AI filmmaking The newest division, Documentary and AI Filmmaking, builds on the documentary filmmaking that began under the JMSC in 2009, which was expanded under Professor Yang. JMSC also pioneered a course in AI Professor Ruby Yang AI is just a tool, like a new kind of pen. It can enable students to tell a better story, but the story itself is the most important thing. Journalism and storytelling can be a minefield in the age of AI, when it is easier than ever to produce deep fakes and there are vast amounts of information to wade through. But the same technology, when used ethically, can also be harnessed to deepen insights or recreate scenes that otherwise would not see the light of day. These twin challenges underpin HKU’s new School of Future Media (SFM), launched jointly in October 2025 by the Faculty of Arts, the Faculty of Social Sciences, and the Journalism and Media Studies Centre (JMSC) to advance responsible use of AI and digital innovation across the media and creative industries. The SFM’s Director is Oscar-winning filmmaker, Professor Ruby Yang, who joined HKU in 2013. “Over the past year especially, we have seen all kinds of software becoming available that enable us to do textto-images and create storyboards and videos that used The new School of Future Media is leveraging AI and other technologies to advance media and film education and produce storytellers who embrace new formats, while adhering to the ethical principles of their craft. Fast Forward to take a lot of time and resources. Now we can do that more quickly and efficiently, and we want to teach students to become creators and leaders in the use of AI,” she said. The SFM has three divisions, the oldest being the JMSC which was established 27 years ago. Its undergraduate degree has been renamed the Bachelor of Journalism, Media and Artificial Intelligence, in recognition of the importance of AI as a vehicle for gathering and processing information and of the need to address ethical questions surrounding deep fakes, algorithmic bias and trust in journalism. HKU Bulletin | May 2026 Teaching and Learning 30 31 filmmaking in 2023 that was one of the first in Asia and has been spun off into the division. There is also a dedicated arm called The Studio with an in-house creative production unit, and a dedicated server is being built to keep students’ work off open-source platforms and protect their intellectual property. The third division, Global Creative Industries, houses an existing Bachelor of Arts degree on the interconnections between culture and commerce in media and film, music, gaming and museum studies, and the critical theory and philosophy to understand the challenges at hand. “The filmmaking part is really the new part because we want to separate fiction from fact-based journalism. Creative filmmaking is all about your imagination,” Professor Yang explained. HKU staff have already produced several AI-generated works in collaboration with outside partners. For instance, a public service announcement on animal conservation used just 10 photos to create a video of moving images with sound, while a documentary project for German television recreated the death of 5,000 cattle being transferred from Australia to China after their boat was struck by a typhoon. “There was no way we could film that incident, but AI was able to recreate and capture it,” she said. Other projects underway include a documentary short on conservationist Jane Goodall, an AI-enabled documentary to recreate author Eileen Chang’s time at HKU and a documentary with acclaimed actress Joan Chen on painters in the Chinese Mainland in the 1980s. Students are recruited as paid interns on some projects to give them a grounding in socially responsible and ethical filmmaking. Students gain hands‑on experience in documentary creation under the guidance of leading filmmakers from around the world. Ethical approaches “We talk about ethics a lot because as responsible filmmakers, we need to have written consent from our subjects to use photographs in an AI recreation. We also have to be very respectful of intellectual property and understand that our creation cannot be a copy. We want students to be clear about this and to be transparent about their use of AI,” Professor Yang said, noting that consent, IP protection and transparency have long been embedded in journalism and filmmaking at the JMSC and are now adapted to include AI. Apart from undergraduate programmes, the SFM offers a Master of Journalism and Master of Journalism in Documentary Filmmaking Specialisation and has proposed a new Master of Arts in Creative Artificial Intelligence Film and Media, the first of its kind in Asia, for filmmakers with prior experience. The SFM also plans to launch a research and production initiative to tap into HKU Libraries and the HKU Archives to digitise and visually reconstruct fragile materials. “AI in filmmaking is still new and getting more and more realistic, and everyone is trying to catch up,” Professor Yang said. “But it is just a tool, like a new kind of pen. It can enable students to tell a better story, but the story itself is the most important thing. “We hope that by linking AI, ethics, storytelling, journalism and critical literacy, we can produce graduates and leaders who can create stories ethically and understand the societal implications of using AI.”
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