The generative AI startup Runway, which recently signed a groundbreaking agreement with Lionsgate, will provide up to $1 million in awards to filmmakers developing AI-powered movies.
The Hundred Film Fund, a project by Runway, aims to assist in the production and financing of up to 100 feature-length and short films that employ generative AI technologies to convey their stories. According to Runway, judgments on submissions would normally be made within 14 days of submission, with financial incentives ranging from $5,000 to $1 million. Additionally, Runway’s gen-AI technology is available for use with up to $2 million in credits from the company. Filmmakers that are interested can apply by clicking this link.
Runway has put together an advisory panel of prominent figures in technology and entertainment to assess fund proposals. Film producer and co-founder of the Tribeca Festival Jane Rosenthal, artist, actor, producer, and entrepreneur will.i.am, VP, GM of media and entertainment at Nvidia (an investor in Runway), award-winning film colorist Stefan Sonnenfeld, co-founder and president of post-production company Company 3, and creative producer Christina Lee Storm, founder and CEO of Asher XR are among the initial advisors.
READ MORE: On The Set Of The Movie, Austin Butler Teams Up With Bad Bunny To Film Gritty Scenes
What’s the deal? There isn’t one, according to Runway co-founder and CEO Cris Valenzuela, who told Variety that his business is primarily interested in pushing AI as a new tool for filmmakers, both established and up-and-coming. “Recovering our money is not the goal here,” he declared.
Runway will not be the owner of any intellectual property produced through the program. The startup intends to use the panel of advisers to link participants with purchasers, but it will not distribute the final items. We operate a software business. We sell tools, that’s our business,” Valenzuela stated. “Our ability to assist storytellers in creating these films will be the foundation of our success.” Runway will take into consideration film projects that utilize other generative AI platforms, even though it will “strongly advocate using our tools,” he continued.
According to Valenzuela, “We think that the best stories are still to be told and that traditional funding mechanisms often overlook these new visions.” Since the Hundred Film Fund is a “rolling fund,” Runway has no predetermined cap on the overall amount of money it will distribute through the initiative.
READ MORE: John Cena Will Star In Mattel’s Matchbox Film
The Black Eyed Peas leader, will.i.am, stated in an interview that he used Runway’s AI video tools prior to becoming an investor. (He has also made investments in OpenAI, Inflection AI, and Anthropic, among other artificial intelligence projects.) According to will.i.am, he is searching for “people who are breaking the mold” for Runway’s Hundred Film Fund.
A storyteller “has more time to develop the things you love about film — story and character development,” according to will.i.am, who mentioned generative AI. “If we’re using AI to do exactly what we did yesterday, that’s a poor use of imagination,” he said, adding that the technology also offers a fresh creative canvas for novel kinds of storylines. AI will be used by the dreamers to tell stories in new ways.
In response to Hollywood professionals who have voiced doubts or even anxiety regarding artificial intelligence’s place in the creative process, Valenzuela suggests that individuals try out the tools that are already accessible. “Cinema and technology have always been linked,” he remarked. “We just see this as a new evolution of that,”
According to Valenzuela, Runway’s first significant agreement with a Hollywood company, Lionsgate, is unrelated to the Hundred Film Fund. Lionsgate and Runway announced last week that they will be collaborating to enable filmmakers and other creative talent to “augment their work” by creating “cinematic video” with Runway’s platform. Filmmakers “are already excited about its potential applications to their pre-production and post-production process,” according to Michael Burns, vice chair of Lionsgate, who also stated that the studio expects to save “millions and millions of dollars” in production expenses.
Runway’s AI Film Festival, which was founded in 2022 as “a celebration of the art and artists embracing new and emerging AI techniques for filmmaking,” is a step down from the Hundred Film Fund. The AI Film Festival called for submissions in 2023 and 2024, choosing ten finalists to present at screenings in New York City and Los Angeles. The winners received a total of more than $60,000 in prizes. Runway and the Tribeca Festival collaborated on this year’s AIFF screenings and panel discussion in New York.
Founded in 2018, Runway is based in New York and has raised over $250 million in funding from investors thus far, including Salesforce Ventures, Nvidia, and Google. $1.5 billion was the company’s most recent publicly disclosed post-money valuation.
Radiant TV, offering to elevate your entertainment game! Movies, TV series, exclusive interviews, music, and more—download now on various devices, including iPhones, Androids, smart TVs, Apple TV, Fire Stick, and more.
