Netflix has used artificial intelligence in various capacities on about 300 titles, one of its senior production executives said during an industry discussion at the Busan International Film Festival, while stressing that the human touch remains critical to filmmaking.

Sung Q Lee, Netflix’s senior director of production for Asia-Pacific, said AI was being deployed across the filmmaking process: in previsualisation, production design, set-dressing concepts, editing and visual effects. He added that the question that mattered to him was not how much AI could be put into a title, but what more a title could do with AI’s help.

Balancing efficiency and creativity

Lee was speaking at Netflix’s annual Creative Asia event, presented in partnership with the Busan festival, at a panel co-hosted with the Motion Picture Association. The panel also featured Korean filmmaker Kang Yun-sung, director of The Outlaws, and Weta FX chief technology officer Kimball Thurston.

Much of the discussion focused on the opportunities AI could create for filmmakers working with limited budgets, while the speakers repeatedly underscored the importance of preserving human creative judgement. The company’s second-quarter shareholder letter noted that generative AI workflows had been used in roughly 300 titles in 2026, with the largest concentration of work in post-production, helping deliver higher quality output more quickly and at lower cost.

AI advocates and sceptics

Kang has become a notable advocate for AI-assisted filmmaking. He previously co-directed Run to the West, described as South Korea’s first fully AI-assisted feature, which earned around $100,000 at the box office amid criticism of its AI-generated visuals. Undeterred, he is now producing an action film titled The Gulf of Aden using generative AI tools, estimating the approach could cut production costs by about 40 percent through streamlined shooting, shorter timelines and VFX efficiencies.

With Hollywood remaining cautious about the technology and parts of Asia’s content industry viewing it as an opportunity, the Busan conversation captured the industry’s central tension: AI as a powerful tool for skilled creators, and the need to ensure it does not replace human teams.