweight Kang himself raised: AI-quality footage is now high, but emotionally he said it has 'actually gotten worse'—meaning any savings carry a storytelling cost the human 'touch-up' Lee called 'absolutely essential' still has to absorb.
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