Knowledge Base

California SB 1050: disclosure of synthetic performers in video and audio advertising

Office of Governor Gavin Newsom (California)

• SB 1050, signed on 16 September 2026, requires explicit disclosure on any video or audio advertisement that uses AI-generated performers to sell a product or service.
• An advertisement found to be in violation may not continue to be used; California is the second state with such a rule, after New York.
• Authored by Senator Angelique Ashby and sponsored by SAG-AFTRA, which helped draft the language; signed at the union's Los Angeles headquarters.

Production & craft Rights, IP & training data Labour & workforce

Pitch Black extends Rising Sun Pictures' REVIZE machine-learning toolset to FOLKS, El Ranchito and Square One

Pitch Black

• REVIZE was developed at Rising Sun Pictures from 2018 and has been used on more than 30 films, including Elvis, Furiosa, Mickey 17 and Sinners.
• It covers face replacement, body replacement, cosmetic adjustment and performance refinement, growing from tens of shots to hundreds of applications on individual projects.
• Pitch Black is extending it to FOLKS, El Ranchito and Square One under Troy Tobin as Head of REVIZE (Research and Innovation).

Production & craft Rights, IP & training data

Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film (ITFS) 2027 regulations: generative-AI disclosure and labelling rule

Internationales Trickfilm-Festival Stuttgart (Film- und Medienfestival gGmbH)

• Entrants to ITFS 2027 must declare any use of generative AI in the production process, including systems used to generate or significantly alter images, animations, text, speech or music.
• Declared AI use does not automatically disqualify a film, but the festival may label or categorise films whose essential creative visual design was primarily created with generative AI.
• Intentionally false or misleading declarations can lead to exclusion; entry deadlines are 15 November 2026 for the short-film competitions and 15 January 2027 for features.

Governance & guidance

Statement of Interest of the United States on fair use in In re OpenAI, Inc. Copyright Infringement Litigation (S.D.N.Y., 1 September 2026)

United States Department of Justice

• On 1 September 2026 the United States told the court that copying written works to train large language models is, in general, fair use.
• The filing confines itself to the training stage, which it calls exceedingly transformative, and takes no position on acquisition of the works or on particular outputs.
• It is a statement of interest under 28 U.S.C. 517, not a ruling: it binds no court but records the executive branch's position, which later briefs will cite.

Rights, IP & training data

California SB 928: California State University faculty members and instructors of record must be human beings

California State Senate (Office of Senator Sabrina Cervantes)

• SB 928 requires that a faculty member and an instructor of record for a California State University course must be human beings.
• Signed by Governor Newsom on 27 August 2026; authored by Senator Sabrina Cervantes and sponsored by the California Faculty Association and the California Federation of Labor Unions.
• It regulates who may hold the teaching role, not the use of AI tools: coverage records that it does not prohibit employees from using AI to assist their work.

Labour & workforce Governance & guidance

National Cabinet backs national AI laws and mandatory data-centre standards (Australia, 26 August 2026)

Prime Minister of Australia (National Cabinet communique)

• On 26 August 2026 National Cabinet agreed the Commonwealth will legislate a nationally consistent framework setting minimum requirements for large data centres.
• Mandatory standards will cover data-centre energy, water and land use, with legislation intended for early 2027 including conditions associated with delivering AI training.
• The framework, AI laws in Australia's Interests, was announced on 15 July 2026 and now has the agreement of the Commonwealth and every state and territory.

Rights, IP & training data Governance & guidance

2026 Visual Effects & Animation World Atlas

HDRI Intelligence (Joseph Bell) · Joseph Bell

• The 2026 Atlas counts more than 140,000 VFX and animation professionals at 2,900 companies, with net workforce growth of 2.7 percent over 12 months.
• AI-specific roles are 0.1 percent of roles at traditional VFX and animation studios, up 68 percent in a year; the data shows no evidence of AI-driven job cuts.
• Los Angeles contracted 1.5 percent while Vancouver rebounded 11.3 percent; Mumbai is now the largest VFX hub in the world, and roto and paint roles grew 8.7 percent.

Production & craft Labour & workforce

A collaborative creation framework for experimental animation pedagogy integrating generative artificial intelligence and vibe coding

Frontiers in Psychology · Yadan Mao

• A five-week experimental animation course at Soochow University ran generative AI and Cursor-based vibe coding with 40 third-year digital media art students.
• Extraneous cognitive load fell from 3.91 to 2.90 and AI-partner perception rose from 3.30 to 4.09 across the course; there was no control group.
• Generative AI flattened non-human motion into scaling, drifting and morphing, so students coded the motion mechanics themselves; a final collaboration statement covered authorship.

Generative techniques Teaching, curriculum & assessment

Disney Q3 FY2026 shareholder letter: ILM, Pixar, Disney Research Studios and Imagineering named in the company's AI investment

The Walt Disney Company

• Disney's 5 August 2026 shareholder letter names ILM, Pixar, Disney Research Studios and Walt Disney Imagineering among teams it is investing in for AI.
• The letter pledges a creative process that will "always be human-centered, artist-driven, and creator-led".
• Every AI deployment the letter actually describes is on the parks side; it names no tool in use at ILM or Pixar.

