Celestial Pictures

Credits

Descriptions by
PaulBlartfan2018, Henrynguye5 and Chow Woon Gan

Captures by
Prodigy012 and Chow Woon Gan

Video captures courtesy of
Hong Kong Movie Studios ID Channel and Asia Movie Logos

Background

Celestial Pictures is a Hong Kong diversified entertainment company focusing on Asian-language film and television content including production, aggregation, distribution and the operation of TV channels. The company was founded in 2000, as "East Asia Filmed Entertainment Ltd" and owned by the Malaysian media group Astro Holdings Sdn Bhd, which in turn controlled by Usaha Tegas Sdn Bhd (a Malaysian investment holding company). In 2001, under the Chinese name "星藝映畫", was produced two films, namely Comic King (漫畫風雲) and Stowaway (驚天大逃亡). It took up the current Chinese name "天映娛樂" in 2002. Around the same time, Celestial sold the rights to all of the pre-2002 Shaw Brothers film library. Celestial was also the Hong Kong distributor of American films from New Line Cinema, etc. The company also produces various films under the current name of "天映娛樂".

1st Logo (2001)

Logo: On an orange computer-generated background, we first see a tunnel which is made of wireframes. A spark then goes through the tunnel. We zoom into the spark after a few seconds, and the tunnel zooms out to reveal that the previous sequence was inside of a wireframe of an abstract "cp". It then colors itself into blue (for the top half of the letter "c"), green (for the bottom half of the letter "c") and red (for the letter "p") as it zooms out into position. A blue star then flies to the edge of the top half of the letter "c". The "cp" shines before the star reaches the edge, and when the star is reached, it shines too. The company name, both in Cantonese and English, flies in to the left and right, respectively.

Technique: All CGI animation.

Music/Sounds: A triumphant fanfare.

Availability: Only seen on two films, Comic King (漫畫風雲) and Stowaway (驚天大逃亡).

2nd Logo (2002-2017)

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  Later variant

Logo: On a black background, we see bright flashes, which dims down to open a door where a silhouette woman sitting on a cliff and looking at a starry sky, which is filmed at the camera. The camera then zooms out, position and zooms closer to form the current Celestial Pictures logo. "CELESTIAL PICTURES" appears below, and the Cantonese characters also appear below.

Variants:

• A later variant has the text in a different font and the Cantonese text in a blocky font. The Cantonese text is now fit to the rectangle shape.
• A textless variant also exists.
• A shortened variant of the logo could be also shown after the film closing credits, followed by a copyright notice screen.
• A filmed variant exists.

Technique: A mix of live-action and CGI animation.

Music/Sounds:

• A piano sounder is heard on the door opening, then a 9-note piano and 3-note cello sounder segues to the logo when the camera and the text animating. Sometimes, a rearranged version is also heard on the different variant.
• A different orchestral fanfare has also been used with the later variant.

Music/Sounds Variants:

• There are high (PAL to SECAM), normal (NTSC-C to PAL) and double low or low pitched (NTSC to NTSC-C) versions of both themes.
• A shortened variant of the logo used the last half of the logo's theme.

Availability: Common. Seen on some Celestial's Shaw Brothers Film Library prints of films, such as The Magnificent Concubine and many others. The textless variant is seen on Cala!, My Dog.