I just spent two days at Amazon/MGM Studios in Culver City at AI on the Lot, the biggest AI filmmaking conference in the world. Paul Schrader, the man who wrote Taxi Driver, among other classics, stood up and walked the room through how he's writing with AI now. Studios that wouldn't say the word two years ago were on the main stage with their names on the work. Films are shipping. This isn't a prediction. It's happening, right now, in Culver City. And I want to say something to those of you who've been dragging your feet, or worse, nursing a grudge about it. I've made this argument before. When the Avid came out, I was one of the first to cut a studio project on it, and I spent a lot of time telling my friends to learn it before it passed them by. Some did. Some crossed their arms, said "That's not real editing," and waited it out. You know how that turned out. I'll be straight with you: the Avid was an easier sell. It obviously made our job better, faster, and more our own. This one's harder, because it doesn't feel like a new tool, it feels like it's coming for the job itself. I understand why that's scary. But hear me: it is not coming for you. Not if you're the one driving it. Here's the part nobody's saying: AI doesn't erase the editor. It puts the editor at the center. Everything becomes post. The person who knows story, rhythm, and how to finish a piece becomes more valuable when the tools get faster, not less. But only if you pick them up. You don't have to love it. You don't have to use all of it. You just have to stop pretending it's going away, sit down, and learn enough to have an opinion based on the tools instead of the fear. I wrote up the whole conference, every session, in this week's AIography newsletter. Read it. Not for the clicks, but so you can see with your own eyes that the people in our business are already doing this. Here is the link to the full newsletter.

We've got some new members to the community and I'd be great if you'd all introduce yourselves. Let us know what brought you to Master The Workflow and tell us how you came to editing in general. Also, for those who've been around for a while, let's hear what the big challenges you're facing? Is there anything in the course you're finding particularly difficult to grasp? Let's get a conversation going. --Larry