Andy is calling in from Annecy — sunglasses on, rosé imminent, 45 minutes from his accommodation in 38-degree heat — while Jo and Emily hold the fort from home. It's a short, lively check-in from the world's oldest animation festival, and the main topic writing itself on every wall in town is AI.

Andy reports that the conversation around AI at Annecy has meaningfully shifted from previous years. The theoretical debate about what AI might mean for animation has largely given way to the practical reality of studios working out how to use it. Students remain understandably anxious about junior roles being squeezed — the very rung of the ladder they need to get started — while producers and execs are focused on workflow integration. Andy's prediction is that a distinct "AI animation" category will eventually become as meaningless as "CGI animation" did after Toy Story: it'll be everywhere, and it'll stop being a label.

There's also a quick and genuinely useful primer on how Annecy actually works — the Imperial, MIFA, the old town, the meetings by the lake, the producers dashing between venues who've badly underestimated the distances — for anyone who hasn't been and is thinking about going. Jo and Emily are already planning next year.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Kids Media Club podcast.

I'm Jo Redfern.

I'm Emily Horgan.

And our EVP of Technical usually gives me hassle about my squeaky chair.

And I'm about to give him hassle about the birds that I can hear really clearly singing in the background against the blue sky in Annecy.

Andy Williams.

Look at this.

I had to wear my.

The regulation sunglasses here.

Yeah.

I mean, Annecy Animation Festival and it's a.

See, very, very hot.

So I hate to be the English guy that's complaining about it being too hot, but it's dangerously close to being too hot.

Oh, mate, I saw you post that on LinkedIn and I was like, I usually run to like your posts.

I'm like, oh, should you be any more British?

Yeah.

Not get a like for that.

Move on, Andy.

I know, but yeah, it's.

There's a good atmosphere.

Yes.

Yesterday it was still in the.

There was.

There's like a musical festival, sort of a music solstice happening.

So every street corner was DJs or live bands yesterday, which was, yeah, an interesting way to arrive.

Wow, what a privileged industry we work in.

I know, yeah.

I have, I have visions of overheated animation execs paddling in the shores of the lake to cool down.

Gotta do what you gotta do, man.

Yeah.

I think the other thing people start to realize is that they've booked.

They might have booked a meeting in the old town and then there'll be another meeting in Imperial.

And they've really underestimated how easy or quickly they can get from one to the other.

So there's a lot of producers dashing from one location to the other to make their meetings.

But yeah, it's good and it's, it's just kicking off now, but already there's the subject of AI and animation is raising its head, which it has done, I think, for the last.

I mean, the last two or three.

Anna C. It's definitely been a feature.

Of the conversation and you're a regular at Annecy, so tell us how that conversation around AI has shifted because already I've seen a couple of people say it's the hot topic.

As soon as I arrived in Annecy, it was the thing that everybody was speaking about.

But you've been there for several years on the trot.

How's it is.

How has it evolved from last year?

Well, I think the makeup of Annecy is quite unique because it's.

There's a large element of animation students here.

There's also a lot of producers of animation.

And it's a festival where they're showing animated films and shorts.

And so it's very much a showcase of that.

So it's like a.

You get a real meeting of industry, so you'll get software developers and you'll get people looking to recruit talent.

You get a lot of animation students, and then you've got producers and the industry in terms of Netflix and a lot of the broadcasters and platforms will be here.

And so because of that, each of them will probably have their own position on AI.

I think.

I think students have been understandably, a bit nervous about the impact it will have on the job market when they leave college.

And then studios and execs are trying to get their heads around how it can be incorporated into the workflow.

And up to now, I think the conversation has been.

It started off as more theoretical, where people were trying to wrap their head around what it might mean.

And now people have had a chance to really play with those tools, incorporate them into their workflows and decide how they can best utilize it.

So I think it's moved on to more of a practical reality this year than previous years, when it's something that everyone knew was coming and they were sort of navigating their positions to kind of really work out what it meant.

But now it's here when people are using it and people are sort of seeing how it works in practice.

So that's.

That's the change that I can see.

Is it.

Is it like the philosophical.

The.

Some people sat there having a philosophical question about it.

Yeah.

