Christopher Dusendschon

Christopher Dusendschön is a Filmmaker and a Hollywood visual effects veteran. He is also a prolific artist and designer. Mr. Dusendschön came to the motion picture business with a mixture of highly technical and extensive fine arts backgrounds. Apart from a 'much storied and chequered past', he is best known for his technical contributions to hundreds of feature films, as well as many award-winning music videos and television commercials. For nearly four decades, Mr. Dusendschön has been creating artwork, experimental films, and designing exotic photographic machinery. Throughout his lengthy career, Christopher has had the great fortune to work with many brilliant artists and artisans from the worlds of design and visual effects.

His father, Noel Philip Dusendschön was a Professor of Art at the Indiana University School Of Fine Arts. In the late sixties, Noel was an accomplished abstract painter and an award-winning experimental filmmaker. His mother, Patricia Mae Peat, was an art historian, art instructor and an extraordinarily gifted artist. Wilbur D. Peat, Christopher's grandfather, was an author, artist, art historian and the Director of the John Herron Art Institute (1929-1965).

Throughout his early childhood, Christopher worked as both a fledgling 'camera operator' and 'editorial assistant' on several of his father's more complex experimental films. These included the award-winning "Necklace" (1969), which premiered at the Ann Arbor Film Festival.

On his eighth Birthday, Christopher received his first 8mm camera. Armed with boundless curiosity and matching enthusiasm, he would quickly gain a reputation as a wünderkind with a movie camera. Christopher's father and his Uncle, David W. Peat, would prove to be endless sources of creative and technical encouragement. From earliest childhood, Christopher was encouraged to paint, draw and to take photographs. David Peat was an engineer at the Western Electric Laboratories. Through David's connections with the Bell Laboratories, Christopher discovered the work of Dr. Ken Knowlton. Knowlton was developing the basic techniques for computer-animated motion pictures, an intriguing concept to the young Dusendschön.

Christopher shared his Uncle David's love of ingenious machinery and 'all things photographic'. These interests were further sharpened by a birthday gift from his uncle. The book "From Man to Machine: a Pictorial History of Invention" sparked his curiosity about cameras, optics and machines in general. These studies formed the foundation of his eventual career as an inventor and machinist.

At his father's urging, Christopher began screening experimental films including film collages and animations by the surrealist artist Harry Smith. Many of these films included the use of inventive and highly artistic optical printing techniques. The iconoclastic artist was an animator who drew and painted directly onto motion picture film to create dazzling and hypnotic animations. Christopher was convinced that he could make similar movies, now that he could film his own experiments.

In 1964, Dusendschön began making experimental 8mm films. His first animations were simple stop motion pixilations and multiple exposure composites' meant to look like oil paintings or charcoal drawings 'in motion'. These films also included his first attempts at traditional cell animation. Dusendschön's interests in chemistry and easel painting expanded into a progression of experiments with drawing animations directly onto clear film. He conducted painstaking experiments with various colored dyes and chemical treatments of both exposed and raw filmstocks. Many of these "Projects" were presented as short abstract films, edited to the electronic music of Edgard Varese and Bella Bartok. A sequence of high contrast black & white graphic animations followed, featuring impressive experiments using cyclical animated strobing and persistence of vision effects.

In the late 1960's, Christopher discovered the dark and dreamlike gothic stylings of Italian cinema Director Mario Bava. Those initial impressions are still reflected in much of his current work. He confesses to an enduring fondness for the lurid pulp novels of the 1930's and 1940's. This love of the macabre blossomed into a life long obsession with gothic comic books, film noir, fantasy and sci-fi movies. He became an enthusiastic student of the works of Willis O'Brien & Ray Harryhausen. As a youngster, Christopher met Oscar-winner Ray Harryhausen. As with many of his early idols, Dusendschön would eventually work with him. In 2002, he helped Harryhausen complete an unfinished stop-motion film, "The Tortoise and The Hare" (1952-2002).

