Welcome to Rendering, a Deadline column that sits at the intersection of AI and showbiz. Rendering examines how artificial intelligence is disrupting the entertainment industry, taking you into key battlegrounds and spotlighting the changemakers who are using the technology for better and for worse. Do you have an AI story? Rendering would like to hear from you: jkanter@deadline.com.
This week: As Oscar voting begins, we speak with filmmakers who have proudly used generative AI in their quest for a golden statuette.
Look under the hood of the 2025 Oscar contenders and you’ll see that AI has greased the engines of some films. Whether it’s a voice setting The Brutalist And Émilie Pérez, or the blue eyes of the Fremen in Dune: Part 2the technology was deployed and then (somewhat sheepishly) recognized during the campaign.
The big difference in 2026 will be films being qualified using generative AI proudly, perhaps for the first time in Oscar history. The technology isn’t just under the hood: in some cases, it’s in the car itself. It was no coincidence. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences changed its rules in April to make it clear that the Oscars’ doors were open to artificial intelligence. “These tools neither help nor hurt the chances of securing a nomination,” the organization said.
His proclamation came at a delicate moment in Hollywood’s dance with AI. The technology’s influence is inevitably growing, but the adoption of AI still turns off many of the authors who triumphed at the Oscars (Guillermo del Toro literally told AI to go fuck itself in recent weeks).
One person who has taken note of the Academy rule change is Craig Lew. A former Dreamworks animator, he saw an opportunity to “make history” by being part of the first wave of AI and Proud awards entries.
His short film, Ahimsaqualified in the Animated Shorts category after Lew filled out an Academy application form, in which he explained that he used Runway and Google Veo to create his visuals, although such transparency was not required. He spoke with Deadline Rendering » to increase voter awareness.
Ahimsa tells a serious story about how AI trained to meditate on children heals a world torn apart by technology. At first glance, detractors might dismiss this as AI screw-up, but Lew says detailed human work was incorporated into the final cut. The director used motion capture to bring the characters to life, animated AI backgrounds with his VFX skills, and turned to composer Dino Herrmann (Troy) to mark the court.
“It feels like AI because I’m not trying to fool anyone,” he says. “We’re ushering in a new look. Does this belong in the Academy race? Yes, it does. The AI is a paintbrush. It’s not the painter.”
“All heart”
Michael Govier and Will McCormack, the Oscar-winning filmmakers behind the animated short 2026 All heartecho Lew’s sentiment, but with one key difference: they used a closed AI model, trained only on their artwork. The duo teamed up with Asteria, the AI studio co-founded by Impassive face star Natasha Lyonne, we All heartwhich follows a father who meets a man with a connection to his late daughter.
“We created original illustrations and hand-animated sequences in a traditional way, then used AI at certain stages to explore visual possibilities, enhance textures, iterate on style, and accelerate the development of the look,” they explain. “AI has not replaced artists, it amplifies them.”
Another qualifier for an animated short film also offers tailor-made AI. Mati Granica Fleur_Ganwho won a bronze medal at the Academy’s student awards, used a custom-made generative adversarial network to create images of flowers, which he animated to create an anxiety-inducing polemic about the AI arms race.
Oscar-qualified animation director Lucas Ansel The 12-inch pianista cheerful (in every sense of the word) little comedy that uses traditional stop-motion, sees the value of bespoke AI as a step in a creative workflow. He’s uncomfortable, however, with his film rubbing shoulders with competitors using commercially available generative AI platforms that scrape the internet in opaque ways. “I don’t think there’s room for that,” he says. “You don’t create singular, unique art.”
As a new generation of Oscar nominees proudly uses AI, there are nuances how they use AI. This distinction is likely to become increasingly important as the debate around the technology evolves in the industry. Transparency will allow Academy members to vote with their eyes open. This seems like a step in the right direction, although some may be dismayed by the characterization of films as generative AI.