Other people got on, started using it, and now the critical mass of people who were having a philosophical discussion or argument about it versus the number of people who actually just got on using it as flipped.

Yeah, I think so.

There's definitely a lot of.

I mean, there will be AI animated movies that are part of the festival, and so there are definitely people kind of using it.

But in some ways I've.

And I.

And I think the.

You get the feeling that maybe the.

The people that are embracing it or kind of pragmatically using it, that contingent is definitely growing and people are sort of modern, sort of.

They're adjusting and amending kind of their thoughts on it as it becomes more a reality.

And I think the.

But there's still a very large passionate sort of contingent that just see it as something to be opposed to at all costs.

And, and is the worry, because obviously you've got a lot of students there, so by nature, them at the beginning of their careers, they're more junior.

Is the nervousness that it potentially impacts their ability to get into the industry at that kind of junior level.

Yeah, absolutely.

Because it also, I mean, I think inevitably what it does, it will remove some junior roles, which are what I think students and graduates will end up feeling like that's the rung of the ladder that they can then climb on and sort of.

And start their career with.

And, and it will remove some of those, I think inevitably.

It does also give space for different roles, I suppose.

And there's always different roles that.

You know what I mean?

Like there's, there's lots of ways, intermediate, you know, just one way.

And the opportunity it gives to students to take their own creative swings into their own hands and stuff like that.

There's, you know, there is an enablement factor of it too.

Yeah, I mean, I think one of the things that.

I've spoken to a number of animation studios here that are using it and I think it's definitely going to, it's going to present an advantage to smaller, more nimble companies to be able to really amplify what they, what they can do.

And so for newer entrants into the, into the industry, I can see there being a big advantage to that.

So, yeah, it's been interesting.

One of the things I think is going to fall away a bit is that this idea that there's like an AI animated category, I feel like that reminds me a bit of when Toy Story came out and you effectively and you had a different category for CGI animation.

Whereas now CGI animation is kind of everywhere.

Even in, even in a stop motion animated movie, there'll be elements of CGI animation.

So it becomes a bit of, a bit of a meaningless category.

And I think in the same way AI animation will become a little bit mean this as it will kind of feature in so many different varieties of animation.

And I think hybrid animation is kind of going to be the way people are going to use it.

I don't think you're going to get a lot of people where it's just wholly done with AI and generative AI.

I think it's always, I think it's going to become a component of an overall hybrid animated kind of way of approaching.

Feels like we've been in this movie before in terms of those technological advancements that come along and for a while everybody talks about them and then they either disappear or they just become so embedded into that creative process, they almost, I mean, it's picks and shovels.

Isn't it?

It's part of that creative process as you go along.

So as someone who's never been to Annecy and who would love to go, I want to know what does a typical day look like?

Andy, tell us.

I mean obviously you're highfalutin and high flying and having all of these high powered meetings.

There was definitely.

There'll be a lot of meetings.

Some people will just be based permanently at the Imperial, which is the kind of the very grand hotel.

So they'll be permanently placed in the bar there and.

And everyone will come to them and so they'll have kind of a table that they won't really have to move from.

And then do you need to like have a ticket?

Do you buy it?

Like will you buy it?

Do you buy a table?

I took it to Annecy and Mipha and MIFA is the.

Effectively there's a sort of a tent that's next to the Imperial where there'll be a lot of stands so that you'll have people like Moho Animation, Blue Zoo will have a stand, you'll have Anime and Animation UK will have a stand there and so there'll be that element of it and that opens tomorrow and then there'll be the festival element and the festival.

There's cinemas throughout Annecy and so there'll be different screenings and festivals on across the town.

And then for a lot of producers they'll be taking meetings kind of in different bars across Annecy and quite a lot of people will come without getting a ticket and they'll just take meetings by the lake or in the lake.

This year.

On a boat.

Yeah.

So there's kind of a lot of different ways that people approach it.

Okay, so if me and Joe are gonna go next year.

Right.

So you've got the Imperial where the main thing, you've got the old town.

Yeah, I suppose it was a bit like what used to be with the.

Yeah, it's a little bit like Mipcom.

You don't have to have.

Well, you can get.

Get away without having a ticket.

Yeah, I suppose.

What's, what's the walking distance?

