PJ Richardson

Since 2009, The Forge has been using cutting-edge tech to help brands thrive. We’re excited to introduce four new services designed to keep your visuals sharp, creative, and future-proof. 🌍 Virtual Production at The Forge Brands today need versatile, adaptive visuals—and we’re making it possible without leaving the studio. Our in-house virtual production setup blends Unreal Engine, AI, and real product photography. We create stunning, context-rich campaigns with the flexibility to adapt scenes, locations, and lighting—all within our controlled environment. The result? Visually stunning, versatile content that saves time, budget, and carbon footprint. Want to see it in action? Get in touch! #VirtualProduction #UnrealEngine #Advertising #Photography #TheForge

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Here's another tutorial for y'all. "In traffic Time Lapse." https://lnkd.in/ggDcQB5E - PROMPT FOR SUIT IN STREET Cinematic overhead shot of a man standing still on a crosswalk, wearing a black trendy fitted suit, with a white button up shirt, and black and white nike panda dunks. Motion-blurred crowd rushes past around him. Moody city lighting, 35mm film aesthetic, shallow depth of field, sharp focus on his portrait, artistic and timeless street photography style. The man's exact facial features, skin tone, and expression are preserved from the original selfie provided. There are many people in the background. https://higgsfield.ai/ - PROMPT FOR TIMELAPSE Camera locked and focused on the subject, face sharp and steady. Slight natural movement on the subject’s dress and jacket caused by passing crowd and vehicles. Fast blurry motion of people walking in different directions, vehicle light streaks rushing by, vibrant city energy. Subject remains clear and still while the surroundings emphasize speed and motion blur.

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Studio Aideal presents: AIRE A Gen-AI concept product for stress relief and mindful breathing. Welcome to our new excuse to play, test, and learn with this wild tech. We imagined, built, and animated AIRE using a mix of tools: Nano Banana to generate the look/views and Weavy’s node-based platform to bring it to life in 360°. This kind of node-based workflow is coming fawst across creative software and we highly recommend getting familiar with it. It gives you way more control over your AI compositions, and makes it easy to drop in products, mockups, and details with precision. More experiments soon. P.S. I added an image of the workflow in the comments Studio Aideal #AI #wavey #nanobanana #genai

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Okay... let’s talk about Nano Banana Pro 🚨🍌 I've been testing it out and it REALLY nails the hard stuff: 🧠 Complicated, layered concepts 🎬 Storyboards and connected shot sequences 🧍‍♂️ Characters that stay consistent across styles 🔤 Accurate graphic design and typography Huge shoutout to Google DeepMind — this update is a major leap for anyone working in filmmaking, design, animation, and visual storytelling. Check out how well it handles these examples👇 #NanoBananaPro #AIImage #AINews #AIVideo

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Most R&D never makes it into the final work, and that’s actually the point. At Ars Thanea, we archive almost everything we test, from mechanics and lighting behaviors to animation systems and technical failures, in what we call the Drawer. Not because we know when it will be helpful, but because over time, experience compounds, and documented experimentation starts to function less like risk and more like infrastructure. When R&D is treated as shared memory rather than isolated experiments, it changes how a studio operates, how clients experience collaboration, and how artists develop within the system. It sounds exciting when framed as innovation, but in practice, it’s slower, more disciplined, and sometimes uncomfortable. It requires structure, documentation, financial exposure, and clarity about when to keep exploring and when to move into execution. In the new article, I look at how long-term R&D infrastructure affects studios, clients, and artists, and what shifted for us when we stopped treating experimentation as a phase and started treating it as a capability. https://lnkd.in/dQ9aNGXr #arsthanea #rnd #process #motiondesign #designthinking

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𝗪𝗲’𝗿𝗲 𝗰𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗲 𝗼𝗻 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗶𝘀𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗹 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗔𝗜 𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗼. For anyone who’s worked in 𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗼-𝘁𝗼-𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗼 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝗳𝗹𝗼��𝘀, you know that 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗹 is everything. That’s why we’ve been heads-down at Bitrate Bash, experimenting with 𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗡𝗲𝘁𝘀 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗱𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝗶𝗼-𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗰𝗮𝗽 𝗳𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆… 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘪𝘰. In our latest showcase, we tested sequences across 𝘄𝗮𝗹𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝗿𝘂𝗻𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝗷𝘂𝗺𝗽𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘆𝗼𝗴𝗮 — and consistently hit above 90% motion fidelity with reduced drift, when compared to generic first frame restyle processes. ❗The best part? 𝗞𝗲𝘆𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲-𝗟𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗣𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗶𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻. This isn’t just R&D for us — it’s about giving creators pro-level control that used to only be possible in big-budget mocap studios. We keep coming back to the same realization: 👉 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝘀𝗻’𝘁 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹𝘀𝗲𝘁𝘀 — it’s about unlocking new contexts for the ones we already have. What workflows would you transform with this kind of control? #AI #MotionCapture #ControlNet #VideoToVideo #Animation #VFX #GenerativeAI #MachineLearning #Innovation #Tech

