M+E Connections

Speaking April 17, during the Creative Keynote session “Securing a Storyteller’s Vision” at the 2023 edition of CDSA’s Content Protection Summit at NAB (CPS@NAB), film director and animator Jerry Rees discussed the important roles that technology has played in his career and in animated movies and films in general.

CDSA’s new “Creative-in-Residence” joined the event in Las Vegas for a continuation of the conversation on the intersection between “creative” and “security,” in both perspectives and philosophy, across his career as a writer, director, animator and Imagineer.

Rees also discussed the realities of working across the Marvel Universe and other well-known Disney brands that have very tight restrictions and control of a complex set of workflows yet still foster the true spirit of artistic innovation and creativity.

First, he touched on the important roles that actors, characters, emotion and story all play in making animated films successful and the possibilities presented by new technologies when it comes to fictional characters interacting with theme park visitors and those using mobile phones and virtual reality (VR) software.

Autonomous robots can be programmed to remember you “so you are able to develop a camaraderie with it across all platforms, so that you can encounter it on your mobile, you could get to know it and then continue to interact with it in your VR,” he said, adding: “You might step into the theme park and have it walk up to you physically because it’s now a beautifully done … autonomous robot” that is artificial intelligence (AI)-driven. “And it picks up right where you left off with your mobile [device] two hours before,” he added. His prediction: “A lot of magic is about to happen.”

Interviewing Rees during the presentation, Richard Atkinson, Content Delivery and Security Association (CDSA) president and chairman emeritus, addressed consumer adoption of these new technologies, saying: “If the experience is lame, no one is going to care and no one’s going to fight for it. But if the experience is magical and transcends everything, then people are willing to participate.”

Rees acknowledged that security is important but could become a challenge if you start talking about “taking that magic moment away in order to [provide the] extra protection of security and privacy.” Many consumers will not want that magic moment taken away due to legal and other concerns, he added.

He also took a walk down Memory Lane, going back to 1937, when Walt Disney was making his first full-length animated film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” and many people felt it could be a huge mistake by the filmmaker, who was targeted it at adults and not small children.

When the film was being shown and the scene with Snow White in a coffin happened, he noted that the audience cried. And that provided a clear example of the power of animation and movies, he explained.

To view the session, click here.

To download the presentation, click here.

The 2023 Content Protection Summit was presented by Fortinet and sponsored by Convergent, Signiant, Verimatrix, Eluvio, NAGRA, PDG Consulting and EIDR. The event was produced by MESA, in association with NAB and the CDSA.