Each day, we are seeing more and more generative AI-produced slop in our lives. While we’re being told that smaller studios and filmmakers are embracing the technology to cut costs, many are rebelling against it. Backrooms director Kane Parsons recently gave his less-than-favorable opinions on the polarizing technology.
“I think I’m in the same boat as most well-adjusted people,” Parsons tells The Australian. “If I could snap my fingers and make generative AI disappear forever, I probably would. Creatively, I get no enjoyment from using those tools. It defeats the purpose entirely for me.”
Parsons was a teen who built his Backrooms universe from the ground up on YouTube. He is exactly the kind of artist we are being told this technology is supposed to help. However, he chose to do it himself in Blender, the open-source 3D computer graphics software suite. He put the work in and learned the program instead of just writing a prompt and pushing a button.
Art Vs AI
“What interests me more is interrogating it artistically,” Parsons explains. “We already live in a world where you walk outside and there are billboards and signs that are obvious AI slop. That’s become part of our visual reality. To me, generative AI feels less like innovation than a symptom of a broader cultural and economic rot.”
“I’m interested in using that iconography in art – not using AI to make the art itself, but examining what it represents. I definitely want to explore it further in future projects,” the 20-year-old filmmaker adds. It’s also the fact that “… there’s so much at stake and so many genuinely harmful consequences already happening.” Like AI, devastating environmental impacts, on top of robbing art of artistry and the human touch.
Some readers may remember that independent filmmaker James L Edwards made similar comments to us about the technology hurting the industry. And if creators with small budgets, like Edwards or Parsons had for their original Backrooms series, then who is this really here to help? Plenty of filmmakers seem to be producing wonderful movies just fine without it.
You can catch Parsons Backrooms in the theaters now.
