Beyond Stock: How Shutterstock Studios Is Powering the Future of Interactive Creativity

When most people hear Shutterstock, they think of stock images, but the reality is quite different. Shutterstock Studios, the company’s full-service production arm, has evolved into the co-op partner that developers building the next generation of interactive experiences need.

This shift comes at a time when the lines between film, games, and branded content are blurring. Developers and marketers increasingly share production pipelines, from 3D asset creation to real-time rendering. Shutterstock’s goal is to sit squarely in that convergence zone — part creative studio, part tech engine, and the connective tissue between traditional media and the interactive frontier.

From stock images to production pipelines

Shutterstock Studios has evolved into a global end-to-end production partner that helps the world’s biggest brands and game developers turn imagination into interactive reality.  With more than two decades of game production experience through its global network, the team has found opportunities across console titles, Roblox activations, and even playable advertising formats.

Each project draws on what the studio calls its “full-stack creative ecosystem” — a blend of human artistry and cutting-edge technology. This approach is what gives Shutterstock Studios its distinctive edge: from concept to launch, they offer ideation, pre-production, 3D asset creation, co-development, post-production, and marketing - all under one roof. And behind it all is Shutterstock’s global creative infrastructure and industry-leading technology. 

AI comes to game creation — ethically

Shutterstock’s generative AI investments stand out not just for what they create, but how they’re built. Every model is trained exclusively on licensed, ethically sourced data, a key distinction in an industry growing wary of IP violations from unregulated datasets.

For developers, this ensures every output is safe for commercial use. When it adds value, the company’s artists use AIto to generate early concepts, expand on visual themes, and iterate faster without replacing traditional craftsmanship. It’s an approach that reinforces, rather than replaces, human creative direction — a balance Takahashi often notes developers are still learning to strike.

Expanding the playbook: Netflix, NBCUniversal, and beyond

For Netflix Games, Shutterstock Studios helped bring Squid Game: Unleashed to life, delivering concept design, 3D modeling, interface art, and effects - propelling it to the top of free action charts in 57 countries. The studio handled character concepts, built optimized 3D models, designed UI assets, and handled complex VFX sequences.

In another collaboration, Shutterstock Studios also contributed to Netflix’s interactive narrative line, Netflix Stories, helping translate shows like Outer Banks and Emily in Paris into mobile experiences that collectively reached over eight million downloads. On the film side, NBCUniversal tapped Shutterstock Studios to build production-ready 3D assets for beloved IPs like Back to the Future and Frankenstein into high-quality, production-ready 3D assets for games, VFX, and AR/VR applications.

Structuring data for the next creative cycle

Beyond production, another initiative is taking shape: data enrichment. Industry veterans note that game publishers often sit on decades of disorganized archives, concept files, and model data - assets that could fuel future development if properly structured. Shutterstock Studios has been working with publishers to help organize and prepare this data for AI training, turning these legacy libraries into brand-safe engines for new creativity.It’s a subtle but strategic move that positions the company not just as a creative service provider, but as a data partner in the AI era of content creation.

The bigger picture in the evolution of play

Game studios are blending generative AI, virtual production, and real-time 3D to accelerate development, deepen storytelling, and invite collaboration across disciplines. At the same time, traditional brands outside the gaming industry are recognizing games as one of the most powerful storytelling channels of our time as a space where audiences don’t just watch or scroll, they participate. From fashion to film to consumer goods, more brands are using interactive worlds to express identity and build emotional connection.

From its origins as a pioneer in digital content, Shutterstock’s evolution reads like a case study in reinvention. By merging its global infrastructure with world-class production and responsible AI principles, it’s aiming to redefine what a modern creative partner looks like — one that helps shape the tools and workflows behind the next generation of game creation.

See some of Shutterstock Studios' work: studios.shutterstock.com/gaming