Speaker 1: You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from
Speaker 1: KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2: KFI. It's Later with Moke Kelly. We're live everywhere in
Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app. Let's talk about special effects. Fawn Davis,
Speaker 2: who has been a previous guest on this show, is
Speaker 2: an alum of Lucasfilm worked there for ten years, worked
Speaker 2: on some of the biggest franchises known to cinema. Fawn,
Speaker 2: very quickly run down some of the franchises that your
Speaker 2: work is seen in. Oh boy, yes, Star Wars, Star Trek,
Speaker 2: Jurassic Park, Terminator. See, that's why I asked him to
Speaker 2: do it a lot, Transformers over forty five feature films today.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, yeah, forty five feature films to date. Also,
Speaker 2: you are featured in Light and Magic season two, which
Speaker 2: is streaming right now on Disney Plus. Very quickly, let's
Speaker 2: quickly review how you even got into special effects.
Speaker 3: For me, it was I was always driven to do
Speaker 3: it so And it's funny because in Light and Magic,
Speaker 3: I actually break down the whole story and they got
Speaker 3: pictures of me as a child even because yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 3: I was in grade school, elementary school. I saw Star Wars,
Speaker 3: and you know, I thought it was good like everyone else.
Speaker 3: But what really changed my path was seeing one of
Speaker 3: those behind the scenes books and seeing that they were
Speaker 3: model makers working, and I'm like, that's a job.
Speaker 4: I want that job.
Speaker 2: For someone who may be listening, they may think special
Speaker 2: effects is only CGI. They're not of the age where
Speaker 2: they remember the model making the practical effects that you
Speaker 2: specialized in. Even today, Yeah, what does that consist of
Speaker 2: these days?
Speaker 4: It's the same.
Speaker 3: We just we use a lot more technology and everything
Speaker 3: that we do with a lot of the end results
Speaker 3: of our work is still physical objects.
Speaker 4: It's like still CAD design.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we do. Yeah, everything starts in the computer.
Speaker 3: Now we do use three D printing a lot more
Speaker 3: than we have in the past. Even when those came out,
Speaker 3: it was still just another tool. But now we're really
Speaker 3: leaning in that pretty heavy CNC machines. We use those
Speaker 3: quite a bit too. They've been around for that is
Speaker 3: it's a computer controlled cutter. Basically, CNC's well, the technology
Speaker 3: can drive a laser, it can drive cutters, it can
Speaker 3: drive vinyl cutters and all kinds of devices, but CNC
Speaker 3: is specifically machining. Most of the time we use it
Speaker 3: for carving foam.
Speaker 2: For your job. What is the most important skill set?
Speaker 2: Is it someone who is good with their hands, or
Speaker 2: is this someone who's creatively brilliant and can see and
Speaker 2: have things materialized from their thoughts. What is it?
Speaker 3: I think it's a combination of dexterity and attention to detail, really,
Speaker 3: because if you have an extreme attention to detail, like
Speaker 3: most of our artists, you really can focus in on
Speaker 3: what makes something look real, you know, and no matter
Speaker 3: what scale you make it. So we do miniature as
Speaker 3: we do the reverse. We do oversized things.
Speaker 2: We do a lot of of course, real life sized objects.
Speaker 4: Our studio specializes in unusual.
Speaker 2: Things sci fi fantasy, yeah fhon Co Studios, and we.
Speaker 3: Still do a lot of practical but we also work
Speaker 3: directly with teams that are using virtual production and using
Speaker 3: computer graphics, and actually within the industry we do specify.
Speaker 3: Special effects are the effects that you do in front
Speaker 3: of a camera and the visual effects of the effects
Speaker 3: you do after photography, like in post.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's that's the major difference between those two.
Speaker 2: And we do special effects for visual effects, you know,
Speaker 2: you just blow them on mat. Tell me this when
Speaker 2: you're doing something for a Star Wars property, whatever that
Speaker 2: may be within that known universe.
Speaker 4: How much information are.
Speaker 2: You given or you're just told we need this star
Speaker 2: destory to look like it's coming over our head.
Speaker 4: One is you know.
Speaker 3: Samilar With They're usually really good about giving you enough
Speaker 3: to go on, but you're also expected to and it's
Speaker 3: my favorite part of the job. You're expected to make
Speaker 3: some stuff up. You might get a piece of concept
Speaker 3: art that shows one side of an object, you know,
Speaker 3: and then you have to figure out what it's going
Speaker 3: to look like on the back and all the sides
Speaker 3: and the parts that aren't visible to camera.
Speaker 4: How were in the in the illustration?
Speaker 2: Excuse me? How often are you tasked with creating something
Speaker 2: an effect or a model, something that has never been
Speaker 2: done before and you have to just go home and
Speaker 2: work shop it every day.