Because if it's 38 degrees,.

It's probably.

About 15 minutes from the old town to see the Imperial.

Yeah, yeah.

And this is the Imperial in the.

Center of the city.

The.

It's quite hard to kind of work.

No, not really.

I mean I'm not quite sure where the, where you'd say the center was.

It's all spread out around the lake.

Yeah, I mean they're Kind of on one end of the lake, really.

And it's a.

It's a.

You don't.

I don't.

I mean, maybe you do, but I don't tend to really venture out beyond the Imperial.

There's not so much out on that side, so.

So your kind of route is often the Imperial one end and then the kind of the edges of the old town on the other.

There'll be people that are more Annecy experienced that will tell me that that's all wrong and that there's somewhere that I should be going past the old town or past the Imperial.

But that tends to be kind of the map that I think a lot of people use.

And presumably people are looking for funding.

Yes.

So, for instance, we're at Viqueens, which is a animated feature film that I'm involved in.

We're presenting on Thursday.

Yeah.

And to.

And to market the movie.

So the people definitely use it as a platform to do that.

And because it doesn't have.

In a way, because it isn't quite so commercial in its reputation as something like Mitt, in some ways it helps because it's kind of.

It helps because it's more of a soft sell.

You don't feel like it's.

You're really selling the movie, although you are.

You're celebrating the movie.

Exactly.

Yes.

Yeah.

Rather than gurning for the sale with the.

With the emphasis on the sell of celebrating.

Exactly.

For nothing.

Redfern.

So, yeah, it's.

The cell part of it is definitely.

An important component because there's also presentations at it too.

Right.

So, like there's a Netflix presentation, Disney presentation.

Like some of the studios show their whole sites.

Absolutely.

As like, kind of like an overview.

Yeah, yeah.

And Netflix recently have used it far more to kind of to make announcements about animated movies, and they've used it as a.

As a space to kind of have sort of exclusives and breaking news, really.

And I think that's something that's developed.

Developed more over the years.

I think it's become more of a place for that than it.

Than it had been.

Yeah, Yeah, I think that's it.

I think that's later in the week.

I'm waiting.

I have my bugs on the inside for that one.

But yeah, those.

It's.

It's a very.

It's a special spot.

And.

And I mean, I think I'm right in saying that it's the oldest animation festival definitely in Europe.

It might be in the world.

So.

So it's definitely got that history there as well.

Great.

I have one more.

I have one more operational question.

Sorry, I'm just getting on to Plummer.

Is the accommodation as bad as everyone says it is?

Because, like, people have said population as bad as bad.

Is it?

Yeah, hard to guess.

It can be.

I mean, I'm.

I'm on the.

I'm in the west fantasy.

I think that's right on quite on the outskirts.

So my, My walk in is about 45 minutes.

Yes.

And so you.

45 Minutes, 38 degrees is no crime.

If it was 22, it'd be beautiful.

You'd be like, yeah, of course.

And you're booking it.

You're like, course, I'll take that walk.

That's a nice time to set the head in the morning.

Yeah.

And so.

And hopefully that.

So.

So, yeah, you.

It's about a 45 minute walk in from.

And I think that's not unusual is people often have to kind of find spaces that are more in there on the outskirts.

And so you have to kind of bring all of your bags that you're going to be using for the day because you're not going back, not nipping back in the middle of the day.

Got it, Got it.

Well, we'll set ourselves an objective for being there, all three people in person next year to record the Kids Media Club podcast live.

Maybe we should pitch this animation that we've threatened to one day pull together.

Yeah, let's do it.

Deal?

Deal.

Let's get the deck done, guys.

Sounds good.

Right, Andy, so your task today is to get us a glorious podcast cover image and send it around the WhatsApp group so that we can make everyone jealous.

All right, Sounds good.

Great.

Shall we.

Shall we do that?

Rose is not going to drink itself, Andy.

Yeah.

Yes.

Well, actually, did somebody else want to take the baton of doing the sign off?

Oh, gosh, the pressure, the pressure.

Go on, Emily.

Thanks for listening, everybody.

Andy's obviously already drunk.

He doesn't want to take responsibility.

Catch us on all major podcasting platforms and on TikTok and YouTube and we'll talk to you next time.