Why AI Hasn't Replaced VFX Artists (The Coffee Mug Problem)

Jan Klier was the lead VFX artist on GOOD BOY, the indie horror film told from a dog's point of view that became one of IFC's biggest openings ever, and he graded our last feature, The Hidden Tiger. He breaks down how AI is really being used in professional VFX: not “type a prompt, get a movie,” but as precise tools inside a real pipeline.

Behind the edit: every graphic in this episode, including the cold open, animated explainers, captions, tool callouts, and sound effects, was built with Claude working directly inside DaVinci Resolve. Michael made the creative calls; Claude did the heavy lifting.

In this episode

• Why prompting “until your fingers bleed” never gets you the exact shot, and how Jan gets it anyway with CG models, depth maps, and ComfyUI
• Building AI shots in stages: stills, image-to-video, first and last frame
• Depth maps, ML masking, and Foundry's new SmartRoto
• The Flame ML Morph node behind Good Boy's skeleton shot
• Which post jobs AI is replacing, and why VFX artists are getting busier

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