Speaker 4: It's my favorite part of the job.
Speaker 2: Give me an example, please.
Speaker 3: It's well, just you know, we'll start a project and
Speaker 3: the majority of the time clients come to us and
Speaker 3: they want to do something that's never been done before.
Speaker 3: That's what every director, every storyteller wants to do something new.
Speaker 3: So we'll have a meeting with them and after the
Speaker 3: meeting is done. You know, we get our team together
Speaker 3: and we start talking about how we actually going to
Speaker 3: achieve the design or the effect needed.
Speaker 2: If you're running the team, and I know you've had
Speaker 2: vary levels of responsibility over the course of your career,
Speaker 2: how closely are you working with a Steven Spielberg, a
Speaker 2: George Lucas or any prominent director.
Speaker 4: It varies wildly.
Speaker 3: You know, I'd say I've worked with directors more in
Speaker 3: pre production when we're trying to flush things out. Once
Speaker 3: you get into production, the special effects team, like as
Speaker 3: a model maker doing design work, you work really close
Speaker 3: with the director, and then once the production happens and
Speaker 3: it balloons out to two thousand people, a lot of
Speaker 3: times you're working with visual effects supervisors that are working
Speaker 3: with directly with the director and or maybe a production designer,
Speaker 3: so they really have an army of like people to
Speaker 3: complete these movies.
Speaker 4: Especially these days, because you'll have two thousand visual effects
Speaker 4: shots in a movie. It's not uncommon.
Speaker 2: Have you ever on into a project thinking like, I
Speaker 2: have no idea how in the hell we're going to
Speaker 2: do this, And then on the other side, wow, we
Speaker 2: really pulled that off.
Speaker 3: Every time? Yeah, we never know what we're gonna do
Speaker 3: before we start a project. You always can tap into
Speaker 3: the things that you've done before, but because they're asking
Speaker 3: you to do something new and different every time, there's
Speaker 3: only so much you can reach towards in your history
Speaker 3: to create something new, So you have to just lean
Speaker 3: into your you know, tools materials technique is what I
Speaker 3: always always go to, but it's it's a lot of
Speaker 3: there's a lot of testing involved, you know, we always
Speaker 3: have a whole thing. And I share this with younger
Speaker 3: people especially. You shouldn't be afraid of failure, but I
Speaker 3: do prefer to fail in private. And what that means
Speaker 3: is if you're running a company, you do all your
Speaker 3: tests when the client's not around, and then you have
Speaker 3: that way when you go into a meeting, you can
Speaker 3: show them what works instead of waste of time on
Speaker 3: things that didn't work. Also, if you're you know, even
Speaker 3: when I was working at high Ale Amazon model Maker,
Speaker 3: when I was.
Speaker 2: Industor Light and Magic for people don't know, yes.
Speaker 4: Correct, Industrial Light Magic.
Speaker 3: So when I was in their model shop and if
Speaker 3: I could see on the schedule that I was going
Speaker 3: to be asked to do something I've never done before,
Speaker 3: I would actually go home. I would study it and
Speaker 3: I would do it in my garage, so that when
Speaker 3: I got to the point where they asked me to
Speaker 3: do it, I looked like a pro and they never
Speaker 3: knew that I'd never done it before because I did
Speaker 3: all my failure at home. I think studying at home
Speaker 3: is underrated. I think that just approaching life as a
Speaker 3: student is a really great tool to aid in failing
Speaker 3: in private.
Speaker 2: Jing Right now in studios front of the show Special
Speaker 2: Effects and Visual Effects Wizard Fawn Davis. His company's Fonco,
Speaker 2: and we talked about visual effects and special effects in
Speaker 2: this segment. But there's also a robotics aspect to your career.
Speaker 2: Some may know you as a former judge for the
Speaker 2: show BattleBots, one of my favorite shows. You know something
Speaker 2: about that world of technology as well. Can we talk
Speaker 2: about that when we come back? Yeah? Absolutely, all right,
Speaker 2: let's do it. It's Later with mo Kelly. Fon Davis
Speaker 2: joins me in studio.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Later with mo Kelly on demand from
Speaker 1: KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2: It's Later with mo Kelly live everywhere in the iHeartRadio
Speaker 2: app and if you're just tuning in my guests in
Speaker 2: studio Von Davis of fon Co Studios. He is a
Speaker 2: visual effects special effects wizard. He has been in the
Speaker 2: game for I don't know, thirty five forty years at
Speaker 2: this point, is that ak?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, a little over thirty five years.
Speaker 2: Also, I know of you as a former judge for
Speaker 2: the show battle Box. You know a little something about
Speaker 2: robotic technology. You are also a participant and competitor at
Speaker 2: one point. Yeah, when you look at robotics today, where
Speaker 2: do you think that is going?
