HPA Releases Program Details For Tech Retreat

LOS ANGELES—The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has announced program details for the HPA Tech Retreat, Feb. 18-22, 2024, at the Westin Rancho Mirage Golf Resort & Spa in Rancho Mirage, Calif.

The retreat consists of three parts: TR-X, Feb. 19, which focuses on Extreme Production; the Supersession, Feb. 20, (details will be announced later); and the main conference program on Feb. 21-22, HPA said.

“Each year we get many more outstanding submissions than time allows in the program, but this year was unprecedented,” said Mark Schubin, who has guided the main conference program for more than 20 years. “There wasn’t a dud in the bunch; it was really hard to choose the most important ones. We’ve ended up with presentations that run the gamut from a graduate student to a major C-level executive to top creatives in the field.”

For Wednesday., Feb. 21, the program includes: 

• What CES 2024 Means for the Media Industry—Mark Harrison, DPP.
• Quantum Dots and Color Imaging—Charles Poynton.
• The Death of Analog: Why Right Now Is the Time to Digitize Your Archive—moderated by Carin Forman, Amazon; with Heidi Shakespeare, Memnon; and Andrea Kalas, Paramount.
• New Developments in Open Source Software for the Motion Picture Industry—David Morin, Academy Software Foundation.

Also on Weds. Feb. 21, the program includes "Revolutionizing Media Production: AI's Role from Conceptualization to Final Cut." This programming includes: 

• Setting the Stage for AI. (AI & Frontier Technologies in the Age of Disruption: A Foundation in Embracing Change for Progress—Daniel Doll-Steinberg, EdenBase; AI for Media: What does good look like?—Mark Harrison, DPP; The Computable Studio: A Vision for 2025 and Beyond—Yves Bergquist, Entertainment Technology Center, University of Southern California; and Setting the Stage for AI Discussion and Q&A.
• AI and Creativity. (AI and the Future of Cinematic Storytelling—Barbara Ford Grant; Studio Perspective: AI and Content Creation—Tony Guarino, Paramount; Using GenAI as a Screenwriting Partner and Preproduction Assistant—Christian Cantrell, Concept.art; OK, We Have AI Tools and AI Content. What About the Business? Bringing It All Together for Successful Future State—Caleb Ward, Curious Refuge; AI and Creativity Discussion and Q&A). 
• AI in the Workflows. (Enhancing Creative Decisions with AI Generated Content. Recommendations—David Colantuoni, Avid; Multi-Language Generation of Movie Content — Siegfried Fößel, Fraunhofer-Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS; Demystifying AI in the Supply Chain — Pinar Seyhan Demirdag, Cuebric; AI in the Workflows discussion and Q&A). 

Programming for Thursday Feb. 22 includes:  

• MovieLabs 2030 Update
• The State of the Vision (Where Are We on the Path to 2030?—Mark Turner, MovieLabs; Bringing the “Studio in the Cloud” to Fruition—Mark Turner, MovieLabs; Richard Duke, Avid; Implementing the MovieLabs Ontology for Media Creation-How & Why—Mark Turner, MovieLabs; Guillaume Rachez, Perfect Memory; Workflows Based on 2030 Vision—Mark Turner, MovieLabs; Aki Seino, Imagica Entertainment Media Services.)
• Metadata Mania: Can We Create a Common Source of Truth? (Introduction: The Challenges of Metadata—Jim Helman, MovieLabs; Our Flag Means Death Season 2—Utilizing MovieLabs OMC for Metadata—Mike Urban, The Rebel Fleet; OpenMetadataIO, an Open Standards Initiative — Jim Helman, MovieLabs; Toby Scales, Google; Dalia Spingarn, Paramount Global). Interoperability: A Key to the Creative Benefits of the 2030 Vision. (Interoperability 101—Jim Helman, MovieLabs; Interoperability panel—Moderator: Jim Helman, MovieLabs; Panelists to be added).
• 2030 Vision Q&A (Stepping Up to Color Managed On-set HDR/SDR Workflows—Moderator: Michael Chambliss, International Cinematographers Guild; Greg Smokler, Small HD; Responsible Innovation in the Age of Generative AI—Ely Greenfield, Adobe; Color Appearance Models and the future of Color Management: How the industry Working Group for the new Developer Release of ACES 2.0 investigated, debated and ultimately embraced CAMs for its new output transform—Alex Forsythe, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences; NeRFs for Nerds: Another Future for Creativity—Erik Weaver, Entertainment Technology Center at USC; Eric Pohl, Singularity Imaging; Alex Porter, Mod Tech Labs; Addy Ghani, disguise; Building the Studio of Tomorrow, Today!—Mary Palmer, Amazon; Let’s Have an Honest Conversation about Sound—Nuno Fonseca, Sound Particles; Untwisting the Rope of Character Identification—Holly Beavon, Fielding Graduate University)

Registration for the retreat is available online.