The letter

One letter a week, starting soon.

The week's signal, what opened and what the festivals did, and the editor's note. No tracking, no ads, nothing else.

We keep your address, your language and the date you joined, nothing else. Every letter has a one-click unsubscribe link that deletes the record.

Makers & tools

The models films are made with, and what changed. Dated, with the page each fact was checked on.

Kuaishou · China30 Sep 2026Kling 4.0A new version, announced on Kling's own blog.

Sources

ByteDance · China31 Jul 2026Seedance 2.530-second clips; plugins for Maya and Blender.

Sources

Google30 Jul 2026Google Flow and VeoFlow Sessions: short films by invited artists; the latest group was published on 30 July 2026.

Sources

Lightricks2026LTX-2.5Named in the titles of the LTX blog's posts (titles only).

Sources

Named by the makers

Tools the makers of our 16 films name; 11 films do not name theirs

VeoCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety), ANCESTRA (stated by Google, which made the film with the director)
ChatGPTCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
ComfyUICastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
Generative AI, including local LLMsTOKYO STORIES (stated by the festival programme)
Google Nano BananaCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
KlingCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
MidjourneyCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
RunwayCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
Seedance on DreaminaGATES (stated by the filmmaker)
TopazCastle Walls (stated by the makers, as reported by Variety)
“Supportive AI”Twins Hinahima (stated by the production (no tools named))