As a youngster, Christopher was frequently invited to act as the projectionist for his father's monthly art school film festivals. These were elaborate events centered on screenings for the experimental filmmaking classes. These esoteric presentations were his first glimpse into the worlds of Eisenstein, Fellini, Cocteau, and the gamut of the Avant Garde auteurs. He soon became a student of the Cinema Verite and Fluxus movements. The Fluxus fusions of art and the media provided further validation for Christopher's own evolving notions of 'art from technology'. Christopher was also keenly interested in the films of Andy Warhol because of his unique mixture of artistic and photographic talents, as well as his use of 16mm cameras to produce 'theatrical' films.

Dusendschön spent a great deal of time researching the history of visual effects cinematographers. He soon discovered that motion picture effects required the joint efforts of the cinematographer and the machinist. Christopher was certain that he possessed the skill and knowledge necessary to both design and build custom cameras. He started to custom design cameras specifically for the processes envisioned for his artistic applications of visual-effects.

Christopher began fashioning animation stands and optical printers from surplus parts combined with home-brew machine work. Throughout his career, Dusendschön perfected his craft while working with some of Hollywood's top designers and machinists. He has worked with Oscar-winning machinists such as George Randal, Bruce Wilton, Carlos Icinkoff and Doug Fries. He has had long associations with master machinists including John Monceaux, John Huber, Jacob Monroy and Ted Gregory, all of whom he considered to be important mentors.

Dusendschön, a voracious reader and a demanding perfectionist, quickly gained a reputation for his encyclopedic knowledge of film production and cinema history. He is equally well known for his sharp tongue and warped sense of humor. He is an intriguing storyteller and quirky monologist. While in his late twenties, Christopher enjoyed a short-lived career as a standup comedian. His material consisted of sardonic diatribes on the movie business and wickedly funny observations on the state of the world.

From the beginning of his awareness of fine art, and later the broader world of design, Christopher strove to emulate the lives and works of his earliest idols, Charles and Ray Eames. Their groundbreaking films and wide range of design projects were tremendous achievements in the fusion of art and purpose. The famous duo created logical models of how the design process could be distilled, then applied to both industrial and artistic ends across a broad spectrum of disciplines. To Christopher, the Eames film "Powers of Ten" (1968-1977) and Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) were prime examples of the successful fusion of art and technology in filmmaking. The use of technology for artistic creation would emerge as the central theme of all of Dusendschön's future artistic pursuits.

Mr. Dusendschön had the pleasure of working with several of the Eames' famous colleagues. In the late 1970s, he worked as an architectural model photographer and animation consultant to the legendary designer and filmmaker Glen Fleck. He collaborated with Fleck on a series of installations for the Museum of Science and Industry. During this time, Dusendschön moved to the artist's enclave in Venice, California. He lived around the corner from, and occasionally visited, the editing room at the Eames' famous 901 Washington Boulevard offices. In the 1980s, he worked with Oscar-winners, Director of Photography Alex Funke and Cinematographer Bill Tondreau, famous Eames colleagues from their IBM film series days.

Easel painters have had a clear influence on Christopher's work. The painters Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg and Wassily Kandinsky all strongly influenced Dusendschön's style of painting and drawing. Their influences, as well as those of his father, could be easily recognized in the airbrushed photographs and 'Photo Paintings' that Christopher created during his early artistic career. This inventive and edgy aesthetic work was always balanced by rigorous studies in drafting and conventional technical drawing. He saw that developing broad skills as a draftsman was essential to his future as a designer and as a machinist.

Dusendschön often cites the more mystical and ultra graphic works of visual effects pioneer Jordan Belson and luminary artist John Whitney Senior, as his major technical influences. Belson's "Transmutation" (1947), "Mandala" (1952) and "Allures" (1961), as well as John Whitney Sr.'s "Permutations" (1966) and "Arabesque" (1975) were all significant influences. Whitney's work with his brother, the painter James Whitney, "Five Abstract Film Exercises" (1940-1945) had already been indelible proof that animated films could be significant works of abstract art. Whitney, also a colleague of Charles and Ray Eames, would ultimately come to be considered the 'Father of Computer Graphics'. Whitney's combined use of the computer, the film camera and the optical printer would prove to be immensely influential in Christopher's evolving visual effects sensibilities. He was fascinated by Whitney's writings about creating abstract films that would strive to 'look the way the music sounds'. He later worked for Whitney's camera operator; Robert Abel and served as a Vistavision Cinematographer on several projects at the Whitney's Digital Productions Studio.

