In Jon Erwin’s telling, even the most advanced visual effects tools are no match for the physics of water.
The director of the film “Young Washington,” the historical drama releasing nationwide on Friday (July 3), needed to film a scene where a pre-Revolutionary War George Washington (William Franklyn-Miller) and his companion nearly drown in an icy river.
But icy rivers are, of course, cold — and subjecting actors or even stunt doubles to such conditions seemed too dangerous. Thus, Erwin relied on a combination of a 50-foot pool of water the crew built in Ireland, filmed close-ups of the actors, props of ice and a suite of generative AI tools to help create the scene, using the technology to help generate wider shots in the sequence.
“The actors were there, the raft was there, the water was there, but the water wasn’t cold,” Erwin told Variety in an interview. “It was a very small area that we were able to film it in, and we just mapped it to a much larger area, and I think that’s a great example of the use case of these tools to make something safer and more affordable in that scope to a project like this, and that way we didn’t have to leave Ireland.”
Erwin is one of a few Hollywood directors who have been vocal about their use of generative AI in their work. He has used it in shows for Amazon MGM Studios such as “House of David” and “The Old Stories: Moses.” Erwin also leads AI production company Innovative Dreams, a venture co-founded by his company, Wonder Project, and Luma AI that combines AI with traditional filmmaking.
