Enlight Movie World: Challenges and Implications of Virtual Production, Artificial Intelligence, and Automation in the Chinese Film Studio

This paper will present a case study of the digitization of the film industry in China with an emphasis on the film studio lot to illuminate the impacts these changes are having on the film industry. The case study will focus on the Enlight Movie World shooting base that is being built in Yangzhou, Jiangsu Province with the aims to develop the most technologically advanced production facility in the world. The facility is built by Beijing Enlight Media Company is one of China’s largest media conglomerates. The new shooting base will include key technologies such as virtual production with LED assemblies, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and augmented reality as well as automated production facilities. The facility will have an attached film school as a joint project between Enlight Media and by Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University.

Film and TV production is advancing rapidly and this paper will examine the digitization of the Chinese film industry and illuminate the impacts on workflows and the workforce through interviews with industry leaders, studio and shooting base executives, production workers, and insights from the developers of a new film school at the Enlight Movie World. The paper will illuminate the digitization of the Chinese film industry and the implications for the workforce, such as the utilization of AI in production workflows and the challenges of virtual production, as well the implications for workforce training.