AI In Nollywood: Between Faster Filmmaking & The Fight To Preserve Nigerian Authenticity
By OBI DAVIES
ARTIFICIAL Intelligence is moving steadily from the realm of experimentation into Nigeria’s film industry.
In writers’ rooms, editing suites and visual-effects workflows, filmmakers are beginning to use AI to perform tasks that once required more people, more money and more time. The technology can generate ideas, produce visual concepts, assist with editing and recreate environments that would otherwise be difficult or expensive to film.
For an industry that spent decades developing a distinctive Nigerian cinematic identity, however, the transformation raises a difficult question: how much technology can Nollywood absorb before efficiency begins to undermine authenticity?
The debate is no longer simply about whether filmmakers should use AI. It is increasingly about how they should use it without allowing the technology to displace the human judgment, cultural knowledge and lived experience that give Nigerian cinema its identity.
The Efficiency Argument
Veteran filmmaker and director Tunde Olaoye does not see AI as an enemy of filmmaking.
Instead, he believes the technology can help filmmakers overcome practical limitations, particularly when recreating places or historical periods that cannot easily be captured with conventional production methods.
Olaoye recalled working on Eshugbayi Eleko, a Jide Kosoko film set partly in the historical past. The production required visual representations of Lagos as it appeared between the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Finding suitable contemporary footage of that period was impossible.
AI therefore became a production tool.
The technology helped the filmmakers create establishment shots and briefly reconstruct scenes that would have been difficult to stage physically. Olaoye said some AI-generated sequences lasted only a few seconds.
That limited use, in his view, illustrates where AI can add value without overwhelming the film.
He argues that filmmakers should deploy the technology selectively, particularly where physical production would impose disproportionate costs or logistical difficulties.
Authenticity Remains the Currency
The concern, however, begins when AI stops being a discreet production aid and becomes the dominant creative force.
Olaoye believes Nigerian audiences place considerable value on realism. Once viewers realise that an image or sequence has been artificially generated, he argues, they may feel that the filmmaker has compromised the authenticity of the experience.
His argument goes beyond visual effects.
Filmmaking, he says, ultimately depends on communicating human truth. Technology can assist that process, but it cannot automatically reproduce the cultural instincts that enable filmmakers to understand why a particular gesture, silence, joke or expression resonates with Nigerian audiences.
A machine may construct a technically convincing scene. That does not necessarily mean it understands the cultural meaning behind the scene.
That distinction becomes especially important in Nollywood, whose appeal is closely connected to its portrayal of Nigerian lives, languages, traditions, conflicts and social realities.
When Technology Meets Lazy Storytelling
Film editor and post-production specialist Steve Sodiya takes a less sentimental approach to the debate over employment.
He accepts that AI will eliminate some tasks currently performed by humans.
According to him, technological change has always altered the labour market. As AI becomes more capable, one person may eventually perform tasks that previously required several workers.
But Sodiya does not regard that development as an argument for rejecting the technology.
Instead, he believes creative professionals must upgrade their skills.
The greater danger, in his view, is not necessarily AI itself but the possibility that weak filmmakers will use it to produce even more weak content.
AI can generate material quickly. It cannot automatically provide the artistic judgment required to determine whether that material is good.
Sodiya points to humour as an example. A machine can generate a joke, but understanding why a particular joke works for Nigerians requires cultural awareness and creative instinct.
That distinction could become increasingly important as AI-generated scripts and images become easier to produce.
The Audience Will Still Judge the Result
For Sodiya, the problem with some AI-assisted productions is therefore not the existence of artificial intelligence but poor execution.
He compares the situation with visual effects in major international productions. Audiences can accept imaginary creatures and environments when filmmakers integrate them convincingly into the physical world.
The same principle, he argues, should apply to Nigerian productions.
AI-generated material can work when it serves the story and remains visually convincing. It becomes problematic when filmmakers use it as a shortcut and expect audiences to overlook obvious weaknesses.
This places responsibility firmly on the filmmaker.
The availability of sophisticated technology does not eliminate the need for artistic discipline. If anything, it may make that discipline more important.
The Job Question
Yet the employment implications cannot be dismissed.
AI-assisted production could reduce demand for some routine tasks. Administrative work, basic editing functions, preliminary visualisation and other repetitive processes may increasingly become automated or accelerated.
That does not necessarily mean the disappearance of filmmaking jobs altogether.
Instead, the structure of employment could change.
Workers who previously performed routine tasks may need to acquire more specialised technical, creative or supervisory skills. Editors, writers, designers and other professionals may increasingly be expected to work alongside AI rather than compete directly with it.
That transition, however, comes with a cost.
For emerging practitioners trying to enter Nollywood, routine production roles often provide the first opportunity to gain experience. If some of those entry-level functions become automated, the industry may have to find new pathways for training and professional development.
The Intellectual Property Problem
Beyond jobs and authenticity lies an even more complicated question: who owns AI-assisted creative work?
The issue becomes particularly sensitive when AI tools reproduce a person’s likeness, voice or other recognisable creative characteristics.
If an actor’s appearance can be digitally recreated, what rights does that actor retain? If a voice can be synthetically reproduced, who controls its commercial use?
And when an AI system assists a writer in generating material, where does the boundary between human authorship and machine assistance lie?
Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, Google’s West Africa Communications and Public Affairs Manager, argues that human creative intention remains central to authorship.
He said generative AI systems do not possess legal personhood or creative rights and that Google does not claim ownership of content created by users through its generative tools.
The implication is that AI should be understood as an instrument rather than an independent author.
Transparency Becomes More Important
That distinction does not eliminate the need for transparency.
Kola-Ogunlade said creators should acknowledge significant AI contributions where appropriate, particularly when the technology has been used to create or alter realistic material.
He cited disclosure practices and digital watermarking technologies as mechanisms that can help audiences distinguish synthetic or altered material from conventional footage.
For Nollywood, such transparency could become increasingly important as audiences encounter more AI-generated images, voices and scenes.
Without clear standards, questions about authorship, consent and authenticity could become harder to resolve.
Nollywood Must Set Its Own Rules
The AI debate ultimately presents Nollywood with an opportunity as well as a warning.
The industry can use AI to lower production barriers, recreate difficult environments, accelerate post-production and expand the possibilities available to filmmakers.
But technological efficiency should not become an excuse for creative laziness.
Nollywood’s greatest advantage has never been the perfection of its equipment. Its strength has come from its ability to tell Nigerian stories through Nigerian experiences.
That includes the rhythm of Lagos conversations, the complexity of family relationships, the humour of everyday life, the contradictions of Nigerian society and the cultural meanings embedded in language, clothing, music and silence.
AI can assist filmmakers in presenting those realities.
It cannot automatically understand them.
The Human Being Remains the Creative Centre
The most sustainable path may therefore lie somewhere between technological resistance and technological dependence.
Nollywood does not need to reject AI. It needs to control how AI enters the production process.
Used carefully, the technology can solve problems that once appeared impossible. Used carelessly, it can make weak storytelling faster, cheaper and more widespread.
That distinction matters.
The future of Nigerian cinema may involve humans and machines working together, but the machine should remain the tool.
The creative judgment, cultural memory and emotional truth must remain human.
For Nollywood, the real challenge is not whether it can win the race for technological efficiency. It is whether it can embrace that efficiency without sacrificing the Nigerian voice that made the industry worth watching in the first place.
