Fresh Angle Films to open a Champaign rental studio

Although Champaign has no discernible film industry (as yet) a Champaign County Film Office was recently established to attract filming to the its scenic locations and facilitate their production.

But come July 15, Film Office Director Terri Reifsteck will have a new film studio to boost her sales pitch. That’s when award-winning filmmaker Robin Christian’s Fresh Angle Films is scheduled to open for business as a full-service stage rental facility with Virtual Reality capability.

“My goal is to make filmmaking more accessible in Downstate Illinois and help establish what could be a viable visual media community,” says Christian.

He has helmed his own Champaign-based Dreamscape Cinema production company for 26 years and a Beverly Hills office for theatrical productions since 2006.

The new studio, currently under construction, is located in a single story, 2,400-sq. ft. building at 403 S. Water Street, in an industrial section of Champaign.

When finished, the studio facility, renting at $300 a day, will offer a 26×40-ft. stage, with a white, 12-ft. high cyc; a 20×20-ft. green screen; three editing suites equipped with a full complement of software and office space large enough to house Fresh Angle Films’ staff of six permalancers.

Fresh Angle Films founder Robin Christian

Producers can also rent the services of camera operators, gaffers and grips and production gear that includes HMI lights and flat panel LEDs, HD and 4K cameras, steadicam, a drone with a 4K camera, microphones, crane, dolly, 20,000 pieces of wardrobe and props and more.

To accommodate VR, the studio will offer a portable 360-degree, 20×20-ft. green screen. Christian and his team are researching and testing best practices to shoot, light and edit VR. His first VR film, action / terrorist / thriller “Ball of Rage,” is in development.

In production is another action/thriller that Christian wrote and directs. “Lowlives” has a large cast and set in a remote rural area.

On the corporate side, Dreamscape has produced a number of NASA-sponsored interactive web portals and web sites about space and time travel. He is also wrapping a documentary, “America’s Love Affair with Brushes: 100 Years of Brushmaking,” for the American Brush Manufacturers Association.

For a Fresh Angle Films rental rate card and other information, call Christian at 217/359-8484 or 310/499-8549, or email robin@dreamscape.la.