Beijing Has Asia's Largest Digital Film Production Base

The Digital Film Making Works under the China Film Group Corporation became operational recently, and is the largest of its kind in Asia.

Huang Yaozu, general manager of the works, said that "We just want to provide Chinese directors more means of film making, so as to help China's film industry out of its stagnant period." As for him, stale content and backward screening methods have been the main factors for the lagging film market.

Digital technology will make films more stimulating and breathtaking, and it is expected to be expanded into picture composition and stunt making, along with audio synthesis and montage, he added.

Huang made it clear that their technological hardware is more or less at the same level as foreign counterparts, but their technological staff need more experience.

The film industry has experienced three stages of development, from silent to sound, black and white to color, and analog technology to digital signals, which is now taking place worldwide. The film "Opium War" in 1997, directed by Xie Jin, was the first in China to use digital technology in audio synthesis, and the recent film "Emergency Landing" was the first to edit stunt scenes with computers.

"The development of multimedia and the Internet has made the use of digital systems a trend, which will eventually combine shooting, film distribution, and screening into one. So, it is a matter of life or death for the film industry whether to use digital technology now," said Huang.

The company will expand its business by making commercials, music TV programs, electronic games, and TV operas as well. Nine of the ten hottest films in the US were digital, and nearly half of the more than 1,000 scenes in "Titanic" were made via computer.

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