NYFA’s Custom Built Facility
Students work directly within NYFA’s specialized production build-out.
The 4-Week In-Person Cinematic AI Specialist Workshop at NYFA’s Cinematic AI Center is an intensive program built for visual creators, designers, VFX artists, and media professionals. This course focuses on practical proficiency in machine learning, diffusion models, node-based workflows, and hybrid production integration across concept development, pre-visualization, physical capture, and post-production.
Program Overview
Format and Duration: 4-Week, Full-time In-Person Workshop
Schedule: Monday through Friday, 6 hours per day (30 hours per week).
Monday to Thursday: 6 hours per day of lectures, systems instruction, and hands-on lab work.
Friday: 6-hour Supervised Systems & Production Lab focused on pipeline assembly, custom workflow building, and sequence finishing.
Faculty Model: Dual-Faculty Instruction. Co-taught by an AI Systems Specialist (focusing on models, ComfyUI, ControlNets, and pipeline architecture) and a Cinematic Design Specialist (focusing on visual hierarchy, lighting logic, and art direction).
Lab Supervision: Friday labs are staffed by faculty and specialized AI lab technicians who assist with local software execution, node troubleshooting, and rendering.
On-Campus Facility & Infrastructure Integration
Genesis Lab (Computer Lab)
Enterprise workstations running ComfyUI, Stable Diffusion, ControlNets, Adobe Creative Cloud, and DaVinci Resolve Studio connected to central networked storage.
The Reality Bridge (LED Volume & Mocap Set):
A 10×10 LED insert volume wall, motion capture space, and camera tracking environment used to capture live performance data, lighting maps, and background plates.
VFX & Scanning Suite
Equipment including 360-degree cameras, 3D scanners, and VFX supervisor kits (chrome balls, lens charts) used to convert physical assets into digital datasets.
Areas of Study
Cinematic Craft + AI Foundations (Lecture & Demonstrations)
Teaches core cinematic principles through the lens of professional AI literacy. Topics include camera grammar, lensing, composition, lighting logic, latent space mechanics, diffusion fundamentals, and evaluating generative tools (LLMs, multimodal systems, video models). Emphasis is placed on promptcraft, reference strategies, style control, and avoiding drift.
Hybrid Production + Systems Lab (Workshop & Sprints)
Trains students to build repeatable, reproducible production pipelines. Students work across text-to-image, image-to-video, and video-to-video modalities using live-action footage as source material. Topics include visualization workflows (pitchvis, previs, techvis), node-based systems thinking, modular recipes, editorial finishing, and legal/union compliance.
Graduation Requirements (Creative Projects)
To graduate, students must complete three portfolio-ready deliverables:
- AI-Enhanced Short Still Visualization Project: A polished visual set (storyboards, mood board, color script, or pitch deck) demonstrating style control and art direction.
- Hybrid AI + Live-Action Shot or Sequence: A piece blending live-action plate capture from NYFA soundstages with generative outputs to prove repeatable workflow design.
- AI-Enhanced Short Video Project: A finished video project (Short Film, Commercial, Music Video, Teaser Trailer, Avatar Demonstration, or Synthetic Talent Piece).
Evaluation Procedures
Grading is split between the theoretical foundation and practical application:
- Cinematic Craft + AI Foundations: 50%
- Hybrid Production + Systems Lab: 50%
Software, Hardware, and Custom Workflow Architecture
Workstations in the Genesis Lab come pre-configured with a dual-stack software suite combining traditional post-production tools, cloud-based generative platforms, node-based local engines, and custom proprietary pipelines.
Final platform selections are confirmed prior to the start of each workshop cycle to reflect the latest model updates and industry releases.
- ComfyUI: Primary node-based architecture used for custom generation graphs, ControlNet setups (OpenPose, Depth, Canny), and spatial continuity management.
- Custom LoRA Training: Students build and train dedicated character, location, and style LoRA models to lock visual consistency across sequences.
- Naifu Proprietary Workflows: Pre-built, custom pipeline recipes and node templates developed by NYFA faculty, designed to give students enterprise-level control and speed.
Students learn to evaluate, select, and prompt across leading generative AI platforms:
- Kling: High-fidelity video generation and motion vector control.
- Runway: Shot-based video synthesis (Gen-2 / Gen-3), image-to-video, and video-to-video restyling.
- Luma AI (Dream Machine): High-speed spatial rendering and camera movement control.
- SeaArt: Multi-modal image generation, upscaling, and asset exploration.
- Adobe Creative Cloud: Premiere Pro, After Effects, and Photoshop for editorial assembly, plate touch-ups, and compositing.
- DaVinci Resolve Studio: Color grading, audio sweetening, and final master exports.
- Genesis Lab Workstations: Dual-monitor PC/Mac workstations with high-end NVIDIA GPUs (RTX 4080/4090 equivalent) and drawing tablets for precision masking and control.
- Networked Server Core: High-speed 10GbE network storage allowing students to save project files, datasets, and renders directly to centralized servers without local file limits.