A filmmaker, writer, and poet reflects on the invitation from NSFF Mumbai—and the deeper conviction it sparked about the future of cinema, creativity, artificial intelligence, and the evolving landscape of AI filmmaking in India.
As a filmmaker, writer, and poet, I have spent years believing that storytelling is the most radical act a human being can commit. Whether I have been behind a camera, pressing words into a manuscript, or finding the precise cadence of a line of verse, the impulse has always been the same: to illuminate something true about the human experience. To be invited into a space dedicated entirely to young storytellers finding their own truths feels, to me, like coming home. I could see how filmmaking using AI is now being evolved among our youngsters of India.
The best films I have ever made is the 85 sec shortest film, which has no dialogs and conveys a strong message for our youth
“A good cinema need not have dialogues convey a message/story; visuals can tell story in most artistic manner”
— Avinash Tripathi, Filmmaker, Writer & Poet
About the National Students’ Film Festival
The National Students’ Film Festival (NSFF) is one of India’s most respected platforms for student filmmakers. It is a space where raw vision meets rigorous craft, where tomorrow’s voices in Indian cinema take their first courageous steps onto a national stage.
National Students’ Film Festival (NSFF) – https://www.nsff.in
The Book I Am Writing: AI in Filmmaking
As a filmmaker and writer navigating the extraordinary disruptions of this decade, I have found myself increasingly compelled by one profound question:
What happens to the art of cinema when artificial intelligence enters the room?
The answer, discovered through years of research, filmmaking practice, and deep study, is neither simple nor cause for fear. It is, in fact, the most exciting creative frontier I have encountered in my life as a filmmaker, writer, and poet. And so — I am writing the book.
As a filmmaker, my craft has always been about seeing what others miss. As a writer, it has been about finding the precise words for what cannot be spoken. And as a poet, it has been about understanding that meaning lives in the space between things — in the pause, the cut, the silence. AI, when used with intention, is beginning to understand those spaces too. And that is worth an entire book.
Artificial Intelligence will not replace the filmmaker’s soul. It will, for the first time, give that soul an infinite canvas—and the world will be richer for it.”
— AVINASH TRIPATH I
A Letter to Young Filmmakers
If you are a student filmmaker or dream of making it there one day—you are the most important storyteller alive today.
You are the first generation of filmmakers to grow up with AI as a native part of your creative toolkit. You are the first writer to ask an AI for a second opinion on your screenplay. You are the first poets of the moving image to generate a visual world from a single sentence of text. You exist at the exact intersection of everything my book is about, and I am writing it, in part, for you.
Do not let anyone tell you that using these tools diminishes your artistry. A filmmaker who uses AI intentionally is no different from a photographer who mastered the darkroom or a writer who moved from the typewriter to the word processor. The tool does not make the art. You make the art.
Also Read—Why Films should be in School Syllabi by Avinash Tripathi
