American Cinematographer - January 2016 - 96

Post Focus

HPA Honors Silverman, Achievements in Post
By Neil Matsumoto

The Hollywood Post Alliance was born in 2002 when ASC
associate and then LaserPacific President Leon Silverman helped
bring together influential members of the postproduction
community to form a trade association. In 2006, the group
created the HPA Awards, whose main aim continues to be to
promote creativity in post and to recognize talent, innovation
and engineering accomplishments in the professional community. Now in its 10th year, the HPA Awards took place on Nov. 12
at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles.
With more than 80 industry experts serving as judges, the
HPA recognized 12 craft categories - including color grading,
editing, sound, and visual effects - for feature film, television
and commercial work. There were also special awards for Engineering Excellence, a Judges Award for Creativity and Innovation, and the HPA Lifetime Achievement Award.
The award for Outstanding Visual Effects for a feature
film was given to The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies and
the Weta Digital team of Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon, David Clayton,
R. Christopher White and Matt Aitken. For television, the award
was given to the Fire and Blood Productions team of Joe Bauer,
Steve Kullback, Derek Spears, Eric Carney and Jabbar Raisani, for
Game of Thrones, "The Dance of Dragons." For commercials,
the award went to the Method Studios team of Benjamin Walsh,
96

January 2016

Brian Burke, Ian Holland and Brandon Nelson, for their work on
Game of War, "Decisions."
Jeffrey Jur, ASC and Salvatore Totino, ASC, AIC presented
the awards for Outstanding Color Grading. "Everybody in this
room thinks the colorist fixes, repairs, and takes all the credit for
our work," said Totino to an amused audience. "And they do.
But tonight we're here to celebrate you, since you deserve it."
The color-grading award for commercials went to Company 3's
Tom Poole, for Lincoln, "Intro," and the award for television
went to Technicolor-PostWorks NY's John Crowley, for Boardwalk Empire, "Golden Days for Boys and Girls."
In accepting the award for Outstanding Color Grading
for his work on Birdman (AC Dec. '14), ASC associate Steven J.
Scott, Technicolor's vice president of theatrical imaging and
supervising finishing artist, gave credit to the film's cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki, ASC, AMC. "Let's face it, he's the
only reason I'm here," said Scott. "His work is endlessly inspiring and challenging. He makes me uncomfortable and unsure,
and I learn the most that way. My great satisfaction is to help
him explore where he wants to go."
Before presenting the HPA Judges Award for Creativity
and Innovation, ASC President Richard Crudo took a moment to
pay tribute to his co-presenter, ASC associate Beverly Wood,
who is retiring after 35 years of working in post at Deluxe and
EFilm. "Speaking from my own tribe, I assure you cinematographers have never had a better friend and advocate by their

American Cinematographer

Photos by Ryan Miller, courtesy of Capture Imaging.

ASC associate
member and
Hollywood Post
Alliance
President Leon
Silverman
accepts the
Lifetime
Achievement
award during
the 10th annual
HPA Awards.

American Cinematographer - January 2016

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - January 2016