For twenty years my job has been making people feel something about a brand, for The Royal Mint, Bentley, Sony and a couple of companies I built and exited myself. AI hasn't changed the job. It's taken the limits off which stories I can tell.
Brands I've made work for
AlsoNikeUnder ArmourJ.K. RowlingNickelodeonBinance LabsAmbarellaThe Protein WorksAaron RamseyWatches of WalesBittrex
The films
A war film that won at the Cannes World Film Festival, a spray that gives you a personality, a pitch that won over a Nasdaq-listed chip company and thirteen more.
A hostile teenager and an elderly war veteran share a few silent minutes at a Welsh bus stop. Adapted from something my dad saw on his way to work. I told him I'd make it one day.
A commercial for a personality spray that doesn't exist, sold by a sweating pitchman who doesn't either.
A pitch to a Nasdaq-listed chip company, made as a film and framed like The Office. They said yes and the rebrand followed.
A quiet night in, until the film she's watching gets into the living room.
A coffee brand invented on a Friday morning, sold by a man in a pink leotard by Friday night.
The launch film for Pineapple, built around the lore instead of the product sheet.
A brand pitch delivered as a film, made to be watched instead of clicked through.
A boy, his mum and a homemade burger, then the grown-up version on his own in a Burger King.
A product film for a creator platform, cut to run as paid social.
The other twenty years
I've worked in brand, design, motion, 3D, web and e-commerce for twenty years. I ran TH3M for ten of them, made The Royal Mint's biggest ever creative campaign, helped grow Watches of Wales into the UK's fastest-growing pre-owned luxury watch business, and was a founder of two Web3 companies, one acquired and one I've since exited. So when a model hands me something that's nearly right, I can tell you exactly which bit isn't.
The longer versionreturn on The Royal Mint's largest ever creative campaign.
market cap for Pineapple, a crypto exchange I built and exited, on no funding.
Galactic Fight League, by Vulcan Forged and SkyBridge Capital.
sales in year one at Watches of Wales, from an industry-first finance integration I led.
How I think
Emotion is the cornerstone of marketing. People forget the spec sheet and remember how something made them feel, and that's been my job for twenty years, long before any of it was generated. What AI changes is the size of the canvas. Stories that used to need a crew, a location and a budget nobody had now only have to be good enough.
Before a single frame gets generated I want to know what someone should feel, and what they'll do about it afterwards. Priority Seat started as four sentences from my dad and one feeling he couldn't shake, and everything in the film had to earn its place against that.
A shoot budget used to decide which ideas survived. Now a dinosaur can come through a living room window, a 1944 landing craft can hit the beach and it rains on cue, so the only question left is whether the idea is any good.
Anyone can generate a nice frame. Priority Seat took 731 images and 163 video generations to get 3 minutes 46, and most of the craft was deciding what to throw away. That judgement is twenty years old.
I've been early to most of it, from building websites before anyone taught me how to working inside crypto in 2016. These days, when the off-the-shelf AI tools slow the story down, I build my own pipelines and tools.
What I do
Most briefs don't stop at the film. There's the poster, the cut-downs, the stills, the site it all lives on, and somebody has to make sure it still looks like one brand at the end. I've done every one of those jobs for a living at some point, so I'd rather do them myself than write someone else a brief.
Short films and branded stories, written, directed and finished by me. Priority Seat is the one with the trophies.
Twenty seconds to three minutes. Cast, wardrobe, set and location are all generated, so the idea doesn't have to shrink to fit a shoot budget.
A pitch made as a film gets watched and passed around. The one I made for a Nasdaq-listed chip company was framed like The Office. They said yes.
A brand invented from nothing, with the name, the packaging and the advert that sells it. I make one every Friday, so I know what the new models can do before a client asks.
Posters, campaign stills and product shots at print resolution, in the same look as the film.
Twenty years in After Effects and five fully modelled 3D worlds for The Royal Mint. Titles, idents and the grade that stops generated footage looking generated.
Models trained on a brand's own reference, so the first generation is already on-brand.
Generated performances, original score and written songs. I wrote the lyrics for Take My Coat, the song Priority Seat leans on, and made the track in Suno.
