Featured Stories

Slowing Down the Finish

Thu, 08/21/2014 - 13:08 -- Nick Dager

Kicking off the 2014 season of Canada’s Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing, Toronto’s Woodbine Racetrack hosted The Queen’s Plate Stakes last month. The event is the longest continuously run stakes race in North America, and this year marked its 155th anniversary. To ensure not a moment of horseracing action was missed, the production of the event included use of For-A’s FT-One 4K variable frame rate camera, used in conjunction with For-A’s ZE-One 4K extraction system.

The Room Transforms a Black and White World

Tue, 08/19/2014 - 15:16 -- Nick Dager

The Room, the boutique finishing facility located within Technicolor-PostWorks, New York, recently completed two months of post-production finishing on The Giver, the new film from director Phillip Noyce and The Weinstein Company. In a project involving numerous creative and technical challenges, the facility handled editorial conforming and color grading. The latter included applying the finishing touch to an onscreen world that undergoes a gradual transition from black & white to color.

Making the ANZAC Girls

Tue, 08/19/2014 - 15:04 -- Nick Dager

Based on Peter Rees’ book The Other ANZACs, ANZAC Girls tells the true story of five military nurses from Australia and New Zealand who served with Allied forces during World War I. Witnessing the horrors of war, the women experienced severe hardships while tending to the wounded and formed bonds of friendship that would last a lifetime. As series producer Lisa Scott (who produced the series with Felicity Packard) explains, the series “offers unique insight by showing how the war affected people, other than soldiers on the line.” The first episode premiered on Australian TV earlier this month and got exceptional ratings around Australia and much critical acclaim.

Magical Glass: Part 2, Canon

Thu, 08/14/2014 - 11:23 -- Nick Dager

Canon was already no stranger to the international filmmaking community when in November 2011 the company hosted a major event at Paramount Studios in Hollywood. Fujio Mitarai, who is chairman and CEO of all of Canon, flew from Tokyo specifically for the event to demonstrate that, in his words, “Canon hoped to be welcomed by the Hollywood filmmaking community and to work together to greatly expand the boundaries of digital cinema.” The history of Canon’s involvement in professional motion picture production is widely known but worth repeating here. In 2007 the company introduced the Canon EOS 1D Mark lll. The camera was designed for the high-end professional still photography market. Sometime during its development the engineers felt that adding the capability of shooting high definition motion pictures would add to its appeal. One Canon executive told me that at that time they were envisioning the camera being used for applications such as wedding videos. But cinematographers discovered the camera and it was suddenly being used for some often un-credited shots in major Hollywood films. Then, in 2008, it was used extensively to shoot the Mumbai scenes in Slumdog Millionaire. The movie won the Academy Award for Best Picture and Anthony Dod Mantle captured the Oscar for Best Cinematography.

John Gillan’s Production Cliffhanger

Thu, 08/07/2014 - 12:58 -- Nick Dager

British cinematographer and Polecam owner operator John Gillan was booked to cover the Azores leg of the Red Bull Cliff Diving competition. He flew in to the Azores on his way to the small island where it would take place, 1000 miles from the nearest city and two days away from shooting the event. It was not the ideal place to hear from the airline that brought him there: "Sorry, Mr. Gillan, we’ve lost one of your Polecam flight cases."

Encore VFX Enhances Lavish Middle Eastern Locales for FX’s Tyrant

Fri, 08/01/2014 - 12:00 -- Nick Dager

Tyrant, FX’s new drama produced by Fox 21, tells the story of an unassuming American family drawn into the inner workings of a turbulent Middle Eastern nation, a fictional country Encore VFX helped realize through exotic set extensions, extravagant computer-generated palaces and city skylines, subtle environmental work and crowd duplication. On site in Morocco, where the pilot was shot last fall, Encore VFX supervisor Doug Ludwig worked closely with the show’s production designer and art director to scout locations that conveyed the appropriate level of opulence, which were then further enhanced with VFX.

Historic Brisbane Theatre Reopens with Christie Technology

Fri, 08/01/2014 - 11:38 -- Nick Dager

Christie Solaria Series projectors and Christie Vive Audio cinema systems have been installed in a newly opened cineplex located in New Farm, a trendy inner-city suburb of Brisbane. Known as New Farm Cinemas, the complex houses six auditoriums that are color-themed with each theater catered for different purposes and clientele.

Southern Theatres Opens New Movie Tavern

Wed, 07/30/2014 - 14:31 -- Nick Dager

Southern Theatres has completed its second all Christie entertainment complex, at the new Southern Theatres Movie Tavern 8 in Covington, Louisiana. The eight-screen cinema eatery has Christie Solaria Series projectors and Christie Vive Audio cinema systems.

Christie Upgrades USC’s Ellen Norris Theatre

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 13:54 -- Nick Dager

Christie, through a generous donation of equipment and installation services, will be the sole provider of all cinematic and audio equipment within the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts Eileen Norris Theatre, and will be working together with USC SCA in enhancing visual technologies, specifically cinematic ones.

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