In 1968, Christopher purchased a 16mm Bolex Reflex camera to be used for animation photography. He began experimenting with optical printing effects including Image Compositing using Front and Rear Projection through a wide range of esoteric 'screen like' Perspex materials. This initial work in photographic projection and manipulation produced several striking and idiosyncratic sequences reminiscent of the abstract works of the late Stan Brakhage, a pioneering artist and experimental filmmaker of the period. Dusendschön's meshing of music with imagery was often a high point of these early artistic endeavors.

Music is always a key ingredient in Christopher's artistic process. In an interesting twist, he suffers from a disorder known as Synaesthesia. This is a condition, in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another. For Dusendschön the hearing of sound produces the visualization of color or imagery in his `mind's eye'. As a result, music evokes powerful images, patterns and moods that find their way into his artistic works.

His efforts turned to experiments with the development and printing of color photographs. Some were rephotographed on a 16mm animation stand to produce interesting attempts at 'morph animation' using cyclical dissolve and superimposition animation techniques. These complex sequences were designed to be images that appeared to have been 'painted rather than photographed'. The resulting set of eight, 3-minute films, was best described as 'mélange-collage' and contained wide ranges of both artistic and technical nuance.

In Visual Effects, he found the perfect mixture of Art and Science.

In addition to movie making, Christopher was an avid still photographer and darkroom technician. While still a Junior in High School, he taught several semesters of "Photographic Art and Special Effects" at Saint Francis College Of The Fine Arts. His class curriculum covered experimentation with extreme photographic development and unconventional printing techniques for artistic effect. He would later work as a custom color repro printer for commercial photographer Ron Miller and as a commercial photographer and custom color printer for Mattocks Photographic Studios.

At age 14, Christopher quit his job at a local camera Store to become a part time drive-In theater projectionist. While learning the mechanics of projection, he undertook extensive repair and reconstruction of damaged 35mm feature prints. This resulted in the resurrection of several horror classics that had been previously earmarked for disposal. He continued the study of creative editing by analyzing both the films projected content and the patterns in which they were physically assembled. He spent the next two summers mastering the techniques and theories of editing theatrical film.

These experiences prompted him to seek work at local photographic laboratories, where he could continue to work with motion picture film while mastering the intricate details of the chemical development and color print processes. Throughout his laboratory training, a heavy emphasis was placed on film duplication, color correction, film restoration and titling. Throughout the course of his career, he was called on to build or modify test gear including photometers, sensitometers and densitometers. It was from these first projects that his lifelong interest in photographic densitometry began.

His connections to film laboratories provided virtually unlimited tools for photographic experimentation. His pioneering techniques for increasing film latitude and sensitivity lead to an initial career in available-light rock concert photography. His artistic use of special processing techniques allowed him to effectively transform reality into moving pointillist paintings. The driving aesthetic of these works was meant as a gritty, but intensely colorful, photographic answer to the ultra-crisp works of that era's superrealists. This was especially ironic since Dusendschön would later dub the over-slick works of his own 1978 Photographic Exhibition as 'Super Real' and 'Hyper Colored'.

His initial live concert shoots included musical acts like Gentle Giant, Genesis, Jethro Tull, King Crimson and Edgar Winter. Through the generosity of artists like Peter Gabriel, and local promoters, he amassed a significant body of photographic work. That portfolio immediately resulted in a great deal of interest in his work. He moved to the East Coast and began working as a commercial photographer, graphic designer and animator. He often created concert posters and album cover art for local rock and fusion bands.

At age 15, he was hired by a local ABC-TV affiliate to set up and operate their in-house news film processing laboratory. His duties rapidly grew to include news cinematography and film editing. Dusendschön, now well known for his eccentric sense of humor, was assigned to do a weekly series of news reports on interesting and obscure local events. The results were both irreverent and humorous. He was often employed as an on-air switcher, studio camera operator, telecine operator and video colorist. An Eastman Kodak technical representative sponsored Christopher into the Society Of Motion Picture And Television Engineers in recognition of his technical contributions and his knowledge of both the film and video processes. While a member, Christopher was involved in several joint tests with S.M.P.T.E. and Eastman Kodak to improve development techniques for news film used in direct telecine broadcast. He submitted several proposed new standards for revised title and action safe specifications for commercial video production cameras.

