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Thought Leaders in association withLBB Events
What Creative Integrity Really Means in Virtual Production
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07/08/2026
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Gorodenkoff Productions producer Volodymyr Golovko sets out the argument as to why the gap between how Virtual Production is used and how it could be used was too consistent to ignore
Virtual Production tends to get pitched on its efficiency. The days it shaves off a schedule, the locations it makes irrelevant, the mountain of post work it quietly removes before the shoot has even wrapped. All of that is true, and it’s exactly why the technology gets through the door in the first place. But for some brands efficiency was never the question. Their concern is creative integrity, and it’s enough to make them refuse the medium altogether.
At Gorodenkoff, we have always understood what creative integrity is and how it’s achieved. It came instinctively, in choices made without necessarily naming them, but it was rarely something we communicated explicitly until recently, when it had to be articulated for a fashion brand with a strong and long-standing heritage. Once it was put into words, finding references seemed like it would be simple, projects shot in Virtual Production that already proved the point. That turned out to be far harder than expected.
That difficulty is what turned a small inquiry into something worth writing down. The gap between how Virtual Production is used and how it could be used was too consistent to ignore, and this article is our attempt to set that argument out properly.
VP perception in the market
What surprised us most was how hard it was to find examples worth being satisfied with. Most of the work out there uses the studio as a substitute for a real location, treats VP as a backdrop only even when the set is surreal or fantasy in nature, rarely complementing it with complex production design, inventive VFX, or any real conceptual playfulness, and then, of course, there are the cars. Naturally, there is nothing wrong with that. The convenience and accuracy you can achieve recreating environments for a backdrop are hard to beat. Yet a project to point to as a proof of concept, where the technology met artistic input and you could read the ‘DNA’ of a brand through visual storytelling, was rare.
There are a few projects we admired and wanted to highlight, among them Nike and Audemars Piguet.
What appealed to us about the Nike piece, produced by Shoot Global, is that the ACG tech-wear line conceptually fits right into a high-tech VP studio environment. They’re playing with real-time VFX on the LED volume, something that’s unique to Virtual Production and can’t really be replicated any other way, and then combining all of that with physical props to complete the surrealness of the digital world the characters are interacting with. It’s a smart use of the medium.
Audemars Piguet, in a piece produced by Iconoclast, had the great idea of placing characters in dreamy environments, then compositing the shots into a single scene where the models appear larger than life, which is something available in Virtual Production through a simplified set extension process. It’s a clean demonstration of how much control the medium gives you over scale and composition once the environment is built to serve the concept.
A personal favourite of ours, and another Audemars Piguet project, produced by Bloom Paris (shot on film in VP!).
Its concept, directing, and filming style blend together beautifully into a single musical and visual experience that works so well for the brand. They came to the studio because the musicians’ availability was limited, which makes it a great case for how efficiency and creative integrity can live in the same project. As enthusiasts, there is a part of us that wishes VP had been used a little more here, though given the tight timeline, leaning on the studio the way they did is fully understandable.
Each of these genuinely draws on what Virtual Production has to offer, and that is exactly why we singled them out. If anything, they left us wanting more, in the best sense. Having seen what the medium is capable of, we found ourselves wishing it were taken even further, used not just to support the work, but to shape it.
What is ‘Creative Integrity?’
All of this raises the question of what gives an AV product creative integrity in the first place. You can film with a 35mm in a stunning location with a decent budget and it might still feel ‘hollow,’ leaving no impression on the viewer, who will file it under ‘appreciate the effort.’
Creative integrity, in our view, comes from a strong visual identity, outstanding craftsmanship, attention to detail, an understanding of the medium and a willingness to experiment with it, and the ability to speak through a brand’s heritage while using tools that give the final product a new edge.
Not all of it needs to be present at once, it depends heavily on the medium. A case that left a lasting impression on us is Gentle Monster’s Instagram post, created by their in-house team. It seems simple on the surface, but the platform is used in a playful, inventive way that became a sensation and reached a massive audience organically, all while fitting perfectly into the brand’s aesthetic.
On the other end of the budget scale are the Jean Paul Gaultier films, produced by Division Global and The Mill. They were shot on green screen, yet the craftsmanship behind the set build is remarkable, and the studio wasn’t used as a substitute or a way to cut corners, but as something built to complement the concept of the work.
The sheer scale of what they attempted comes across in this BTS video.
The technique isn’t sitting on top as decoration, it’s doing the storytelling, and that’s the whole difference between work that looks impressive for the sake of being impressive and work that actually tells you what the brand is about.
What connects all of these, across platforms and budgets, is that the medium was used with intent rather than convenience. That is exactly what Virtual Production is still rarely asked to do. It’s widely promoted as an efficient way of shooting, but it isn’t taken seriously for the unique, creative ways artists can work with it, and the two don’t have to be separate.
Conclusion
In the end, the efficiency of the technology alone was never going to be the answer. Virtual Production is a tool, and like any tool it only carries as much creative integrity as the intent behind it. Put it in a workflow that treats it as a shortcut, and it will produce a competent backdrop and little else. Put it in the hands of people who understand the medium and want to push it, and it becomes something a location or a green screen simply cannot be: a space where the concept, the craft, and the technology are working toward the same idea at the same time.
That is the gap, and also the opportunity. The industry has spent years proving that Virtual Production is efficient. What it has rarely bothered to prove is that it can be genuinely creative. We think it can, and we think the brands holding back for exactly that reason are right to ask the question, because the answer was never in the technology. It was always in the choice of who gets to use it, and why.
Thought Leaders in association withLBB Events
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