Speaker 4: And where are we?
Speaker 2: Where would you put us in the spectrum of a progress?
Speaker 4: A progression? Oh, it's pretty funny.
Speaker 3: Because I work in robotics, I actually see a I
Speaker 3: actually get really frustrated because I expect us to be
Speaker 3: moving a lot faster with the technology than we are.
Speaker 3: And you see a lot of promises since the eighties.
Speaker 3: Really we've been promised to robot to go grab as
Speaker 3: strings from the fridge, right, I'm still waiting for it.
Speaker 2: But don't we kind of have that the way we
Speaker 2: have the little roombo which will clean the room. I
Speaker 2: mean we have robots on a smaller level. We do
Speaker 2: household items.
Speaker 3: We do and you could classify some of the technology
Speaker 3: that we use for fabrication, or three D printers as
Speaker 3: little robots. I feel like the three D printers in
Speaker 3: particular feel like robot helpers. They'll work when you go home, right,
Speaker 3: just great. But I still really want to see just
Speaker 3: me personally too. I want to see more consumer robots
Speaker 3: beyond the rumba, you know, okay, something something that can
Speaker 3: actually like you see a lot of experimentation happening with
Speaker 3: humanoid robots right now, like Boston Dynamic, Yeah, Boston Dynamics.
Speaker 4: Tesla's got a robot. There's a lot of.
Speaker 2: Companies in China creating these humanoid robots.
Speaker 3: But it feels like, you know, I've just learned to
Speaker 3: kind of recognize this through the years about technology.
Speaker 4: It seems like they've hit a bit of a wall.
Speaker 2: If they've hit a wall, let's combine what we were
Speaker 2: talking about last segment with this segment.
Speaker 4: Let's talk about cinema.
Speaker 2: How close are we to the world of eye robot
Speaker 2: for example? How close are we to I don't want
Speaker 2: to say the terminator, but you know, how close are
Speaker 2: we to that humanoid assistant or presence in our homes?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I think that's the wall that's been hit. You know,
Speaker 3: there's a lot of stuff happening with AI, and of
Speaker 3: course AI is going to be a fundamental core component
Speaker 3: of humanoid robotics in our daily life. I think, you know,
Speaker 3: I feel like the label AI is being slapped on
Speaker 3: a lot of things is just software. You know, chatbots
Speaker 3: has been around forever, for example, true, now chatbots are AI.
Speaker 2: You know, it's like l M is another term that
Speaker 2: has thrown out their language learning models. Yeah, where more
Speaker 2: than software is software that evolves in its own space.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, but I think I think there's more, there's
Speaker 3: more programmers involvement than most companies want to.
Speaker 4: Kind of reveal.
Speaker 3: Because speaking again, this is just my perspective on all
Speaker 3: of it, because I do a lot of work in technology,
Speaker 3: it feels like there's a lot of protecting the companies
Speaker 3: in you know, so they can get investment. Whenever there's
Speaker 3: a lot of investment in new new technology, there's an
Speaker 3: incentive for technology companies to kind of exaggerate their success
Speaker 3: their successes and to hide their failures.
Speaker 2: Okay, let me let me jump in there because we
Speaker 2: have an ongoing discussion on the show about self driving vehicles,
Speaker 2: autonomous vehicles, robotaxis, that's not the hugeoid robot, but I
Speaker 2: would say that's the combination of AI and also robotic technology.
Speaker 2: If you were to get in a way, moo, where
Speaker 2: do you see that aspect of technology going. That's I
Speaker 2: feel like WEIMO has already brought us there. I think
Speaker 2: it's just a matter of time for or driverless vehicles
Speaker 2: to be to become more commonplace. Okay, let's talk about
Speaker 2: cinema and also this. When I think of self driving cars,
Speaker 2: I think about movies like of course I robot. I
Speaker 2: think of the fifth element. I think of what other
Speaker 2: ones minority report, all sorts of examples in cinema where
Speaker 2: we have this self driving technology, is it that we
Speaker 2: do not have the infrastructure to accommodate it, or is
Speaker 2: the technology not quite ready.
Speaker 4: For consumer use?
Speaker 3: I think for something as sophisticated as driving a human
Speaker 3: form like a humanoid robot, the technology has got a
Speaker 3: long ways to go. A car is weirdly much much
Speaker 3: more simple in terms of the math that is required
Speaker 3: to operate it. Not saying it's simple, but it's more
Speaker 3: simple than driving a human body, you know, hands, fingers,
Speaker 3: oh so in other words, just the you know, awareness
Speaker 3: of the surroundings.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: The road is a confined kind of formula, you know,
Speaker 3: but but you step into what humans encounter in a
Speaker 3: day and.