In a short time, Dusendschön graduated from the news department to full-scale commercial production. This would lead to work as a cinematographer and technical director, again with special emphasis on visual effects projects. He purchased a 35mm Éclair CM3 Camflex camera that he modified for single frame animation and time-lapse cinematography. His career in 35mm animation cinematography really began here. He applied a wide variety of animation techniques to the multiple exposure cinematography of electronic shapes and phosphor patterns on television tubes and oscilloscopes. Several 1-minute long, 35mm composite animations were created. These projects were again praised for their inventive blending of music and imagery.

Christopher started supplementing his earnings by moonlighting as a director of photography and editor on low budget industrial film projects. He began to find work as a director and film editor on more mainstream projects. During this period, he directed several ambitious half-hour television documentaries for local broadcasters. While working at a Midwest television station, Dusendschön began a series of mechanical design projects including building a servo-controlled animation stand for film and video cameras. This system was used to create on-air motion-graphics and in-house commercial elements. One project, "The Great Ohio River Flood" (1974), involved kinestasis sequences that were created from hundreds of hand tinted still photographs rephotographed on his 16mm animation stand. These sequences incorporated full camera motion and automated dissolves.

While assigned as a television news cinematographer, Dusendschön was selected to field test RCA's revolutionary TK-76 `electronic news-gathering' video camera. During the course of this project he was extensively trained in 2" quad and 3/4" videotape editing and electronic mix-effects. As a part of the S.M.P.T.E. field-testing of the new camera, Christopher was assigned to shoot documentary footage of the location shooting of "The Deer Hunter" (1978). He struck up a friendship with Oscar-winning Director of Photography Vilmos Zsigmond and Director Michael Cimino. Both encouraged Dusendschön to seek work as a cinematographer in Hollywood.

Christopher started to produce his own experimental effects sequences, in order to create a portfolio reel for potential employers in Hollywood. This project was the culmination of his work in the motorization and motion-control of live action and optical printer cameras. He subsequently designed a variety of systems to control shutters and to move cameras in synchronization with the objects they were photographing. Several generations of motorized 'analog animation generators' were created. These animation generators contained integral light boxes and worked under programmable servo motor motion-control. At the same time, he began experimenting with the application of newly emerging stepper motor technologies to both live action and process camera shutters. Using these exotic devices, he undertook serious experiments with streak and slit-scan photography, in an attempt to duplicate effects he had seen in the work of Jordan Belson, John Whitney Sr. and Douglas Trumbull.

His extensive experience with computerized animation stands lead to work with Creative Information Associates, a Chicago based animation studio. Christopher swiftly rose to senior effects designer and Oxberry aerial-image animation cinematographer. Projects included work on several National Geographic documentaries and a number of animated commercials.

In the fall of 1978, Christopher was invited to stage an exhibition of his 'Special Effects Still Photography' at the Art-Link Galleries. The esoteric exhibition, simply called "Visions", consisted of a progression of surreal photographs. This series of composited images had complex perspective and color juxtapositions progressing through them. These works were achieved through the artistic application of motion picture special effects techniques to produce a wealth of stylized photographic images. Each intricate image was designed to enhance the subject matter as well as the observer's experience of viewing them. Most of the images in this series were designed to help the observer to develop a sympathetic view of the works, as if one was seeing through the eyes of the artist. This thought-provoking imagery became a key component of the visual effects portfolio that Dusendschön used to generate interest from several Hollywood visual effects houses.

At the end of the 1970s, now in his early twenties, he was brought to Hollywood by effects guru Robert Abel. Dusendschön was assigned to setup and operate an in-house optical printing department for the Robert Abel & Associates Effects Studio. He had previously acted as a 65mm and Vistavision technical consultant for Abel's Astra Studio on "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" (1979). The pioneering environment at Robert Abel & Associates provided a virtually limitless source of exotic imaging processes for Dusendschön to explore. The firm was comprised of one of the most remarkable groupings of artists and technicians ever assembled. This group would go on to make CGI history with their groundbreaking computer-animated theatrical and commercial projects.

