“Letting Go” was a winner at the South Coast Film Festival; quite an achievement given that we were up against non-synthetic thespian talent like Neil Warnock.

The veteran football manager’s “pitch”-perfect performance as a stroppy police superintendent was one of the event’s many highlights, which included Dean Stalham’s intense prison drama “Barred”, and deftly crafted films from as far afield as Iraq, Ghana and Crouch End.

Hosted at Soho’s glitzy Century Club, the event was sold out and had a happy, eclectic buzz. It was unusual to be an AI filmmaker surrounded by traditional auteurs, but there was no Luddite pitchforkery – just curiosity, enthusiasm and a shared sense that making stuff was infinitely better than sitting about moaning about the underwhelming state of the mainstream industry.

“Letting Go”, a six-minute film about a tsunami survivor, was made in eight days by a team of five with a budget of zero. So far, it has been nominated for Best Narrative and Best Sound Design in MIT’s Global Hackathon, reached the finals of Spain’s AI Movie Awards and collected silverware in Soho. Whether its next stop is Hollywood or Chorleywood, it’s been a fun journey for Shaggy Dog AI and the Creative Intelligence team of Shingo Narita, Chris Bairstow, Jess Brady, and Ailen Martinez Infante.