Speaker 4: It becomes a lot more complicated.
Speaker 2: So we're not going to have Johnny Cab like in
Speaker 2: uh Total Recall, where you have the humanoid driver, but
Speaker 2: we will have the autonomous vehicle.
Speaker 3: I think you could end up with a human just
Speaker 3: to make people a humanoid robot.
Speaker 2: Attached to a car, but it's not actually driving a car. No, no,
Speaker 2: probably not well, and you wouldn't need it, you know. Uh,
Speaker 2: it's always funny to see science fiction, even in Star
Speaker 2: Wars some cases, you know, robots drive vehicles when the
Speaker 2: vehicles themselves can be robots, and they have some of
Speaker 2: that too. But I think to make I think robots
Speaker 2: are going to be utilized a lot more just to
Speaker 2: make people feel comfortable, you know, because because a humanoid robot,
Speaker 2: the anthropomorphic design is going to lend itself to people
Speaker 2: being more comfortable with technology.
Speaker 4: See.
Speaker 2: I feel actually less comfortable with seeing that anthropomorphic humanoid
Speaker 2: thing because you can't get the facial expressions right, that
Speaker 2: the eye contact focus right.
Speaker 4: It just seems oh disconcerted. Yeah, yeah, I don't mean like.
Speaker 3: One to one human copies that kind of like replicants
Speaker 3: from Blader on or anything.
Speaker 4: Keep going. I'm thinking more like.
Speaker 2: I'm thinking more like, you know, you look at the
Speaker 2: robots and it looks at Johnny five, okay or Wally right,
Speaker 2: you know those there's like this short circuit Johnny five right,
Speaker 2: right exactly, And and those robots really connected with people.
Speaker 2: But if you take a robot and you make it
Speaker 2: try to make it look human, like literally really human,
Speaker 2: then it just gets creepy.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it does.
Speaker 2: And I know some countries they do have the humanoid human,
Speaker 2: you know, trunck facing, like in Japan they will have
Speaker 2: like the concierge, which is supposed to be human presenting robots.
Speaker 4: And that's unsettling to me.
Speaker 3: That is, yeah, And I think that's the that's one
Speaker 3: of the walls that this technology is going to hit.
Speaker 3: And I mean that from not just the robotics side,
Speaker 3: but just AI in general. Just the idea that you
Speaker 3: can you can mimic humans, but to copy humans is
Speaker 3: a whole different thing.
Speaker 2: When we come back, I want to go now further
Speaker 2: down this AI path. We talked about special effects, visual effects.
Speaker 2: Now we talked about robotics and how it's going to
Speaker 2: be integrated with AI. I want to have this conversation
Speaker 2: with you about where we are with AI and where
Speaker 2: you expect it to go in five ten years.
Speaker 4: If you're just tuning in, My guest is Fon Davis.
Speaker 2: We started off talking about the second season of Light
Speaker 2: and Magic, Season two, which is now streaming on Disney Plus.
Speaker 2: Fon Davis is promintly featured in all three episodes. He
Speaker 2: is an alum of Lucasfilm more than ten years in
Speaker 2: the special effects and visual effects Wizard. When we come back,
Speaker 2: when we get into a Hi, it's Later with mo Kelly.
Speaker 2: I Am six forty Live Everywhere in the iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Later with Mo Kelly on demand from KFI.
Speaker 1: AM six forty is Later with mo Kelly Live everywhere
Speaker 1: in the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2: My guest in studio is Fawn Davis of fon Co Studios.
Speaker 2: He is a visual effects a special effects expert. He's
Speaker 2: worked on every major franchise in cinematic history.
Speaker 4: I'm not really exaggerating.
Speaker 2: He could run him down, but we would be here
Speaker 2: all night and at the beginning of our conversation. We
Speaker 2: were talking about his involvement in the show Light and
Speaker 2: Magic and it's in season two. All episodes are now
Speaker 2: streaming on Disney Plus, talking about special effects, visual effects,
Speaker 2: and in this conversation we touched on that. We touched
Speaker 2: on robotics and its future according to Fawn, and now
Speaker 2: I want to get into where we are as you
Speaker 2: see it fonn Davis with AI and where we're headed.
Speaker 2: Let me couch it like this. More and more discussion
Speaker 2: is being had about the singularity, the point where AI
Speaker 2: surpasses human intelligence and becomes capable of self improvement. You know,
Speaker 2: it's just it doesn't need us anymore. From where you sit,
Speaker 2: from what you know about robotics, from what you know
Speaker 2: about AIK, how close do you think we are and
Speaker 2: what implications might that be?
