PowerHouse VFX, the New York-based boutique visual effects studio, rounded out its first year in business by serving as the sole visual effects vendor on M. Night Shyamalan’s Glass. PowerHouse completed approximately 300 shots ranging from Hero CG character animation work, environmental set extensions including buildings and cars, to bringing The Beast to life in many more scenes than they had done previously in Split.
Ymagis Group has announced the implementation of the Employment Protection Plan for Eclair Cinema SAS following its approval by the regional labor authority and validation by the official receiver. This decision follows the placement in receivership of the French subsidiary Eclair Cinema SAS last November. For information, Eclair Cinema SAS represented 5.5 percent of Ymagis Group’s revenue for the first half of 2018 and almost all losses recorded over this same period.
Leading event cinema distributor Abramorama has partnered with Experience Hendrix and Sony Legacy Recordings to release Jimi Hendrix: Electric Church in select theaters around the world. The film opens at the ArcLight Hollywood Cinerama Dome January 31with a special Q&A with director John McDermott, legendary record producer and engineer Eddie Kramer, and Janie Hendrix, the late artist’s sister who is the CEO of Experience Hendrix.
More than one hundred dog owners and their pets from all over Taiwan recently converged on Songshan Cultural and Creative Park for a charity premiere of the Hollywood film, A Dog’s Way Home. The film chronicles the heart-warming adventure of Bella, a dog who embarks on an epic 400-mile journey home after she is separated from her beloved human.
Qube Cinema has published a case study highlighting the deployment of Qube Wire by Tugg, a pioneer in developing the Cinema On Demand model bridging the gap between filmmakers and audiences. According to the company, Tugg has the ability to book titles into more than 85 percent of commercial movie theatre screens in the US, from the largest circuits to independent art houses. One noteworthy aspect of the Tugg platform is that it also provides access to venues that potentially wouldn’t ordinarily play a film, such as churches, museums and libraries.
Arts Alliance Media is providing their Screenwriter Theatre Management System and software support to the Sundance Film Festival for the third year running at six festival screening locations across Park City, Salt Lake City and the Sundance Mountain Resort in Utah, from January 24 to February 3.
Self-service ticket kiosks have wide acceptance in movie theatres, but Brisbane-based TouchMate saw the potential in combining the widespread use of video walls in cinema foyers with kiosk-style features. To bring the concept to market, the company joined forces with touch sensor supplier Zytronic. TouchMate director David Ellsworth said, “Our system is an evolution of the current technology. Traditionally, the cinema might spend more than $50,000 on a video wall then install eight self-service kiosks that might cost an extra $50,000-plus. If you merge the two technologies you halve the capital costs and costs of maintenance. You save space and money.”
Dolby Laboratories congratulates this year’s Academy Award nominees who have tapped into the audio-visual power of Dolby technologies to draw audiences into their stories. Five of the eight Best Picture nominees this year used both Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. And all five films nominated for Sound Mixing and Sound Editing awards this year were presented in Dolby Atmos.
Three of the five Best Animated Film nominations also utilized Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos.
Red Digital Cinema has added the DSMC2 Touch seven-inch Ultra-Brite LCD Monitor to its line of innovative camera accessories. According to Red, the monitor is a robust, optically bonded touchscreen with Gorilla Glass that provides the most intuitive way to navigate menus, adjust camera parameters, and review .R3D clips directly out of the camera.
The Motion Picture Sound Editors association has announced nominees for the 66th Annual MPSE Golden Reel Awards. Nominees represent the work of the world’s most talented sound artists and their contributions to the past year’s most outstanding feature film, television, animation and computer entertainment productions.
