Why should writers not be afraid of AI progress?

WGA writers are on strike. There were some serious copyright issues questioning current regulations because of artificial intelligence services. A kind of a panic…

One of my contacts in Twitter, a well-known Producer and Screenplay Writer, posted that AI news made him so sad that he stopped writing another script and got a kind of writing block. Doubts…

While my recent talk with peers working with AI closely, they repeated several time, “we are living in the era of deep fake”. Even marketing professionals are not happy, either.

My last writing job involved lots of communication with ChatGPT, too. Now I can recognize lots of ChatGPT clichés in posts around the Internet. Stop. What?

Yes, my dear readers, lots of writers or just marking-related workers rushed to use ChatGPT for their purposes and almost flooded the online space with low-meaning texts generated by AI.

And after all the mentioned above, I tell you – that’s OK. There is no fear about the true writers’ future if…

an AI generated fire flower,
an illustration for my novel "The Second Herald"

Just before my last project, connected with extensive use of ChatGPT for SEO, I have had a pleasure in meditations digging out ideas that still thrill me with their depth. It’s not a joke. I do not boast any intellectual abilities here. Those ideas are not mine at all. They are just ideas. And that’s the key point. All I did is just meditating. That’s all.

Just as the Bible says: “Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known” (Jeremiah 33:3), we have a source for wisdom and knowledge much more powerful than any AI tool. 

For those who are not a believer, I also have some ground to base your hope upon. Any true writer takes one’s inspiration and ideas from… life… Real life has always been and will always be much richer any artificial thing which is just a small particle in the living stream, nothing more. So, my dear peers, we should not be afraid of upcoming AI era. It has even its advantages I hope to discuss here in my blog or in social networks. 

Words to communicate, words to create…

There are such words in the Bible: “In the beginning the Word already existed…” (John 1:1) and further in the same passage we see: “But although the world was made through him (the Word), the world didn’t recognize him when he came…” (John 1:10).

I always thought that language and words, as its natural parts, are means for communication. I often repeated to my students that if they want to learn a foreign language, they should communicate, using this language. But… the mentioned above passage from the Bible made me think in other direction… How was that possible to have the Word before creation of the world? For what kind of communication could it be used?

Surely, someone may say that it’s too theosophical question with no relation to the real world. But I feel that some great truth lies in the answer to this question. And it’s very practical.

Ok, let’s say it in other way. Could you imagine a word that could create something new? Sure, you could. And it might be any situation from a word of a command addressed to a team of workers to a key word in some important negotiation. But all these known situations are related to some communication, anyway.

To create a world through a word, it should be a part of a communication. Of course, I understand that there are lots of thing I just can’t imagine at all, due to my limited senses. I do understand that the Bible was rewritten, revised, and translated many times. But… my mind has been just caught by this image, this idea of the world creation with one word. Isn’t that just beautiful and powerful?

Try to read the New Testament with this idea in mind that Jesus Christ was God’s Word. This might give us an idea about what features should have such a word with ability to create the world, the life. And the first features of this kind we see in the same chapter: “So the Word became human and lived here on earth among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness…” (John 1:14). The Word was full of Love and Faith – that’s what I feel a creative person needs in words to follow God’s ways creating and keeping life.

And the question about who God communed in His divine process of creation is still open to me…   

When the world’s getting too wordy…

Yesterday I finished drawing the last location for our animation pilot “Sunny and the meowing tree”. It will be our third short film where the story will be told without words. I’d wish to find a way how to fill every tiny part of an expressed idea with power to touch the audience's souls. Ideally, it might be just a single glance or a gesture giving some interesting experience.

Surely, I’m aware of me standing somewhere in the beginning of this way and being so distant from those masters who have inspired me – Charlie Chaplin, Slava Polunin, Rowan Atkinson…. But I believe it’s worth trying =)

Speaking of new project, it actually started almost 12 years ago as a short story, a comedy – “Miss Beam – the great artist”. Certainly, it was written after watching series about Mr. Bean. I was so impressed how skillfully Rowan Atkinson creates funny situations with minimum tools. But at the same time, being a positive person, I’d wish to have someone… sunnier 😊 Yup, that’s how miss Beam was born, but later I’ve found that miss Beam is taken by someone else.

First stories about miss Beam were welcomed by readers what gave me inspiration to write a sitcom series, but producers didn’t like the idea. Now I’m happy to have all necessary tools to produce my own films with my characters. Well, let’s see how the audience meet them…

My first international writer contract

This happened back in 2010, when I was on the search for a job and decided to test my fate at some point. I sent some CVs to New Zealand, to IT companies as a Technical Writer and my story “Higher than stars” to Japan, Tokyo, applying for International Festival “Story Circus”. I wished to see what God kept for me, which way is mine. As a result of that experiment, I didn’t receive any reply from New Zealand, but… Yes, my story got into Top20 best works of the Tokyo festival. Soon I received a contract from Marza Animation Planet, a branch of famous Sega Company. So, animation didn’t come into my life just out of blue…

In January I received also this wonderful card from Marza Animation Studio. It was so kind of them to send me these seasonal wishes…

Our new animation film "Elixir of Life"

Recently, I and my wife Ira finished working on our new animation film "Elixir of Life". It was a really interesting experience to see how a fairy tale I've written many years ago is coming into reality - slowly, scene by scene, but steady this story of an old alchemist, who received an expected present that changes his life, became visually real... 

By the way, our film has no dialogues - no language limits, the story will be told in the language of your heart. At least we hope so... Just in case you're curious about technical part, this film is a result of our work with Adobe Animate. If you wish to support our small family studio (just me and my wife), please, share the film with your friends. Thanks in advance.