Speaker 3: I don't know if I feel like this is probably
Speaker 3: not a popular opinion right now, because people really really
Speaker 3: love touting the achievements of AI, and they should be rightly.
Speaker 3: So it's come a long long way and it's really
Speaker 3: hit some huge mind milestones this year. But but in
Speaker 3: my opinion, I think that they've like I said, I
Speaker 3: think they've hit a wall in terms of like the singularity.
Speaker 4: I just don't think we're anywhere near it.
Speaker 3: I often draw a graph, and this is actually referring
Speaker 3: to visual effects. Like you know, one percent of the
Speaker 3: work is creating a shot. Ninety nine percent of the
Speaker 3: work that you put into a shot is making it
Speaker 3: look real. So one percent is to create it, ninety
Speaker 3: nine percent is to make it look real. And I
Speaker 3: think that that AI is right now is at that
Speaker 3: one percent.
Speaker 2: Let me push back on that big conspiracy theorist for
Speaker 2: a second. I remember seeing satellite photos from the nineteen
Speaker 2: sixties which were very advanced, and I would say maybe
Speaker 2: twenty thirty years ahead of our consumer level access to
Speaker 2: satellite photos that we take for granted now on our GPS,
Speaker 2: for example. I say that to say, I'm quite sure
Speaker 2: the military is way beyond our consumer level consumption of AI.
Speaker 2: And might that change the equation?
Speaker 3: No, Okay, I don't think so, because, like I said,
Speaker 3: I I think that we're scratching the surface.
Speaker 4: I really do.
Speaker 3: And a good example of that is if you look
Speaker 3: at was it vo Vo three from Google just came
Speaker 3: out with a bunch of new videos. I watched a
Speaker 3: bunch of those on my phone and I'm like, oh
Speaker 3: my god, they did it. They did it, And then
Speaker 3: I went home and I brought I put it up
Speaker 3: on my big television.
Speaker 2: So I'm sorry to interrupt you when you say they
Speaker 2: did it, they passed at.
Speaker 3: Well, no, they just they in their piece of technology,
Speaker 3: they've created audio and video in AI of humans that
Speaker 3: look on my phone, they look pretty good, pretty impressive.
Speaker 3: But then when I put them up on my television,
Speaker 3: the mouth, mouth shapes are weird, the eyes do weird things.
Speaker 3: It's it's the same thing that Visual Effects has been
Speaker 3: struggling with for decades, trying to make you know, computer
Speaker 3: rendered humans look real. They've they've come a long way,
Speaker 3: and they get really really close, but it's it's just
Speaker 3: uncanny and weird looking, and I think it'll continue to
Speaker 3: be there for quite a long time. I'm predicting decades
Speaker 3: before AI can actually generate believable human beings, and I
Speaker 3: could totally be wrong, but I just I've seen this
Speaker 3: so many times, the promise of a technology solving something like,
Speaker 3: you know, human performances, and I just I just don't.
Speaker 4: I don't buy it. I don't buy it.
Speaker 2: All right, let me ask this then, as you know
Speaker 2: as a cautionary tale, what is the worst case scenario
Speaker 2: from where you sit as far as the use or
Speaker 2: implementation of AI.
Speaker 3: Well, obviously, because I work in visual effects, I mean
Speaker 3: the worst.
Speaker 4: Case would be there.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, Well, well we know it's going to replace
Speaker 2: people's jobs. We know that, and yet it will and
Speaker 2: it has and I think, but I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't see AI generating with true creativity. You know,
Speaker 3: as an example, if you if you have an AI
Speaker 3: generate a armored suit, a space armored suit, right, you know,
Speaker 3: being a designer, I can look at it and I
Speaker 3: could go, oh, that piece is from Star Wars, that
Speaker 3: piece is from tron Legacy, that piece is from a
Speaker 3: fifties sci fi you know, I can see the influences.
Speaker 3: I could see exactly where it drew its references from.
Speaker 2: It's too literal in the way it learns. It has
Speaker 2: to it's not creative. It has to drop on information.
Speaker 2: It's been fit in one second, And Mark Runer, I
Speaker 2: want to bring you into this conversation right now, because Mark,
Speaker 2: who's our newsman. We have this conversation all the time
Speaker 2: about AI and the type of scripts it may generate,
Speaker 2: how it may impact the movie industry.
Speaker 4: Mark ask it the way you want to ask it.
Speaker 5: Well, I'll tell you that if an AI writes a script,
Speaker 5: then only an AI should read a script.
Speaker 2: The purpose of art is for.
Speaker 5: Connecting with other humans and becoming more of a human yourself.
