Chinese Cinematographers Expand Their Vision With A Visit to Rosco

When a group of VIP Chinese filmmakers visited Hollywood for the ASC 2016 International Cinematography Summit, they took time out of their busy schedules to visit Rosco’s Los Angeles office. The group of six Chinese dignitaries included:

Photo1 Da-Yuan Mu – President of the Chinese Society of Cinematographers and past dean of cinematography at the world-famous Beijing Film Academy.
Photo2 Xiaoding Zhao – Acclaimed cinematographer who was nominated for an Academy Award™ for his work on House of Flying Daggers.
Photo3 Shu Yang – An award-winning cinematographer from Beijing who just completed work on a WWII action-drama entitled The Bombing, starring Bruce Willis, Song Seung-heon, Nicholas Tse and Liu Ye.

The International Cinematography Summit, hosted by the American Society of Cinematographers, was a unique, four-day event where cinematographers from around the world met in Los Angeles to discuss professional and technological issues and define how they, as cinematographers, can maintain the quality and artistic integrity of the images they create. Before the summit, the Chinese filmmaking ambassadors, accompanied by Nan Zhang – Rosco’s Chinese Business Development Manager, visited our office in Sun Valley, CA. There they were greeted by Rosco CEO Mark Engel and Jim Meyer – Rosco’s Director of International Business Development, along with a small host of other Rosco product managers and sales officials.

Jack Burwick demonstrates the LitePad Vector

After a brief tour of the facility, Rosco product manager Jack Burwick gave the delegation personalized demonstrations of our Silk ®210 and LitePad Vector CCT LED fixtures, as well as the X24 Effects Projector. All three cinematographers were absolutely impressed with the quality of light they saw from the Silk210. The group asked Jack about the wattage of each LED light he showed them, and they appreciated the wattage/lumen ratio they found in all of our LED fixtures.

A closeup shot of one of the X24 effects

All of the Chinese cinematographers agreed that the X24 is an excellent effect light for film as they reminisced about the old method of using a tray of water with broken mirrors in the bottom to create water effects. They commented that the X24 provided amazing control, color, focus, and speed of the effect – which offered continuity for their shots that the “old method” could not. As we showed the filmmakers other effects the fixture could create by changing the color and/or the gobos inside, Mr. Shu Yang took several closeup videos of the effect on the wall, on the ceiling, and on the table. The light was hitting each of these surfaces at different angles and was, therefore, creating different effects that he was interested in.

Photo5The delegation discusses the advantages of Rosco SoftDrop

Rosco’s Phil Greenstreet was also on hand to offer his expertise on backdrops as he introduced the Chinese filmmakers to SoftDrop. They loved its Day/Night capability, as well as the quality of the image and the matte finish of the fabric. Phil’s presentation inspired them to discuss the pros and cons between SoftDrop and digitally created backgrounds using green screen/postproduction. It never occurred to them that they could have a backdrop of such scale (as large as 39'h x 170'w (11.89m h x 51.82m w) - seamless!) in this kind of quality.

Photo6Thank you to our honored guest for visiting Rosco LA

As the visit drew to a close, our guests from the Chinese filmmaking community reported that they were grateful for the opportunity to be introduced to Rosco. They appreciated the guidance of our "very knowledgeable staff" and valued the opportunity to see and experiment with some of our products in a private, uninterrupted environment (as opposed to finding time to experiment on set or seeing the products at a busy trade-show). Considering that their trip was dedicated to new filmmaking technology and to maintaining high-quality image standards for their projects, we were honored that these respected cinematographers chose to visit our Los Angeles office, and that they consider Rosco a company they can trust in both regards.

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About Joel Svendsen

Marketing Director: Joel's Rosco career began in Rosco's Hollywood office in 1999 – first in sales covering the Western US and the Los Angeles Film & Television market, and then as Product Manager for Rosco's Film & Television Products. Joel's knowledge about Rosco's products and how they're used in each of our different marketplaces makes him well suited for bringing the stories in Spectrum to life.