What stayed with us this year
2025 was not about proving that AI works.
That question was already behind us.
What interested us this year was something else:
what creators choose to do with AI once the novelty fades.
Through 2025, SHAIKE reviewed, curated, and shared hundreds of projects in 2025. Short films, animations, music videos, ads, and hybrid experiments. Different formats, different tools, different intentions.
Some patterns quietly emerged.
AI disappeared from the foreground
One of the most striking shifts we observed is that AI itself became less visible.
Many of the works we featured no longer introduced their tools or process. They did not explain how things were made. They simply presented a finished piece, with its own rhythm, tone, and point of view.
AI was there, but it stopped asking for attention.
Advertising entered carefully
AI advertising became more present in our coverage, but in a restrained way.
Most projects we featured were not polished campaigns. They were tests, sketches, visual explorations. AI was used to try ideas quickly, to prototype narratives, or to explore aesthetics before committing to full production.
This is the context in which Creative Ad Daily took shape.
Recognition came without spectacle
2025 brought more visibility through festivals and awards.
AI films appeared more frequently in selections and competitions, sometimes in dedicated AI sections, sometimes alongside traditional works. What stood out was not the scale, but the tone.
AI films were no longer framed as curiosities.
They were simply part of the program. This normalization mattered more than numbers.
Throughout its first year, SHAIKE brought together 250+ Shaikers from different countries, working across film, animation, music, and advertising.
What we stayed away from
Just as important as what we shared is what we avoided.
We did not inflate figures.
We did not publish unclear authorship.
We did not turn AI News into a promotional feed.
Every feature was tied to a real creator and a real piece of work. That editorial choice defined SHAIKE’s voice throughout the year.
Carrying this into 2026
2025 did not deliver a single direction for AI filmmaking.
It revealed multiplicity.
Some creators use AI to gain speed.
Others to gain access.
Others to express something they could not express before.
In 2026, SHAIKE will continue to do the same thing it did this year:
observe closely, curate carefully, and give visibility to work that speaks for itself.
No hype.
Just films.