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The Wonderment by Design Team is reimagining how visitors engage with museum installations. We’ve created a proof of concept that invites audiences to explore art pieces on a 75” display. Through real-time eye tracking, the scene subtly responds to your movement, shifting perspective as you look around. No controllers. No interface. Just natural, intuitive viewing. This approach transforms static museum collections into spatial, immersive experiences. It scales effortlessly across galleries and exhibitions, and is especially powerful for presenting fragile, rare, or otherwise inaccessible artifacts. Next step: User Interaction with hand tracking. ✁ ------------------------------------------------------------------ #Museums #XR #Design #ImmersiveInstallations

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The comedy centric commercial production company Thinking Machine, founded by the award-winning directing duo Docter Twins (Matthew Docter & Jason Docter), has partnered with two new repping companies. On the West Coast the company is now represented by Katie+Co, a talent agency and network for producers and creatives, repping high-impact talent. Thinking Machine has also aligned with Texas-based AG Reps, a management company for directors, editors, animators and composers founded by Alyson Griffith . “As we expand our roster and grow our reach, we decided to sign with two of the most hard-working talent execs in the business,” said Thinking Machine Executive Producer Alon Simcha. “Texas is a fantastic, always evolving market and Alyson really has her finger on the creative core of the business there. Meanwhile, on the West Coast, Katie Ward is an inspired collaborator, with a great network of relationships and the inventive mind of a fellow creative. We’re excited about how both of these new partnerships will help us grow.” "I was so excited when Thinking Machine’s executive producer Alon Simcha reached out,” said Griffith, “We’d worked together several years ago and I was thrilled to hear about his alliance with the Docter Twins. I’d followed them for quite some time and knew they were always putting out fresh, innovative work with a real sense of originality. After reconnecting with Alon and diving into Thinking Machine’s uniquely curated roster, it just felt like a great fit for me and the Texas market. I can’t wait to connect their creativity with the incredible community here." "Thinking Machine's directors have a rare gift for uncovering authenticity in everything - finding the truths that make you laugh out loud or ache with feeling,” said Katie Ward Gerard. “Katie+Co is thrilled to amplify that blend of humor and heart, connecting them with agencies and brands excited for work that truly resonates. Together, our goal is simple: to bring more laughter, love and humanity into the ad space." https://lnkd.in/gJSAfuc3

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Here is a breakdown of the process behind this 15-second short. Contrary to the "one-click" myth, creating production ready AI video is a workflow that mirrors traditional filmmaking. It doesn’t start with a blind prompt, it starts with pre-production. I treat the AI like a film crew: I begin by "casting" the characters, generating multiple headshots in various outfits until I find the perfect lead, and then I move to "location scouting" to lock in the environment, mood, and lighting before the action even begins. The production phase is where technical precision meets creativity. I’ve learned that consistent results require a specific prompting structure: describing the Action, followed by the Camera Movement, and finally the Lighting. This order is vital for guiding the AI effectively. Even with Kling 3’s impressive multi-shot capabilities, you cannot just rely on the algorithm to direct the scene; you have to get right references and apply the vision to get the framing right. Finally, the output is just raw footage, not the final product. The real thing happens in post-production, where I grade the footage, edit for pacing, add sound design, and even simulate manual camera movements in tools like After Effects to ground the visuals in reality. Kling 3 has made the heavy lifting significantly easier, but it remains a tool. It doesn't replace the workflow; it simply adapts it, requiring us to combine new tech with traditional filmmaking skills to create something worthwhile. #VideoProduction #AI #KlingAI #CreativeProcess #Filmmaking

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How to streamline storyboarding for AI production? 🎬 For the last few years, AI storyboards struggled with one major issue: inconsistency. Faces would change. Lighting would shift. Environments would drift from frame to frame. This week, Higgsfield AI solved this problem by releasing 'Popcorn' 🍿 It’s the first AI storyboard tool that actually thinks in sequences, not single shots. Popcorn stand out with its new 'Reference Lock System': this feature allows creative teams to maintain full frame-to-frame continuity across up to 8 generated shots. For the first time, your previsualization can match your creative intent: → Consistent faces → Lighting → Environments If you’re leading creative or production workflows, here’s how to leverage Popcorn effectively: 1️⃣ Use multi-reference uploads to train visual identity → Characters, mood, product, or brand color tone 2️⃣ Lock your narrative flow using 'Storyboard Mode' 3️⃣ Integrate 'Popcorn' into a 4D or ComfyUI pipeline → You will reach continuity between previsualization and final AI video This is where 'Operational Precision', one of the pillars of the Xtendency™ Blueprint, comes into play ⚙️ 𝗞𝗲𝗲𝗽 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗼𝘂𝗰𝗵 👇 https://lnkd.in/eW3RAt35

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