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This is veering somewhat off topic so all I will say is I operate within a niche within a niche. I have worked very hard for over a decade to be in this position. I'm not being bigheaded about it, but I'm not going to give or piss it away for either nothing or a fast buck. And I have no obligation to share that knowledge, paid or otherwise. As above, way off topic so I'll shut up about it 😘 But no John, it's terrible!

Here's my Panasonic 2024 travel setup: Generic bag Panasonic HC-VX980 (integrated 31-626mm lens), 2 batteries, USB power cord Panasonic GX800, 3 batteries, lenses (Panasonic 12-32mm, 17mm f/1.8, and 45mm f/1.8), USB charging cord Variable ND + CPL that fit both cameras Olympus LS-P4 audio recorder with wind muff 3 x SD cards The total weight: about 1650g. This setup is significantly less than my FF setup (especially considering I'd need a bigger bag, NDs, lenses, etc.). With the release of the new Panasonic 28-200mm, I thought I might get away with that but have since reconsidered. I like the idea of having two devices, one for video, one for photos and b-roll video. At $900, the 28-200mm's a decent deal IMO, given the size, but I'd probably need to sell the remainder of my M43 stuff. Also, I'd probably end up wanting more lenses for lower light with a FF setup.

The 3D animation stuff looks the scariest. Not my industry, but it looks like it's seriously coming to get that sector in the near future. They are first. The realism and uncanny valley issues are not so important. It's a really technically demanding field, so this will smash down barriers. Be interesting to see how people mitigate. For what it's worth, I think there will still be plenty of stuff for people to develop expertise in, it's just going to be quite a different load of stuff.

Maybe none! https://www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/robots-run-the-show-as-swiss-radio-station-tests-ai-voices-for-a-day-1.6374928

I'm sure all of the above. Point is people in those realms of media were already on edge and then along comes Sora. But to be clear, many already felt AI had the power to do this - so Sora is just confirming it.

@MrSMW, Why wouldn't you target some of the French speaking crowd? Given what I've seen in rural France, some of the photographers and videographers are fairly old-school. Bringing in different eye would be unique. I imagine your French is fairly good now.

You literally went out of your way to let us know you disagree with the way people are "obsessing" over these recent advances in AI. If that isn't a sign that you're bothered I'm not sure what is...

Lol, this is a forum FILLED with people "obsessing" over much less important stuff - but also - we all respond to cultural shifts like this differently - so if this thread bothers you, feel free to move along. I do it all the time.

All of this! But also as I said in an earlier post - everyone has their own way of coping in a moment like this - so I'm trying my best to not judge or engage when that seems to be the case.

I think people brushing this aside are being a bit short-sighted, bordering on naive. I'd say that what we've seen so far from text-to-image from machine learning has been - Quick developing. One month it's all fuzzy, the next month it's all smoothed out. One month there are 11 fingers on each hand, a year later there are only 6.😅 In other words - it iterates fast. Unpredictable. As even a tech-savvy person, it is really hard to predict what 'AI' (I don't like using that term) is going to be good at, and bad at - 🖐️! Far reaching. Useful. I'm not a particular enthusiast, but I have used Adobe's AI tools on around 75% of the projects I have delivered as a freelancer over the past 6 months or so. And that's just casually discovering things that make my life *tons* easier. I also believe them to be reasonably ethical, or I wouldn't be using them. Similarly, I think the impact of this will be quick developing and unpredictable. The biggest threat I think, may be that unpredictability itself. It's going to be very difficult developing a workflow, without knowing whether it will become undermined by a much easier AI pathway at some not-so-distant point. Example - I recently decided to really lean into doing 2.5d and true 3d animations from flat artworks as a client offering (for context, a lot of my clients are museums). To really develop skills in this using tools like Cinema 4D, Projection 3D, DUIK, etc. will take a couple of years of learning as I go. I very much doubt that AI will explode into use in that time, but certainly at some point just beyond that horizon I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a turnkey AI tool that offers very professional bespoke 3D animation from still images. That's very up AI's street. Aside from some very obvious things, like news gathering, I don't see anything that machine learning could not potentially impact within the foreseeable future. This includes - editing a corporate film from start to finish from supplied footage almost instantly, with several versions to choose from; writing a compelling and original television series (yes, I honestly believe that machines will be doing this); creating photo-realistic footage of any location in the world that has been photographed more than 3 times, etc., etc. Of the course the nature of unpredictability is that just as equally, none of this might happen. But I think the main point to make is that the scale of the threat (to professional livelihoods) is so profound, that anybody just blithely ignoring it has their head in the sand to my reckoning.

Feel free to take a gander below. Keep in mind I work as a producer on a talk program that directly intersects with terrestrial radio/tv, podcasts, pop journalism and film. There's also funding for several acclaimed/high end BIPOC tv shows/upcoming docs here in Canada that have either not been renewed or were not greenlit bcuz these cuts were on the horizon. Point is this was all happening BEFORE this Open AI/Sora news hit. https://apnews.com/article/canada-media-job-cuts-newscasts-bell-media-d02a5dbf200e86e333c227dbceecac68 https://www.cp24.com/news/bell-ends-some-ctv-newscasts-sells-radio-stations-in-media-shakeup-amid-layoffs-1.6761001 https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cbc-radio-canada-layoffs-budget-1.7048530 https://www.billboard.com/business/business-news/pitchfork-layoffs-restructuring-under-gq-1235583802/ https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/feb/21/buzzfeed-layoffs-complex-sale https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/television/acclaimed-cbc-bet-drama-the-porter-will-not-receive-a-second-season/article_748effd1-c40b-5c2b-b3c9-1a6eb132b1f1.html