‘The Art Of Self-Defence’ Producers End Cue Launch AI-Powered Production Solution Platform RivetAI

Diana Lodderhose
·4 min read

EXCLUSIVE: As the entertainment industry grapples with how AI will impact the business, production outfit End Cue has launched an in-house AI powered workflow platform to the wider global filmmaking industry, designed to help producers, streamers and studios help streamline their script coverage, scheduling and budgeting processes.

Dubbed RivetAI, the suite of tools analyzes potential projects and helps reduce the time producers spend on planning and producing content as well as streamlining script coverage for projects. It’s a platform that the company is now offering to the wider global production community after having used it in house on a number of its projects, most recently the Paul Mescal and Josh O’Connor romance title The History of Sound, which is currently shooting in Italy.

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“We’ve been interested in how AI was being harnessed across the last few years and it was more the streamlining processes that we felt this could help us in directly,” said Andrew Kortschak, co-founder at End Cue. “One of the best parts of my job is working with writers and directors and their own human creativity so using tools to hone in and make those things better appealed to us. There’s obviously been a narrative in the industry that AI will replace people but our philosophy with this platform is to elevate everybody and give them the tools to work faster and make more informed decisions without just pressing the button and seeing something new pop out.”

End Cue co-founder Walter Kortschak, a board trustee at Caltech, recruited two Caltech AI scientists – Debajyoti Ray and Sadaf Amouzegar – to form RivetAI and develop and commercialize these internal tools for the global market. The platform was incubated outside of End Cue and has been vetted by a raft of filmmakers so far. Producer Andrew Swett (Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse) collaborated with the team on this project and has used the platform for several ongoing productions so far.

Amouzegar, RivetAI co-founder and CEO, leads the creation and development of the company’s AI platform and has a wealth of expertise in the application of natural language processing, predictive analytics, anomaly detection and deep learning to architect data-driven solutions across multiple domains. Prior to RivetAI, she made her mark as co-founder and chief data scientist at an AI development agency known for its work with large companies such as Siemens and she’s worked as a software engineer and senior data scientist at institutions such as Qualcomm, Smartrac and SpaceX.

RivetAI’s platform aims to empower producers with what it describes as “unprecedented control” over movie production budgets, with a key feature being the ability to optimize crucial variables impacting production costs. Through the technology, producers can run detailed “what-if” cost scenarios, gaining insights into making informed decisions on production expenses. The platform is also built upon a foundation of Large Language Model enhanced through specialized training on End Cue’s own unique screenplay data, which involves sophisticated Natural Language Processing techniques to understand and analyze scripts.

RivetAI also leverages advanced deep learning and optimization algorithms, ensuring efficient resource allocation and cost-effective production planning.

“We understand on a grassroots level the challenges of independent filmmaking and were excited by the opportunity to harness emerging technologies to empower creatives to navigate some of the areas where projects most often get stuck,” said Andrew Kortschak. “The intention is to give independent producers, line producers and production companies access to a purpose-built program that rivals the proprietary internal tech that the streamers and studios base their greenlight processes off of. Optimizing variables that drive production costs is the biggest driver on whether feature films are greenlit, as the cost of production has risen at a significant rate given the Covid-19 pandemic, union rate hikes and inflation. With RivetAI, users can move into the production phase more informed than ever before.”

Amouzegar added: “With a background in data science and a passion for the arts, I am so proud to be able to provide a solution for some of the biggest roadblocks in film and television content production. AI can create a meaningful support for producers and creatives – and we’ve brought together a huge collection of research, innovation and drive to be able to get this tool to the point where we can launch it publicly. At its best, technology like this can democratise access to genuine support for projects as they navigate the various hurdles of cost projects, planning and scheduling.”

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