Speaker 5: I have no interest in AI generated art. There's a
Speaker 5: really narrow bandwidth of things where AI can be used
Speaker 5: legitimately in art. Maybe special effects is one of them.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I feel like maybe an advertising in commercials, but
Speaker 3: true narrative storytelling. I agree with you. I think that
Speaker 3: every aspect of storytelling, to achieve the nuance and to
Speaker 3: achieve that connection with people, it has to be done
Speaker 3: by a person.
Speaker 2: I think that's altruistic and I think that's personal preference.
Speaker 3: But we also know that Hollywood is money driven. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: but I also a lot of money. Yeah, and that's
Speaker 3: why I also think the technology is not there yet.
Speaker 3: You know, to further back that that feeling and it
Speaker 3: is strictly technical. This is not me just wanting to
Speaker 3: protect my job. I mean, why would I fight something
Speaker 3: that's inevitable. But I don't think it's inevitable because I
Speaker 3: can design something and we do on a daily basis,
Speaker 3: we're designing things, and I can I can say I'm
Speaker 3: going to draw from a dragonfly, and I'm going to
Speaker 3: draw from aviation, and I'm gonna make an aircraft that
Speaker 3: has a vibe of those two things. But I'm not
Speaker 3: gonna take literally pieces from someone else's work or literally
Speaker 3: things that exist in the world and combine them to
Speaker 3: do that. I'm gonna draw a line, and I'm gonna say,
Speaker 3: what is this? What blends with this line? That gets
Speaker 3: me where I want to go as an artist? And
Speaker 3: there's so much nuance in all of that that that
Speaker 3: AI has never proven itself capable.
Speaker 5: Yes, I'm glad you used the word inevitable because I
Speaker 5: keep seeing this debunked more and more that inevitability is
Speaker 5: just something we have to face when it comes to AI.
Speaker 5: When it's more and more clear to me and from
Speaker 5: everything I read that people don't really want it and
Speaker 5: it's being forced upon us, especially this inevitability line. What
Speaker 5: do you think about that? Yeah, I think all of
Speaker 5: that is just salesmanship. Honestly, it's the people who are
Speaker 5: saying that are the ones benefiting from investors pouring money
Speaker 5: all over this technology.
Speaker 2: You always follow the money. That's exactly right. Okay, let
Speaker 2: me add to that, though, But can't inevitability be I'll
Speaker 2: say it may vary. In other words, it's inevitable I'm
Speaker 2: going to die, not to be morbid. But I don't
Speaker 2: know when that data is going to come. I don't
Speaker 2: know if I'm very close or still years and years off.
Speaker 2: Can't the same be said about the inevitability the supposed
Speaker 2: inevitability of AI.
Speaker 4: We know it's.
Speaker 2: Coming, but it may not be as close as some
Speaker 2: have theorized.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I've not seen anything to indicate that they're remotely close
Speaker 3: to what they say they're close to. But it's already
Speaker 3: taking jobs, it is, and it's taking mathematic jobs. It's
Speaker 3: taking it's taking jobs that rely on statistics and solid
Speaker 3: you know, kind of formulaic you know, equations and research.
Speaker 3: I think there's a place for it. I think it's great.
Speaker 3: I think it's there's a lot of places in science
Speaker 3: for it. There are places for it in visual effects,
Speaker 3: but I don't think storytelling is one of them.
Speaker 2: When we come back Fon Davis, let's close out our conversation.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Star Wars celebration in Japan and you're
Speaker 2: doing something with Beyonce.
Speaker 4: Do I have that right? That is correct?
Speaker 2: All right, don't tell us now, we'll tell us on
Speaker 2: the other side. Fon Davis joins me in studios. We
Speaker 2: talk about the world and how it's changing so quickly
Speaker 2: and much to Mark Runners delight. AI is not going
Speaker 2: to take over as of yet, it's not quite inevitable.
Speaker 2: I Am six forty is Later with mo Kelly.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Later with mo Kelly on demand from
Speaker 1: KFI AM six forty KFI.
Speaker 2: It's Later with mo Kelly. We're live everywhere in the
Speaker 2: iHeartRadio app. No video simulcast tonight. We're just live radio,
Speaker 2: old school style. And my guest in studio for the
Speaker 2: better part of this hour has been Fon Davis of
Speaker 2: fon Co Studios. He is in a lum of lucasfilm,
Speaker 2: worked there ten years. He has a new show, which
Speaker 2: is Light and Magic Season two, which is streaming right
Speaker 2: now on Disney Plus. He's prominently featured in all three
Speaker 2: of its episodes and fun You just came back. I
Speaker 2: wouldn't say just came back, but you know, a couple
Speaker 2: months ago came back from a Star Wars celebration in Japan. Correct, Yes, great, okay,
Speaker 2: I'm just kind of envious of you. What was that, like,
Speaker 2: what happened? Oh man? Well, first of all, Japan is amazing.
