Ben Affleck taught himself Python and CNNs, built an AI video company—and sold it to Netflix
_jaydeepkarale · x · 2026-10-08
A rundown of Ben Affleck's AI journey: he got into computers through VFX and filmmaking, taught himself Python (self-described as writing "pretty shitty Python scripts"), GPUs, tensors and CNNs, visited Google and OpenAI to see their AI work, then founded an AI video company built on filmmaking-specific domain knowledge—and sold it to Netflix.
In a GQ interview he casually explains how CNNs turn images into numerical representations, how tensors encode RGB values, and how feature extraction identifies edges. The author argues this isn't a celebrity bandwagon move—his interest goes back years, and he became convinced AI video needed real filmmaking expertise.
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