Digital Omnibus on AI, Regulation (EU) 2026/1744: AI Act simplification in force, education high-risk compliance deferred to 2 December 2027

European Commission

• Regulation (EU) 2026/1744, the Digital Omnibus on AI, was published in the Official Journal on 24 July 2026 and entered into force on 27 July 2026.
• Rules for Annex III high-risk systems, including AI used in education, now apply from 2 December 2027; Annex I product-embedded systems from 2 August 2028.
• A new prohibition on nudification systems applies from 2 December 2026, and the Article 4 AI literacy duty is softened to measures supporting staff literacy.

Governance & guidance

Generative AI adoption in 3D animation production: a pipeline-wide empirical benchmark of early-career practitioner perceptions and the HGAI hybrid pipeline framework

Multimedia Tools and Applications · Sandeep Maithani

• A 2026 survey of 126 students, educators and early-career practitioners found generative AI used most in pre-production (storyboarding 45.6 percent, concept art 41.6 percent) and least in rigging (16 percent) and denoising (10.4 percent).
• Mean perceived reliability of current tools was 2.95 out of 5 (SD 1.07), with output inconsistency the dominant barrier at 46.4 percent; professionals adopt more intensively than students but rate reliability the same.
• The paper proposes a three-phase human-guided AI (HGAI) pipeline: AI-led pre-production, a hybrid mid-pipeline, and human-led technical stages.

Generative techniques Teaching, curriculum & assessment Labour & workforce

Disney Jr launches Ozzy Fox, its first series made with AI-native studio Animaj

Animation Magazine / C21Media

• Disney Jr quietly launched Ozzy Fox on YouTube and YouTube Kids in mid-July 2026: the first original series from AI studio Animaj, co-developed with Disney Jr.
• Disney and Animaj frame the series as creator-led, with Animaj's AI tools accelerating production workflows while creative teams drive storytelling and quality.
• Neither company has disclosed to what extent generative AI was used to develop and produce the series, a gap noted by the trade press.

Netflix Q2 2026 shareholder letter: GenAI workflows used in roughly 300 titles this year

Netflix, Inc.

• Netflix's Q2 2026 shareholder letter states GenAI workflows have been used in roughly 300 of its titles in 2026, with work concentrated in post-production.
• It is the first quantified, company-level disclosure of generative AI adoption scale from a major streamer.
• Netflix says the tools deliver higher quality output faster and at lower cost, citing complex sequences in Glory, Brasil 70 and The American Experiment.

Assuring quality learning in a gen AI-integrated future: The role of adaptive capabilities

TEQSA (Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency)

• Third resource in TEQSA's assessment reform series (24 June 2026), shifting emphasis from securing assessment against gen AI to developing student capabilities.
• Names evaluative judgement, critical thinking and ethical reasoning as adaptive capabilities tertiary education should deliberately develop.
• Offers evidence-informed approaches for assuring learning quality where gen AI is embedded in study and future work, under the Threshold Standards.

AI use tailored to creative-industry programmes requires institution-wide support (De Montfort University, Times Higher Education Campus)

Times Higher Education Campus · Shushma Patel

• De Montfort University's pro vice-chancellor for artificial intelligence reports that some creative students, including whole cohorts, oppose generative AI to the point of refusing to discuss it.
• Fashion Textile Design at DMU now requires students to reference the AI tools they use and the prompts they write, making visible how much of the work is theirs.
• Resources on authorship, copyright, ethics, environment and privacy, with staff and student development, run institution-wide through the DMU AI Campus Collective; implementation is tailored programme by programme.

Teaching, curriculum & assessment Governance & guidance

Code of Practice on marking and labelling AI-generated content

European Commission · European Commission

• The European Commission published a voluntary Code of Practice on marking and labelling AI-generated content on 10 June 2026.
• It helps providers and deployers meet AI Act Article 50 transparency duties, which apply from 2 August 2026.
• It covers machine-readable marking by providers and the disclosure or labelling of deepfakes and public-interest text by deployers.

AI Adoption Plan: Creative Industries

UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology · AI Champion for the Creative Industries

• DSIT published an AI Adoption Plan for the Creative Industries on 8 June 2026, authored by the sector AI Champion.
• Its lead principle is augmentation first: AI should support human creativity, not displace creative workers.
• It reports 51% of creative businesses use AI versus 33% across all businesses, and sets out eight practical steps.

Rights, IP & training data

What UK university AI policies actually do: a study of 96 institutions (HEPI Policy Note 71)

Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) · Illingworth, S.

• Analysis of UK university AI policies finds 41 per cent of 163 degree-awarding institutions have no easily findable public AI policy.
• Four exemplar policies are named, including creative-arts specialist Arts University Plymouth.
• A policy's hosting location predicts its function: misconduct-framework policies enforce compliance, learning-and-teaching policies educate.

Teaching, curriculum & assessment Governance & guidance

EU ratification of the Council of Europe Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence

Council of Europe

• The European Union ratified the Council of Europe Framework Convention on AI on 15 May 2026, the first binding international AI treaty.
• The Convention entered into force on 1 November 2025 and covers AI across public and private sectors, with education within its scope.
• Parties must ensure AI lifecycle activities comply with human rights, democracy and the rule of law, including risk assessments and remedies.

Governance & guidance

Netflix confirms INKubator, its artist-led, GenAI-native internal animation studio

Netflix statement, carried in full by Animation Magazine

• Netflix's INKubator launched quietly in March 2026 as an internal, artist-led, GenAI-native animation studio making experimental shorts and specials.
• Netflix describes an artist-focused environment for exploring how new tools and workflows, alongside traditional animation practices, can enhance storytelling.
• Netflix states that Netflix Animation Studios' films will continue to be made using traditional animation techniques and practices.