Several years later, Christopher was selected to be the Supervisor of Technical Operations for Midocean Motion Pictures. This `East Coast driven' animation house boasted another impressive mixture of artists, filmmakers and designers for Christopher to learn from and to work with. As head of the camera department, he was privileged to work with a group of highly talented cinematographers and directors of photography. These included Scott Farrar, David Hardberger and Pat Sweeney, later of Industrial Light and Magic. He first met Oscar-winner Ray Feeney while overseeing motion-control animation at Midocean Motion Pictures. Mr. Feeney's mentoring was instrumental in Christopher's success as Midocean's chief technical officer.

Tiring of his supervisory role, Dusendschön returned to cinematography and animation for Midocean. He provided extensive technical direction to commercial clients such as Panasonic, AT&T, Oxy Petroleum, Ford and Showtime. Christopher also assisted Director Mary Lambert on a development project for Francis Ford Coppolla. During his tenure at Midocean Motion Pictures, Christopher finely honed his technical skills. He was promoted from camera operator to technical director. As time progressed, he was promoted to Director of Photography for Visual Effects. His new position found him working with designers like Wayne Kimball, Dan Kohne and John Hughes, the founder of Rhythm & Hues Studios.

In 1977, he saw "Star Wars" (1977), which had been final impetus to aggressively seek work on visual effects projects in Hollywood. Christopher would now operate the original Star Wars optical Printer for Oscar-winner Robert Blalack's Praxis Filmworks. While at Praxis Filmworks, He served as an optical compositor creating 3-D Stereovision composites for "Jaws 3-D" (1983), followed by high speed miniature, pyrotechnics and cloud tank cinematography for Oscar-winner Nicholas Meyer's ABC Mini-Series "The Day After" (1983).

Robert Abel & Associates selected Dusendschön to assist in the design of camera systems and optical compositing systems for use on the innovative movie "Tron" (1984). Christopher contributed his design and fabrication skills to a wide array of technical projects including the 'Abel Motion-Control Optical Printer', the experimental 'Tron Film Recorder', 'The TRON Rear Projection Optical Printer' and the 'Tron Motion-Control RP Compositing Camera System'. During this period, Christopher briefly collaborated with Oscar-winner Linwood G. Dunn, 'inventor' of the optical printer, and his partner Don Weed at Film Effects Of Hollywood. He collaborated with some of their top designers and technical directors on an interesting range of projects and computerized machinery. Major figures in the world of film design became colleagues and mentors, such as Con Pederson, Bill Kovacs, Richard Taylor, Wayne Kimball, Michael Gibson and Randy Roberts, several of whom employed Dusendschön to design and construct computerized animation cameras for their experimental use.

Christopher went on to work for a number of top Hollywood effects houses in a wide variety of visual effects design, animation, camera operator and technical director positions. During his first years in Hollywood, Dusendschön spent a great deal of time repairing and modifying Oxberry animation stands and optical printers. Mitchell live action cameras were of special interest, with innovative modifications routinely designed and tested. He converted several Mitchell 35mm BNC cameras for reflex shooting. He was hired to assist in the modification of several Mitchell FC 65mm cameras and a Mitchell Vistavision 35mm 'Butterfly' camera for visual effects work. Shortly thereafter, he began modifying a Mitchell High Speed 35mm GC camera for his personal use. This camera was frequently used as a time lapse and stop motion animation camera. This amazing camera was used at Silvercloud Productions, on a variety of motion control rigs, shooting motion graphic materials for HBO, Showtime, Cinemax and other Cable Broadcasters.

While a cinematographer at an early incarnation of Title House Optical Inc., he configured the aerial-image animation stand to shoot live action and cell-inked animation composites for Hanna Barbera's 'Space Ghost' cartoon series "Space-Stars" (1981). These were the first 35mm to 35mm optical composites done at Title House Optical Inc.

