Broadcast News

Bookmark and Share
10/07/2017

Pitch – Creative Women Interview Simona Cristea

News Image
Rushes Head of Creative Colour Simona Cristea is interviewed by Pitch for their 'Creative Women' Cannes Lions special issue.

For this year's Cannes Lions edition of Pitch, the fanzine dedicated itself to shining a light on some of the incredible and inspiring women in the industry and the work that they produce.

Along with featuring Simona Cristea, Pitch also cited Rushes creative artists Sarah Breakwell (Nuke Artist) and Tania Nunes (Motion Graphics Artist), amongst their creative women.

In association with Creative Equals, Publicis, Kodak, illuminatrix, Stripes and Oath, Pitch also paid tribute to 100 Superwomen who work behind-the-scenes across the industry in a special supplement that named Rushes Managing Director Joce Capper as one such Superwoman!

You can read the full interview with Simona below…

"When people ask what a colourist does, I used to say it was like Photoshop with moving pictures," said Simona Cristea, "but it's more complicated than that." The petite and charming 38-year old Romanian is Head of Creative Colour at Rushes, and much in-demand by directors including Vicky Lawton, Trevor Robinson and duo Warren Du Preez & Nick Thornton Jones. She won three international awards for her colour grading work last year and has been described by Rankin as his "go-to colourist".

"I'm very lucky he thinks that," she said. "He really trusts me, and his films always keep me on my toes. I can never relax with anything Rankin sends me, because he always challenges you to be better and come up with original beautiful unique looks."

Working on Rushes' DaVinci Resolve System, Dolby monitors and SAN network, Cristea can "adjust the contrast, colours, add texture and grain, even adjust the framing," of an image to a point where her work challenges that of visual effects artists. "The grading suite is an incredibly powerful tool, I can accomplish a lot on the beauty side of things. I spend time working on eyes, lips, hair and skin," she added.

Cristea can use colours as a sound designer uses music, to change the viewer's mood, and says the technology has advanced exponentially since her early days working on physical film. "The machine is amazing, but at the end of the day it is just a machine and anyone can learn to operate it. Along with the specific technical skill, you need to be very artistic to excel in this career. You need to understand colours." She shows me before and after versions of Skoda's ad with Bradley Wiggins and a Superdrug beauty film: her finished frames pop and glow with vitality.

Born in Bucharest (her father a phone engineer and mother an agriculturalist), Cristea was recruited and trained as a colourist while at art school in 2001, at a time when many international movies were shot and processed in Romania (films such as Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain were shooting there at the time). She came to the UK, after a nine-month diversion via Mumbai, in 2007, and joined Rushes four years ago. Early on she continued painting and exhibited internationally, but it's indicative of how in demand she is as a colourist, that her last show was ten years ago in Stuttgart. "I paint with my DaVinci balls now," she smiled, waving an arm at the console's colour-wheel trackballs.

Recently, for a Nike ad featuring Ronaldo, she had to colour grade several VFX layers around the pink hue of the featured football boot: "It was a nice challenge to make pink look macho," she added.

For UNKLE's Cowboys and Indians, she enhanced the sense of a melting world created in camera by directors Warren Du Preez and Nick Thornton Jones. And for Vicky Lawton's set of erotic fast cuts for Coco de Mer's Project X, Cristea created a range of different palettes for each vignette: "Because it is so fast, you can see them better if they contrast."

She has worked with Lawton again on a forthcoming BBC film, and with Warren and Nick on a two-part Bjork video about life and death, half of it noir-ish monochrome, and the other half bright fluorescence: "As it's Bjork you know it's bound to be nuts."

Many directors become friends as well as colleagues, "which is good as you spend so much time in a darkened room together."

The colourist's job is a singular skill, but Cristea is a team player. "I'm very lucky to lead an incredibly talented team at Rushes. I enjoy what I do and one of the great things about being a colourist is that every day is different and presents new creative challenges. I'm very happy."

www.rushes.co.uk

Solidmate Ltd Memory Card Hire London

Top Related Stories
Click here for the latest broadcast news stories.

30/08/2023
TNDV Puts New Sony And Panasonic 4K/HD Camera Fleet To Work
TNDV has been putting its new Sony and Panasonic 4K/HD camera fleet to work this summer for high-resolution content acquisition of live and recorded e
09/02/2024
ITV Appoints New Executive Creative Director
ITV has announced that Tom Houser – formerly a Creative Director at the BBC and Uncommon London - will join ITV Creative as Executive Creative Directo
23/01/2024
Confetti Institute Of Creative Technologies Opens New Industry Centre
Confetti Institute of Creative Technologies has expanded from its base in the Midlands by opening a new industry centre in the Whitechapel district of
24/03/2023
Multistory Media Promotes Simone Haywood To Creative Director
MultiStory Media has promoted Simone Haywood to Creative Director, MultiStory London. Having joined MultiStory Media four years ago as Head of Factual
12/03/2024
Avid Congratulates Oscar®-Winning Users For Their Creative Achievements
Avid® has congratulated its Oscar®-winning users for their creative achievements at the Academy Awards®, following the success of Oppenheimer, which c
10/07/2023
Ateliere Creative Technologies Named 'IDC Innovator'
Ateliere Creative Technologies has been named an "IDC Innovator" in the IDC Innovators: Media and Entertainment Cloud Production, Distribution, and Te
07/07/2023
NAB Show And FMC Announce AI Creative Summit
NAB Show and Future Media Conferences (FMC), with sponsorship by Dell Technologies, has announced the AI Creative Summit. The series of training event
06/06/2023
Clear-Com Arcadia Upgrade Expands Northridge Church's Creative Boundaries
Northridge Church's fusion of technology and creativity – as evidenced by their praise band playing against an LED backdrop of digitally rendered but
04/05/2023
EditShare To Display Productivity And Creative Developments
EditShare® is to display its latest productivity and creativity developments at CABSAT 2023 (stand S1-E20, Dubai World Trade Centre, 16 – 18 May). Thi
26/04/2023
EditShare Technology To Support Creative Storytelling
EditShare is bringing its latest productivity and creativity developments to the Media Production & Technology Show (stand D40, Olympia London, 10 – 1
15/08/2017
X-Rite to Showcase Colour Management Solutions At IBC2017
XP Distribution has announced that it will demonstrate its extensive range of colour management products for video production at IBC2017 in Hall 12 St
08/12/2023
Adobe Unveils 2024 Creative Trends Report
Adobe has announced the 2024 Adobe Creative Trends Report which showcases the trending visual styles and themes that are set to scale in demand and ma
23/05/2007
Colour Confidence Expands Colour Correction Software Range
Colour Confidence has announced the expansion of its colour correction software range, with the introduction of two new solutions from PictoColor. Aim
11/04/2007
Colour Management and Extension 2 Add To Autodesk Lustre Colour Grading
Lustre Colour Management, now included in Autodesk’s visual effects, editing and finishing, and colour grading solutions, ensures that everyone across
10/08/2010
Gekko Nominated As Design Awards Candidate 2010
Gekko Technology's 'kleer colour' has been nominated as 'IABM Design Awards 2010 Candidate'. (Pictured: Model lit with Gekko Kleer colour based fixtur