James Cameron: The Futurist

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (0:00)
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Hello and welcome everyone. I'm Patrick O'Shaughnessy, and this is Invest Like the Best. This show is an open-ended exploration of markets, ideas, stories and strategies that will help you better invest both your time and your money.
Invest Like the Best is part of the Colossus family of podcasts, and you can access all our podcasts, including edited transcripts, show notes and other resources to keep learning at joincolossus.com.

**SPEAKER_2** (1:14)
Patrick O'Shaughnessy is the CEO and founding partner of PositiveSum and the CEO of O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. All opinions expressed by Patrick and podcast guests are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinion of PositiveSum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions.
Clients of PositiveSum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this podcast.

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (1:46)
Almost exactly a year ago, Colossus entered into a partnership with David Senra and the Founders Podcast to join the Colossus Network. The show has exploded since with more devoted fans than any podcast that I've encountered. With that in mind, we are excited to share an example episode from his show here today on the director, James Cameron. It's my personal favorite recent episode of David's.
I also want to mention that David and I will be doing our first and probably only live show together in New York City on October 19th during Tech Week at Webster Hall. Tickets are selling pretty fast, so if you're interested in joining us, you can check out the link in the show notes. Now, please enjoy his episode, and if you haven't already, subscribe to Founders.

**David Senra** (2:28)
After James Cameron's avatar made $2.7 billion, the director found the deepest point that exists in all of the Earth's oceans and dove to it. When Cameron reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench, he became the first person in history to descend the 6.8-mile-distance solo. Since then, others have followed. Most prominently, a private-equity titan and former Naval Reserve intelligence officer turned explorer named Victor Vescovo. But Cameron is adamant that none have surpassed him. Vescovo, Cameron told me, claimed that he went deeper, but you can't, so he's basically just making shit up. Vescovo disagrees. I have a different scientific perspective, he told me diplomatically, but even he is a fan of Cameron's films.
Like Cameron, Vescovo has made multiple dives to The Wreck of the Titanic, and while returning from one of them, he emailed Cameron. I said, I watched Titanic at the Titanic. And he actually replied, yeah, but I made Titanic at the Titanic. It is perhaps illustrative of Cameron's gifts as a filmmaker that even his most determined rivals will admit that Cameron has written and directed some of the most successful films of all time. It would be fair to call him the father of the modern action movie, which he helped invent with his debut, The Terminator, and then reinvent with his second, Aliens. It would be accurate to add that he has directed two of the three top grossing films in history.
But he's also a scientist. A camera that he helped design served as the model for one that is currently on Mars, attached to the Mars Rover.
And he's an adventurer, and not in the dilettante billionaire sense. When Cameron sets out to do something, it gets done.
The man was born with an explorer's instincts and capacity. The original Avatar required the invention of dozens of new technologies. From the cameras Cameron shot with, to the digital effects that he used to transform human actors into animated creatures, to the language those creatures spoke in the film.
For the sequel, The Way of Water, Cameron told me he and his team started all over again. They needed new cameras that could shoot underwater and a motion caption system that could collect separate shots from above and below the water and then integrate them into a unified virtual image. They needed new algorithms, new AI, to translate what Cameron shot with what you see.