Mr. Dusendschön's extensive experience with the aerial-image compositing process created opportunities to collaborate on many projects. The bulk of these projects involved using the process in conjunction with traditional cell animation. Christopher used a similar system to humorous effect photographing Fred Olen Ray's "Evil Toons" (1992). He had previously used this process on the campy remake of "The Blob" (1958), called "Blobermouth" (1990), featuring a talking cartoon `Blob' superimposed over its live action predecessor, with a new soundtrack by the "LA Connection" comedy troupe.

He next came to the attention of designer and filmmaker, Bo Gehring, a founding member of Magi Synthavision Inc., a consummate inventor and a brilliant visual effects supervisor. Christopher also collaborated with Oscar-winning motion control wizard and cinematographer, Bill Tondreau. He would learn volumes about motion-control systems and visual effects from Mr. Gehring, and his many colleagues. While at Bo Gehring & Associates, Dusendschön created several elements for use in the animated title sequence of the movie "Heavy Metal" (1981). As a senior effects cinematographer at Bo Gehring & Associates, Christopher created special visual effects for the Universal Studios horror anthology "Nightmares" (1983). He photographed animated 3-D vector graphics through custom laser etched optics to create the `Bishop of Battle' video game effects sequences.

Dusendschön then returned to duties as senior animation camera operator at Kramer-MC2. Christopher collaborated on many music video and feature film projects. He frequently worked with producer Jerry Kramer and the noted technical director, editor and cinematographer, Ken Rudolph. While at Kramer-MC2, Christopher shot Vistavision texture map plates for use in "The Last Starfighter" (1984) and "2010: the year we make contact" (1984). While working on the A&M Records lot, Dusendschön served as an animation camera operator and animator on a number of high profile music videos with producer Jerry Kramer's Kramer-MC2 INC. These projects included working with the late Jimi Hendrix's controversial Manager, Alan Douglas, and Director Gerald V. Casale of Devo, on the posthumous music video of the Jimi Hendrix classic, "Are You Experienced?" Other music video projects included Michael Patterson and Candace Reckinger's MTV award-winning music video, A-ha's "Take On Me", another project incorporating aerial-image compositing with cell flop animation. Then he collaborated with Meiert Avis and Patti Smith on "People Have The Power". This string of videos was capped off by animation camera work on Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train", for Director Wayne Isham and Producer Jerry Kramer.

Kramer-MC2 evolved into Kenimation Animation Services. After this change, Christopher began shooting material for an extraordinary variety of clients including the major motion picture studios. This period provided work with another extremely eclectic list of directors, editors and graphic designers. Their widely varied techniques contributed significantly to Dusendschön's broadening range of technical expertise.

Christopher went on to work as a cinematographer and technical director at Silvercloud Productions. Dusendschön's projects included motion-graphic sequences and shooting materials for a re-release of D.A. Pennebaker's "Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars" (1973, re-release: 1985). Dusendschön continued to work in visual effects and animation, next with Cruse and Company for Danny DeVito's directorial debut "The Ratings Game" (1984), this project was done in collaboration with veteran editor and effects designer Dale Beldin.

During this period he frequently moonlighted as a matte and rotoscope artist on low budget Sci-Fi /Horror Films and on several stop-motion animated commercials. Christopher built a stop motion camera for, and worked briefly with, 'Claymation' creator Will Vinton, on the set of Michael Jackson's "Moonwalker" (1988). Several music video projects followed, each involving animation and kinestasis, Dusendschön created elements for the music videos "State of Shock" (1988) and "Speed Demon" (1988) with editors Will Godby and Dale Beldin. In the early seventies Christopher had been heavily influenced by Vinton's early work, especially his groundbreaking animated `music video' for Frank Zappa's "200 Motels" (1971).

Interested in advancing his career in animation cinematography, Christopher accepted a position at Klasky/Csupo. He began as a cinematographer for Gabor Csupo's Frame-By-Frame Animation Division. Projects included cell flop cinematography of the original "Simpson's" (1987-1998) animated short segments for the "The Tracey Ullman Show" (1987-1990). Between shoots for Klasky/Csupo, Dusendschön returned to Kenimation Animation Services as the Vistavision compositing camera operator on the animated main title sequence of Julien Temple's "Earth Girls Are Easy" (1988). After the "The Tracey Ullman Show" segments aired, Tom Burton and John Graves, of Calico Productions, selected Christopher to provide cell flop cinematography and technical direction for the animated television series, "Widget, The World Watcher" (1990).