Speaker 3: We we went to my partner and I went to
Speaker 3: Star Wars celebration and then we spent almost a month
Speaker 3: in Japan.
Speaker 4: Oh so you did just kind of just give back,
Speaker 4: we did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but yeah, No, Star Wars celebration is always amazing
Speaker 3: because it's it's well, you've been to cons before. It's
Speaker 3: it's it's a celebration of you know, art and creativity
Speaker 3: and fans and artists and I don't know, to get
Speaker 3: that many people together that want to be in any place.
Speaker 4: It's always my favorite thing about But is.
Speaker 2: It a different Khan if you will, culturally because it's
Speaker 2: in Japan as opposed to let's say San Diego.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, you know, I would say traveling anywhere
Speaker 3: in the world, you have to do a little bit
Speaker 3: of study to just kind of understand what the local
Speaker 3: customs are. I think whenever you travel to Asia specifically,
Speaker 3: it's definitely the furthest from Western culture. So there are
Speaker 3: things like you bow to greet people, you tend to
Speaker 3: show less emotion in public, you know, yeah and so,
Speaker 3: and I don't know. You just I think, just out
Speaker 3: of respect for people, you learn, you know, some of
Speaker 3: the key phrases. You need to get by and try
Speaker 3: to use the language whenever you can. So, yeah, I
Speaker 3: don't know. I love travel because I love food and
Speaker 3: the food reason it is amazing. They have a okinoma
Speaker 3: yaki Hiroshima style. It's like a crape with vegetables and
Speaker 3: noodles in it and it's made just a little crispy
Speaker 3: with delicious sauce. Oh, I just found out in Los Angeles,
Speaker 3: where I live. They do have it in little Tokyo.
Speaker 3: So let me ask you this as it aside. You
Speaker 3: were born in Vietnam, correct, that's correct. Have you been
Speaker 3: back to Vietnam?
Speaker 4: I did. It was a life changing trip.
Speaker 3: I went back in the nineties when they first opened
Speaker 3: a US embassy in Vietnam, and so not a lot
Speaker 3: had changed because of all of the restrictions on trade.
Speaker 4: Which is kind of in the news right now. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like Vietnam was kind of left in the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 3: So I went there in the nineties and they were
Speaker 3: driving around on motorcycles from the sixties and seventies, and
Speaker 3: even Vietnam Airlines had some very old scary planes, you know,
Speaker 3: flying domestically within Vietnam. It was a very very different experience.
Speaker 3: And what I hear it's like now, I haven't gone
Speaker 3: back since. But weirdly, I was born there, but my
Speaker 3: father was American. He was in the Air Force. He
Speaker 3: was from Oklahoma, and my mother was born in a
Speaker 3: village outside of Saigon and they met there, so so
Speaker 3: I'm half So when I went back to Vietnam, they
Speaker 3: did not treat me. I was like, oh, my people,
Speaker 3: I'm going to go to my homeland, you know, and they.
Speaker 4: Were like, no, not at all. I'm not laughing at you,
Speaker 4: but no, it was. It was.
Speaker 3: That's I think why it was such a life changing
Speaker 3: event for me, because it really helped me to find
Speaker 3: who I am as a person, because I grew up
Speaker 3: in America and I thought, I'm a Vietnamese American and
Speaker 3: I'm so proud of my Asian heritage and I'm I
Speaker 3: just felt and also because I look, I'm brown, people
Speaker 3: identify me as Asian more than they identify me as
Speaker 3: American growing up.
Speaker 4: So when I went there and they were like, no,
Speaker 4: you're not.
Speaker 3: That was really shocking, and it made me realiz, how
Speaker 3: you know, for lack of a better description, how white
Speaker 3: I really am. I'm one hundred percent American. I am
Speaker 3: not in their eyes at least in my eyes too.
Speaker 3: After that trip, really because it was I realized how
Speaker 3: different I am because I grew up here.
Speaker 4: I am. I'm a you know, I'm just American.
Speaker 3: I don't feel like an Asian American so much outside
Speaker 3: of my appearance. And I do appreciate my my family history,
Speaker 3: and I have an appreciation for those things, but as
Speaker 3: far as my personality goes, I'm one hundred percent American.
Speaker 2: Before I let you go, I tease this that you
Speaker 2: have something in the works, as best you can tell me,
Speaker 2: because I know there's a cloud of secrecy around a
Speaker 2: lot of what you do because manytimes, you can't tell
Speaker 2: us about the movies you're working on, the franchises you're
Speaker 2: associated with. I assume there's the same level of non
Speaker 2: disclosure here with Beyonce. But what can you tell.
