An Australian digital content designer has won a prize at an international AI film festival for a short documentary that uses artificial intelligence to depict the symbiotic relationship between a giant Amazonian tarantula and a tiny dotted humming frog inside the spider's burrow. Jodie Heenan's 'Guardians of the Burrow' took an award at the Omni international AI film festival, judged by a panel led by director Alex Proyas.
AI recreates an impossible wildlife scene
Heenan says no nature documentary crew, including those led by David Attenborough, has ever captured this relationship on film because the action occurs entirely inside the spider's lair. Lights and microscopic cameras would interfere with natural behaviour. 'Nobody's actually managed to capture [the spider and frog] on film in the wild, to my knowledge, so I thought that was a really great reason to use AI specifically,' she said. The film is entirely AI-generated, as stated on its YouTube page.
Controversy over AI in creative fields
AI remains a controversial tool among creatives, with concerns about copyright infringement and job displacement. Heenan is part of an international team established by California AI studio Fable, which has Amazon as a major investor, to reconstruct 44 minutes of Orson Welles' 'The Magnificent Ambersons' with the ending Welles originally wanted. The Orson Welles estate criticised the project, calling it 'a purely mechanical exercise without any of the uniquely innovative thinking or a creative force like Welles.'
Heenan defends AI as a creative tool
Heenan argues that AI can show the impossible and be used creatively. She researched how National Geographic, Animal Planet, and Attenborough's teams produce documentaries, deliberately avoiding AI's capacity for cheap special effects. 'No fancy camera tricks and morphs and warps, none of the fun stuff that AI can do that looks really cool,' she said. 'I almost wanted it be: you're in boring hotel room, you put on Nat Geo because there's nothing else on the TV, and you get sucked in.'
AI film festival winners from around the world
AI film-makers from the US, UK, Brazil, Ukraine, China, and Australia were among the Omni category winners. Canada's Robert Gaudette, a self-confessed 'middle age nobody' working in creative AI, won the best picture award for his eight-minute film 'A Face Only a Mother Could Love'. The film also won the $50,000 grand prix at the Runway AI film festival at New York's Lincoln Center in July 2024.
Gaudette's story of emotional connection through AI
Gaudette's film tells the poignant tale of Marcel Dupont, a physically disfigured man who perfects the waltz alone in his kitchen each night, convinced someone will eventually ask him to dance. 'I knew what type of story I wanted to tell, and I knew I wanted it to be different from what a lot of other people were doing in AI,' Gaudette said. He hopes the film counters criticisms that AI cannot craft emotionally resonant stories from uniquely human imagination. AI did not create the story—he did, using AI as one tool among many.
Addressing concerns about job displacement and copyright
Both Heenan and Gaudette acknowledge that AI will replace some jobs, but they believe new roles will emerge. Gaudette compared the shift to the transition from traditional film sets to CGI, which initially caused fear but ultimately led to larger teams on projects like Marvel films. 'If you look at a Marvel film nowadays, there's 300 to 400 people working on those projects, so there's been a net addition in terms of the economy and employment,' he said. He added that AI will bring 'unanticipated and unexpected new roles.'
Heenan sees AI as a democratic revolution
Heenan believes AI levels the playing field for storytellers without Hollywood resources. 'I don't need to wait for Hollywood to allow me in as a PA, then get the gracious gift of being able to maybe be on a film set to maybe make something one day,' she said. 'It's no longer a choice – do I spend my house deposit on making a short film? I can make a short film for $500.' She called this 'groundbreaking' for removing gatekeepers. Gaudette agreed, noting that three weeks ago nobody knew who he was, and he would have had zero potential for traditional funding.
