A different take on awards season trophies materialized at the Advanced Imaging Society’s 19th Creative Arts Awards, which were given out at Warner Bros. Studios on Wednesday evening.
While Pixar’s “Inside Out,” already showered with multiple noms, took the honor for animated feature of the year, two other pics receiving multiple honors from the Society – “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and “The Walk” – have received less awards love from other orgs.
The Disney/Lucasfilm’s space saga (pictured above, in production) won two of the Society’s Lumiere statuettes: one for top live action 3D feature and one for best 2D-to-3D conversion.
“The Walk,” in its “The Walk: Virtual Reality Experience” iteration, from Sony/Create Design LA, won for best virtual reality experience. The theatrical version of the pic also got the prize for 3D scene of the year for its high-wire walk by actor Joseph Gordon Levitt.
20th Century Fox’s “The Martian” was also honored with two awards, for best live-action stereography and best use of native 3D.
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Pixar came home with three Lumieres in all, including best 3D animated feature and best animated stereography for “Inside Out” and best 3D short for “Lava.”
Atlantic productions’ “Conquest of the Skies” won best 3D documentary. Russian cinema commercial “Schvabe” (from StereoTec) won for Best 3D advertising. 3D short “Hard Reset” (from Buk Films) won for best live-action short.
Pannon Entertainment’s “Emma” was awarded for best use of HDR and Atlantic Productions’ “Great Barrier Reef” won in the Best UHD content category.
Marvel’s Victoria Alonso, who heads the studio’s physical production unit and serves as executive producer on many of the its films, received the Harold Lloyd Award for filmmaking.
BBC and BBC Earth were awarded the annual Sir Charles Wheatstone Award for excellence in natural history documentaries.
“With movies like ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens,’ ‘The Martian,’ and ‘Inside Out’ competing for our top honors, we had an extraordinary awards process this year,” said society president Jim Chabin. “3D has never had better year at the box office, or a better year in terms of brilliant creative work.
“With the addition of virtual reality, high dynamic range, and ultra high def entries,” Chabin added, “our members are clearly working at the very cutting edge of our industry’s future.”
Several Jury Prizes were presented for special achievement. Director Raman Hui was awarded a Lumiere for 2015’s “Monster Hunt,” (Edko Films Limited), the biggest box office hit in Chinese history. The romantic comedy “40 Below Zero” (Avatar Media), the 3D Short “Coda” (National Film Board of Canada), and the Japanese animated children’s film “Gamba,” (Shirogumi) were also honored with jury prizes.
“Our honorees this year came from all over the globe, from China to the U.K., to Europe, Canada, and of course Hollywood. 3D has truly come of age,” said Society Awards Chairman Buzz Hays. “Both the high level of quality and the quantity of 3D, HDR, and VR production is impressive,” he added.