Speaker 3: Us, Oh, well, that one actually she's on tour now,
Speaker 3: as we all know. So your work is so, our
Speaker 3: work is done. It's it's there's videos playing behind her
Speaker 3: while she's performing, and we did a number of the
Speaker 3: miniature effects for her video show.
Speaker 2: That's kind of cool.
Speaker 4: It's really cool.
Speaker 3: We didn't even know there was so much secrecy around
Speaker 3: it while we were doing it. I'm sure we didn't
Speaker 3: know it was for her tour. We thought we were
Speaker 3: working on a music video. But you know, when you
Speaker 3: when you work on really top secret, high profile things,
Speaker 3: you get the information for your little component of the show.
Speaker 4: When when you're not told anything else, when you.
Speaker 2: Read it, when did you realize, like, oh, this is
Speaker 2: going to be going around the world. It's going to
Speaker 2: be on the screens right behind her when she's doing
Speaker 2: her thing.
Speaker 3: The funny thing is we found out when she went
Speaker 3: on tour this like all you say, someone saw it.
Speaker 4: Someone saw it.
Speaker 3: Videos were leaked onto the internet and someone forwarded me
Speaker 3: one and I was like, oh, there it is. No
Speaker 3: one told you, and then of course somebody takes those
Speaker 3: videos down immediately, right, But no no one ever told us.
Speaker 4: And that's that's common. That's pretty common.
Speaker 2: I'm quote.
Speaker 4: I'm quite sure that concept the agreement.
Speaker 2: You know, they did what they were going to do,
Speaker 2: what they promise, but you would think somewhere in there
Speaker 2: someone or at least would have given you a heads up.
Speaker 4: No, not at all.
Speaker 3: Well, and you know, to be fair, we work on
Speaker 3: about a dozen projects at a time, so I don't
Speaker 3: even know if our interest is in what we did before.
Speaker 3: Of course, when we find out, it's always exciting at
Speaker 3: a personal level, but professionally you've moved on to the
Speaker 3: next twelve projects and you just you know, it's a
Speaker 3: little factory of work that we're always kind of in
Speaker 3: the grind, So we don't think about projects once we've
Speaker 3: left them, you know, until they get presented in front
Speaker 3: of us.
Speaker 2: You have sat with me I don't know, maybe four
Speaker 2: or five times over the years since the beginning when
Speaker 2: I had the bo Kelly Show Saturdays and Sundays here
Speaker 2: on KFI, and each time you come in I learned
Speaker 2: something new. We got to have you on more regularly
Speaker 2: in the future. I don't know how that's going to happen.
Speaker 2: I don't know how we're going to create it. As
Speaker 2: they say, I'll work shop it and see if we
Speaker 2: can find a way. Because your insight has to robotics AI,
Speaker 2: all this ever changing world that's happening around us. I
Speaker 2: would love to be able to get your insights. So
Speaker 2: I'm just going to say thank you for coming on
Speaker 2: tonight and I'll see you soon.
Speaker 4: Fond Davis, I certainly hope, so I love it here
Speaker 4: very quickly.
Speaker 2: Is there a way that an aspiring effects artists might
Speaker 2: be able to reach out to you?
Speaker 3: The best thing to do if you want to see
Speaker 3: some of the you know, share in some of the
Speaker 3: things that I, you know, teach. I teach with the
Speaker 3: stan Winston School, and I share a lot of the
Speaker 3: knowledge that I have in very specific areas. In fact,
Speaker 3: we just came out with a new lesson that focuses
Speaker 3: on technology in fabrication.
Speaker 4: But there's also not just me.
Speaker 3: There's a multitude of incredible special effects artists that share
Speaker 3: their work and the tools, materials, techniques of their work
Speaker 3: in the stan Winston School lessons.
Speaker 2: We'll have to make sure when you come back we
Speaker 2: talk more about the stan Winston School.
Speaker 3: It is amazing. Yeah, I just saw them. They were
Speaker 3: at Monster Palooza. They had a little set up there.
Speaker 2: Matt Winston runs runs it with Eric Liddoff, so they
Speaker 2: were there were both sons of Dan Winston. You don't
Speaker 2: have a bad life, do you.
Speaker 3: I can't complain. I actually life is so good for me.
Speaker 3: I sometimes feel guilty about it. You don't feel guilty.
Speaker 3: I enjoy it.
Speaker 2: I get the imposter syndrome really bad. I get that
Speaker 2: it's like, wait a minute, they're paying me to do
Speaker 2: what for who? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm excited to get up every day I go
Speaker 3: to work. It's it's incredible. It's a wonderful feeling.
Speaker 5: It is.
Speaker 2: I know what that's like.
Speaker 4: It's an enjoyable feeling. Von Davis, I'll see you soon,
Speaker 4: all right.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from
Speaker 1: KFI AM six forty