AI Gets a Seat at the Oscars. The Ad Industry May Be Next in Line.

On April 22nd, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released an updated set of eligibility rules for the 2025 Oscars. Tucked among them was a statement that generative AI, if used in the production of a film, would “neither help nor harm” a project’s chances of being nominated. While human contribution will still play a role in deciding who wins, the message was clear: artificial intelligence is now a recognised part of creative output in cinema.

The move formalises what many already suspected: AI  is an accepted collaborator in the creation of award-worthy cultural work.

And, as the lines between entertainment, branded content, and marketing continue to blur, the standards set by Hollywood often set the tone for commercial creativity. Just as CGI and de-aging technologies moved from novelty to norm, AI-generated creative may be on a similar path—rapidly becoming less controversial and more expected.

A Familiar Trajectory

The creative industry has seen similar transitions before. In the early 2000s, digital de-aging was met with skepticism. Early applications, like X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), were widely criticised for their unnatural look. But by 2024, Tom Hanks and Robin Wright were digitally rendered to appear decades younger in Here, a film that sparked debate not just for its narrative ambition but for its embrace of AI and visual reconstruction.

Across film, music, and performance, technologies once viewed as distractions are now tools used to deepen storytelling—or, in some cases, extend it. From ABBA’s digital concert avatars to the “youthification” of actors in The Irishman, the direction of travel has been consistent: toward permanence, replication, and reinvention.

With the Academy’s latest announcement, generative AI now joins that trajectory. The advertising world is watching closely.

Implications for Commercial Creativity

As agencies and brand teams weigh the role of AI in their workflows—from moodboarding to message testing to voice synthesis—the Oscars’ decision brings new urgency to a set of industry questions that have so far been explored in private rather than in public.

Here are three potential shifts the creative industry may begin to see:

1. Authorship Will Be Redefined

Awards shows like Cannes Lions and D&AD have long celebrated the craft of teams: art directors, copywriters, editors. As AI tools become more integral to the ideation process, new credits may emerge—prompt engineers, model trainers, or even data curators.

Questions of credit, ownership, and originality will follow. Festivals may eventually need to establish criteria to define the boundaries of human versus machine contribution.

💡 At Cannes 2028, don’t be surprised if someone thanks “Mira-17”—a custom-trained AI creative assistant—in their acceptance speech.

2. Synthetic Spokespeople Will Get Talent Deals

With AI-enhanced performances now being awarded at the Oscars, brands may increasingly develop fully synthetic ambassadors—personalities designed to embody a brand’s tone, voice, and values across geographies.

These digital figures will be more than mascots. They may appear on red carpets, in livestreams, and even on fashion week guest lists—designed to evolve with a brand and appeal to specific microcultures.

💡 By 2030, a synthetic brand face might have more Instagram followers than its CEO—and demand royalties.

3. Campaigns Will Get Cannes-Nominated Before They're Real

Generative tools allow agencies to create highly polished concept campaigns before they’re ever produced. These pre-visualised ideas—complete with cinematic trailers, synthetic VO, and detailed brand worlds—may soon enter awards festivals in a new form: as speculative visions.

Some call this a natural evolution of mockups. Others view it as a potential blurring of what it means for a campaign to be “live.”

💡 Imagine a trailer for a non-existent brand manifesto going viral—and then the client retrofits a campaign around it.

What Cannes Lions Might Introduce Next

As AI takes a more central role in creative output, awards frameworks may begin to shift. Future-facing categories could include:

• Best Prompt-Led Campaign – celebrating creativity through large language models.
• Synthetic Talent Activation – for campaigns fronted by virtual or AI-generated figures.
• Pre-Production Concept Lion – recognising fully rendered speculative campaigns.
• Co-Creation Ethics Award – for transparency in AI-human collaboration.

Each would point toward the recognition that creativity is no longer confined to the traditional production model—and that intention, storytelling, and execution can take many forms.

How the Industry Might Respond

Trade press outlets such as Adweek, Campaign, and The Drum may initially frame the shift with questions: Should AI-generated work be judged against human-made campaigns? How are juries evaluating originality in a machine-assisted world? Should there be clearer disclosures?

Concurrently, analysts at WARC might begin benchmarking creative efficiency using AI (e.g. cost-per-idea, speed-to-market), while forecasters at WGSN may track aesthetic shifts in what they might call synthetic storyscapes—a blend of digital surrealism, nostalgia, and emotional mimicry.

Meanwhile, creative teams will face internal decisions about transparency, credit, and craft. How AI is used—and whether it is acknowledged—may become as important as the output itself.

The Goods

The Academy’s announcement doesn’t answer every question. But it shows a growing consensus that generative AI is not antithetical to creativity—it is, increasingly, part of the process.

For the Adland, that means a new set of creative expectations, new ethical conversations, and, likely, new awards criteria.

Whether this leads to a golden age of invention—or a confusing period of recalibration—remains to be seen. But the era of AI-assisted creativity has officially entered the spotlight.

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