Singapore drama series Crooks is using artificial intelligence (AI) to reduce the cost and time involved in visual effects and repetitive post-production work. This approach allows productions to stretch tighter budgets without giving up creative control. Producer Boi Kwong says AI is a practical necessity, not a creative philosophy.
Kwong explains that the team uses AI to automate expensive and repetitive work while leaving storytelling, performances, and artistic judgment firmly in human hands. The distinction matters to Kwong, who is wary of what happens when the technology is handed the wheel entirely.
The project was already under way when one of its investors withdrew, taking about 40% of its funding with it. With grant deadlines fixed and few options available, the team spent three months developing an AI-assisted production workflow. Kwong shares that it was scary, and they really didn’t know what they were doing at first.
Working alongside Kwong are veteran visual effects supervisor Jay Hong and AI researcher Lim Kim Hui. Kwong notes that putting a tech guy and a creative guy together can create an uncomfortable space, but that discomfort was where the team’s workflow eventually emerged.
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One of the biggest technical hurdles is consistency, as large AI image and video models can generate a convincing single shot but begin to struggle when scenes grow crowded and the camera moves. Lim explains that if you give the AI too much information in one generation, it will start to move and hallucinate.
Instead of simply altering backgrounds, the models quietly rewrite camera angles, characters, and compositions. Lim says the AI starts to change everything, including the director’s camera, the angle, and the characters.
The team breaks each shot into separate layers, an approach long used in traditional visual effects. Backgrounds, lighting, and performances are processed individually before being recombined. To keep the models on a leash, the team builds a “control net” — a framework of guides and seed values telling the AI what it can alter and what must remain untouched.
The cost savings have been significant, with the team cutting the number of AI generations needed for a usable shot from as many as 30 to 40 in the early stages to about six. Lim explains that these are tools that turbocharge your man-hours, and what usually took 10 hours now takes one.
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Kwong estimates that the overall savings are around 30% across sets, logistics, post-production, and equipment.
Despite the controversy, Kwong believes audiences ultimately care far less about how a film is made than whether it works on screen.
Kwong’s advice to filmmakers tempted to let the machine do the thinking is blunt: the school of hard knocks is always the best school. This approach has allowed the Crooks team to find a balance between using AI to streamline their workflow and maintaining creative control over their production.
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