Sites, web apps and internal tools, designed and built by me with AI. MakesMe.Me and the Fingerprint site were built this way, and so was this one.
Every model in one pipeline, driven from Claude over MCP. When an off-the-shelf tool slows the work down, I build my own.
Strategy, positioning and the guidelines everyone else works to. I was in the room for the AntShares to NEO rebrand and was VeChain's first European creative partner.
Twenty years of it, from Head of Design at Tredz to helping grow Watches of Wales into the UK's fastest-growing pre-owned luxury watch business. I know what a product page is actually for.
How it's made
This is how Priority Seat went from my dad's description to 3 minutes 46 on screen, with AI in every stage of one pipeline. A client job runs the same way, with more people in the review.
Drag the playhead, or pick a stage.
Stage 1 of 6
Script, shot list and a rough animatic. Nothing gets generated until the story works on paper.
4sentences from my dad
Stage 2 of 6
Characters, locations and wardrobe are locked as stills first, so every shot starts from the same faces and the same light.
731images
Stage 3 of 6
Stills become shots. I pick the model that suits the shot, and most takes never make the cut.
163video generations
Stage 4 of 6
Voice, score and sound design. For Priority Seat I wrote the lyrics to Take My Coat and then created the track in Suno.
1song I wrote for Priority Seat
Stage 5 of 6
The cut, the mix and the grade. This is where generated footage turns into a film or stays a demo.
3:46on screen
Stage 6 of 6
Masters, cut-downs, the poster, the trailer cover and the publishing kit, so the film has everything it needs to go out.
4festival awards so far
The Priority Seat page has the real character sheets, props, plates, storyboards and the song.
Read the case studyWork with me
Part time or full time, embedded with your team. I bring the whole pipeline with me and make the work myself.
One film or advert, or a whole campaign. You get a price, a date and one person to talk to. Think of it as a production company of one, minus the catering.
Ongoing creative direction, an AI pipeline built for your brand, and your team trained to run it.
From the blog
I've been in crypto since 2016 and built and exited a crypto exchange. The market has always outrun the people making its creative. Here's what that taught me, mistakes included, and what AI finally changed.
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When Nickelodeon and Recur Forever brought out a Rugrats NFT collection, I built Chuckie a bedroom full of Easter eggs and let the communities go hunting.
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After my Goblintown work, Atari asked me to make a short looping film for Atari X, their move into Web3. I built it around Centipede.
Read itStart here
Pick what fits and I'll get an email with the gist. I reply to every one, usually the same day.
FAQ
I'm a multi-award-winning AI filmmaker, storyteller and creative director based in South Wales. I've spent twenty years making people feel something about brands, across design, motion, 3D, web and e-commerce, founded the creative studio TH3M in 2016, and built and exited companies of my own. My debut AI short, Priority Seat, won Best Super Short Film at the Cannes World Film Festival.
I direct and make films, adverts and brand work with generative AI, from the script to the grade. That covers the look, the shots, the voice and score, the edit and the finish. Around the film there's usually more to make, so I also do the key art and campaign stills, motion and 3D, websites and apps, custom models trained on a brand's own reference, and the pipelines that hold a production together.
Yes, and I've made plenty. Cast, wardrobe, location, set and product can all be generated, which is how ideas that would never clear a live shoot budget get made anyway. Whether it works still comes down to the idea and the judgement about what to keep. Priority Seat took 731 images and 163 video generations to reach 3 minutes 46.
A short advert can go from brief to finished in days. A three minute narrative film is weeks, and most of that time goes on story and the edit. I'll give you a date with the price before anything starts.
There are three ways. I can join in-house and remote, part time or full time. I can take on a project, from a single spot to a full campaign. Or I can work on retainer, which usually means ongoing creative direction, building an AI pipeline for your brand and training your team to run it.
Yes, and I'd like to do a lot more of it. I helped grow Watches of Wales into the UK's fastest-growing pre-owned luxury watch business, my studio made The Royal Mint's biggest ever creative campaign, and Priority Seat is set at a Welsh bus stop. If you're a Welsh brand, agency or production company that wants to work AI-first, get in touch.