LOS ANGELES, Oct. 3 (Xinhua) -- An entertainment technology festival was held Wednesday in Hollywood in the U.S. state of California, aiming to explore cooperation opportunities between the Asian and U.S. entertainment industries.
Featuring expert presentations and panel discussions on the latest industry trends, the 2018 Hollywood Entertainment Technology Festival attracted hundreds of attendees.
"The tight connection between entertainment and technology development brings profound changes to people's life," said Zhuang Zhizhe, Chinese deputy consul general in Los Angeles, adding that the event has offered a new platform for exchanges, cooperation and investments in the past three years.
"With increasing contact between China and America, China's remarkable development in the 40 years since its reform and opening-up has provided the impetus for the deepening and expansion of China-U.S. complementary cooperation in the cultural and technological fields," he said.
"We are happy to present another exciting program to build on the insightful event we had last year. To recap, a year ago at this event, extraordinary experts and futurists discussed how the entertainment technology space was growing like never before in the U.S.-Asia landscape," said Wang Hanguang, chairman of Hanhai Studio, which hosted the event.
Hanhai Studio is a cross-border business focusing on the entertainment industry technology in the United States and Asia.
"The foundation of its rapid growth was attributed to the desire to innovate, and the widespread understanding of the need for global collaboration," he said.
Robert Stromberg, an American special effects artist, designer and filmmaker, said "We have Chinese investors in my company, so I am very familiar with that market."
As a two-time Academy Award winner for production design, Stromberg's credits include films such as James Cameron's "Avatar" and Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland."
He underscored the importance of new technologies in filmmaking such as virtual reality (VR).
"VR has so much potential as an entertainment medium, medical, technical, for all kinds of things. It's brand new space. It's constantly changing and evolving," Stromberg told Xinhua.
In 2014, Stromberg co-founded the Virtual Reality Company, a content studio and production company that combines narrative storytelling, technology, art and gaming to create VR experiences for people around the world.
"And as we import better film creators and artists, it will only make VR more compelling. They can go creatively wild like they do in film. When that happens, VR will explode," he said.