When "Widget" shooting wrapped Visual effects supervisor William Mesa hired Christopher as an animator, rotoscope artist and effects cinematographer for Introvision Studios and Paramount Pictures, on "Flight of the Intruder" (1991). During the beginning stages of production, Christopher's talents as an animator were brought to the attention of Oscar-winning Director John Millius. After screening Christopher's work, Millius immediately promoted him to animation supervisor for all elements provided by Introvision Studios.

He spent many of his off hours working for friend Harry Nilsson's Hawkeye Entertainment. Dusendschön was the photo editor and animation prep artist on "The Doobie Brothers: a Retrospective" (1991) for Nilsson. At the end of 1991, he directed, shot and edited an outrageous 60-minute television pilot about the Hollywood underground music scene. "The U.F.O. Rock 'N Roll Party Show" (1991) featured the music and video theatrics of underground acts like Muffy Panics, 45 Grave, Doby Danger, Pygmy Love Circus and The Venutians.

After returning to the newly renamed THDX Optical Division in late 1997, he oversaw the automation and computerization of the optical printing department. His duties included senior optical camera operator, technical director, hazeltine color timer and color QC supervisor. He participated in a wide variety of projects with the industry's top title designers including Pablo Ferro, Dan Perri and Wayne Fitzgerald. Dusendschön's THDX Optical Division projects included extensive motion control optical effects. He provided main title sequence composite cinematography for a wide range of films including: "Hope Floats" (1998), "For Love of The Game" (1999), "Gods and Monsters" (1998), "Jesus' Son" (1999), "The Virgin Suicides" (1999), "Happy Texas" (1999), "Lightmaker" (2001), "Psycho Beach Party" (2000), "Drowning Mona" (2000), "Galaxy Quest" (1999) and "Jawbreaker" (1999).

He was subsequently transferred to the THDX Digital Division to oversee the I/O and digital imaging departments. His duties included film negative lineup, film scanning, and laser film recording. Traditional film Projects included: "Dune" (2000), "Donnie Darko" (2001), "Memento" (2000), "Soul Survivors" (2001) and "Ghost World" (2000). He was also responsible for large format 65/5perf, 65/8perf Showscan and 65/15perf IMAX film scanning and film recording. His IMAX Large format Projects included "Ultimate-X" (2002), "Endurance" (1999), "Extreme" (1999) and the large format trailer for "The Young Black Stallion" (2003).

Dusendschön is the founder of VGI Digital Imaging. This endeavor began as a research & development firm to assist independent film producers with creative visual effects design and production. VGI Digital Imaging currently specializes in offbeat design work and innovative animation techniques, as well as custom mechanical design for the motion-picture business.

He is currently an associate at iO Film, where in collaboration with colleagues Adam S. Hawkey, Kevin Mullican and two time Oscar-winner Les Dittert, he continues their pioneering work in the areas of 4k film scanning, high-definition video to film transfers and perfecting the emerging Digital Intermediate process. As Digital Imaging Supervisor at iO FILM, Dusendschön oversees all facets of editorial services and digital imaging. He supervises the operation, calibration and programming of the two Arrilaser Film Recorder cameras. He supervises and operates several cinema scanners, Including the VGI 4K Digital Cinema Scanner which was custom designed and built for iO FILM by Dusendschön, and the 2k High Speed Cinema Scanner, designed and built by Les Dittert. Christopher's recent iO FILM Projects include "The Celestine Prophecy" (2005), "Hooligans" (2005), "Steven King's Riding the Bullet" (2005), "Crash" (2005), "12" (2004), "Godsend" (2004), "Saved!" (2004), "Dracula: Legacy" (2004), "Dracula: Ascension" (2003), "Mimic: Sentinel" (2003), "Igby Goes Down"(2002) and "Halloween: Resurrection" (2002).

Mr. Dusendschön continues his work as a designer and conceptual artist. As an artist he concentrates on creating computer animation and artwork. As a technician he specializes in motion picture scanning, esoteric color timing effects, imaging of exotic film stocks as well as high definition video to motion picture film conversion processes.