Recorded February 2025. OpenAI’s brand-new O3 Mini drops just as China’s DeepSeek reasoning model grabs headlines, setting off a fresh round in the global race to AGI. Shannon Leonard and director Brett Leonard unpack what makes these models different, why agentic AI matters, and how O3 Mini already lets a non-coder spin up production-ready software in days. They trace the knock-on effects for medicine, markets, and every creative field, pointing out where skepticism is warranted and where it isn’t.
Then the conversation zooms out. Brett compares today’s acceleration to the shift from analog film to digital, only thousands of times faster, and explains why the skills of a movie director map perfectly to commanding AI agents. Father and son debate job loss versus new opportunity, the environmental cost narrative, and the urgent need for positive stories that shape AI for good. By the end you’ll know why the “studio of one” is here and how to keep your humanity in the loop.
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Brett Leonard is a veteran Hollywood film director known for introducing the concept of Virtual Reality to popular culture with his hit film Lawnmower Man. Apart from directing many other feature films, he is involved with innovating immersive content production for the emerging virtual mediums of the Metaverse era. Brett’s son, Shannon Leonard, has over 10 years of experience across feature films, advertisements, YouTube, and short-form media. He is focused on integrating AI and VR into creative media workflows.
