LOS ANGELES — Editor/color artist Stephen Hens has launched KiddKolor (http://kiddkolor.tumblr.com), a new studio that provides editing, color and finishing services. Hens and KiddKolor collaborated with writer/actor Rob Benedict and director Michael Weithorn on their new featurette The Sidekick, which debuted at Comic-Con 2013 recently.
The Sidekick is a 30-minute featurette that offers an offbeat take on the super-hero genre, and an allegory about the struggle to find purpose in life even as one is being re-purposed.
KiddKolor was hired for the project by Nathan Adams of Cinematomic, a company that provides full-service post for Web, television and theatrical projects.
“When we set out to make this featurette, one of our primary mission statements was that it not look like an independent short,” notes filmmaker Rob Benedict. “We wanted this to appear to be like any big-budget, super hero feature that could morph into a banal world where people just happened to be super heros. This put an enormous amount of responsibility on our colorist Stephen Hens, who was the hero of our post production journey. He was able to elevate our project into this amazing realm where you could shift between a show down on a rooftop to four guys talking in a laundromat; from an evil lair to a boring lunch at a sushi restaurant. He brought character to the vision of the movie, which we honestly thought could not be done.”
In addition to the featurette, KiddColor also recently collaborated with production company AtSwim on a new Jeep commercial with director Tom Gatsoulis. AtSwim previously worked with Hens on a five-spot Acura campaign.
Hens is currently working on a children’s educational Web series for www.CHALKPreschool.com, which is inspired by the unique teaching approach of the actual brick and mortar CHALK Preschools. Created and produced by Capozzi Productions, the series is due to debut this fall.
KiddKolor’s studio is calibrated by David Abrams of Avical. The KiddKolor DI theater runs a Sim2 DLP Darkchip processor 1080p projector that outputs 14 foot-lamperts; the same as theatrical specs at a local cinema. Driving the projector is a custom-designed Mac that offers realtime playback.