Hollywood has spent years chasing the next big thing, but some of the most interesting ideas right now aren’t necessarily coming from the traditional studio system. Films like Backrooms and Obsession have found huge audiences by feeling different – strange, ambitious and a little outside the usual Hollywood formula.

For Lightcraft co-founder Elijah Welch, that shift says a lot about where filmmaking is heading. ‘People look online, and you just see a lot of people going, “Where’s an original story? Where’s something I haven’t seen? Where’s something that feels fresh?” ’

The challenge is that having a great idea and actually making it are two very different things. A filmmaker can picture an incredible shot, write it into a script and explain it to a team, but until everyone can see that idea, it remains open to interpretation.

Spark Story, Lightcraft’s new platform launching in beta at SIGGRAPH 2026, aims to change this by allowing filmmakers to build, explore and refine scenes before they start shooting. The idea is to bring some of the planning tools traditionally reserved for major productions to a much wider group of creators.

The interesting thing about Spark Story is that it feels less like a traditional filmmaking tool and more like the way games are made. Lightcraft sees previs as the next stage in that evolution, allowing teams to work with scripts, 3D environments, camera movement, and production planning in one place.