Phil Galler, co-founder of Lux Machina Consulting, tells TVBEurope why he thinks AI/ML, lightfield and spatial displays will drive solutions for content creators, and why the company’s R&D department has a rule about presenting new ideas.
What impact has the pandemic and its continuing aftereffects had on the company’s approach to R&D and product development?
The pandemic has made it harder to get production-centric research done, we’ve worked around this by doing more in-house demos, classes, and projects, which helps to replicate semi-real production environments in an environment we can control. Also, many product offerings came about as part of the surge in virtual and digital production during Covid.
Seeing this, our approach changed to focus more on solutions that worked for digital production and physical production. In fact, our R&D department has a rule – no one can present an idea that only works for LED walls or in-camera visual effects (ICVFX); the idea has to apply to the broader entertainment industry. We see this being particularly important as many people are still focusing on ICVFX, but the tools we develop reach across many facets of the entertainment and technology industry.
What are the biggest challenges you are facing in R&D and product development/deployment in the current landscape?
The speed of development powered by AI presents significant challenges, largely related to how fast iteration has become, but also a reliance on inaccessible AI solutions. AI/ML is clearly a central focus for research right now, but it is difficult to wield properly and can cause more harm than good in many cases.
On the deployment side, there are so many channel partners or resellers it can be hard to identify key channels and the true stakeholders for product placement.
Where do you see the most opportune areas for innovation in your area of the market, and what tech/solutions will drive that development?
Creative solutions for quickly creating digital content that can be easily conformed to an end user’s needs i.e. smart digital assets. This is a huge growth area as more young customers focus on content creation.
AI/ML, lightfield and spatial displays will be tech that continues to grow in use to drive solutions for content creators.
What are you working on currently that excites you as a product team, and what can we expect to see at IBC 2023?
We are working on continuing to develop our ARCA platform, which, as a high-powered computer solution, works well for digital content creators, but also in providing the best in class service as a partnership with our ARCA customers – enabling them to have access to a well of knowledge that gives them the cutting edge.
