Martin Scorsese Embraces Artificial Intelligence as Advisor at Black Forest Labs
Martin Scorsese has become an advisor to AI company Black Forest Labs, using its FLUX technology for storyboarding, sparking both endorsement and fierce backlash from Hollywood artists and filmmakers.
Objective Facts
Martin Scorsese has joined AI company Black Forest Labs as an advisor, utilizing the company's FLUX technology to assist in creating storyboards. Per The New York Times, Scorsese signed on as a partner and adviser to Black Forest Labs last year, with the partnership made public on June 2, 2026, showing how Scorsese used FLUX while storyboarding his next film, What Happens at Night. In his statement, Scorsese noted he has been creating his own storyboards for 70 years and said there has always been a problem communicating his vision to cast and crew, stating he is interested in the intersection of technology and storytelling. However, some human storyboard artists are decrying the move, with concept artist Karla Ortiz and director Sam Deats making direct, public objections.
Left-Leaning Perspective
Concept artist Karla Ortiz accused Scorsese of throwing storyboard artists under the bus and demolishing their livelihoods with models likely trained on those storyboard artists' same works. Ortiz, whose credits include Rogue One and Thor: Ragnarok, and director-animator Sam Deats both made pointed objections, with Deats writing that storyboarding takes seconds and there is absolutely no reason to need AI built on stolen work of millions of artists. Boots Riley criticized Scorsese for his attempt to push the industry toward generative AI, speculating that at 83, Black Forest Labs gave his family significant money and he is therefore less concerned about long-term consequences. Left-leaning critics argue that AI systems are frequently trained on works made by human artists without permission, that Scorsese is working against the professionals who helped realize his films, and that broader AI use could remove roles traditionally performed by artists, designers and visual development specialists. The core objections center on economic concerns about AI displacing storyboard and concept artists, and ethical concerns about training data: AI image models are trained on enormous datasets scraped from the web without disclosed sources, raising questions of whether the model Scorsese uses was built on the work of the very artists whose jobs it threatens. Riley's specific issue is not with Scorsese using AI privately but with using his cache to promote it and push the industry toward it, stating they need his legitimacy. Scorsese has not publicly addressed the criticism. Left-leaning coverage emphasizes the threat to working artists' livelihoods and the ethical questions about AI training data, while generally downplaying Scorsese's stated efficiency benefits and his historical adoption of new technologies like 3D and de-aging.
Right-Leaning Perspective
Avatar creator James Cameron joined the board of Stability AI and articulated a vision where AI doubles artist speed to completion on shots, increases cadence and throughput cycle, allowing artists to move on and do other creative things. Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson said at Cannes he doesn't dislike AI, comparing it to a special effect, framing it as another creative tool rather than a threat. Scorsese himself argued that the tool allows faster work, saves production time, reduces crew wear and tear, and supports pushing the bounds of creativity to create deeper experiences for audiences, noting cinema must be open to evolution. Proponents argue that storyboarding has long been an imprecise translation layer where hand-drawn boards convey composition but rarely capture light, texture, or detail for designers to build from, while AI compresses that gap into seconds rather than hours, providing real financial value for high-budget productions and potentially more significant impact for independent filmmakers. Rather than technology forced upon the industry by studios seeking cost cuts, AI is being voluntarily adopted by a legendary auteur to solve creative problems, with Scorsese viewing generative tools as administrative accelerators and forcing Hollywood to confront that AI is no longer just external threat but a tool directors choose to integrate. Scorsese explicitly positioned this as consistent with his past adoption of 3D in Hugo and de-aging in The Irishman, technologies that helped enrich cinematic storytelling. Right-leaning and pro-technology coverage emphasizes efficiency gains, cost savings, and artistic freedom, while generally downplaying labor displacement concerns and not engaging substantially with the copyright training data concerns raised by artists.
Deep Dive
The 79th Cannes Film Festival in May 2026 crystallized institutional tension by banning generative AI from Official Competition requiring human effort, yet the Tribeca Festival is hosting a fully AI-generated docudrama premiere. This institutional split reflects genuine fracture in the industry. Scorsese's endorsement marks one of the most consequential endorsements of generative AI by a working filmmaker—coming from a director whose entire reputation rests on the primacy of craft. What both sides genuinely agree on is that his voice carries unusual weight in both directions: the same authority that makes his adoption significant to those viewing AI favorably also makes his pivot feel personal to artists who spent careers supplying exactly what FLUX produces. The disagreement hinges on competing frameworks. Critics like Ortiz operate from a labor and copyright protection lens, viewing AI as systematically extracting value from artists' unpaid training data and threatening livelihoods. Proponents like Cameron operate from a productivity and artistic evolution lens, viewing AI as solving longstanding communication gaps and accelerating creative throughput without replacing humans. Scorsese himself claims the tool helps communicate visual ideas more quickly and precisely while enriching cinematic intelligence—a claim neither side disputes on its face, but which they interpret through opposite lenses: as threat to employment or as legitimate tool. A critical gap exists: Scorsese has not publicly addressed the criticism, leaving unanswered questions about whether he considered labor impacts, whether he reviewed training data disclosures, or whether Riley's financial motivation speculation has merit. Notably, Scorsese's connection came through his talent manager Rick Yorn, who co-founded BroadLight Capital, an investor in Black Forest Labs—a detail that adds credence to questions about incentive structure without proving them. What comes next: Whether Scorsese expands to AI in production itself before the decade ends, whether other major directors follow his lead, and whether copyright lawsuits against AI companies succeed in changing the legal and ethical landscape around training data.