Curtis Clark, ASC studied theater at the Art Institute of Chicago’s Goodman School of Drama and
cinematography at the London Film School. After graduation, he began his career by shooting numerous
documentary films in Britain before transitioning to shooting feature films.
Clark’s feature film credits include such critically acclaimed narrative films as The Draughtsman’s
Contract; Dominick and Eugene; Alamo Bay; Extremities and Triumph of the Spirit. He started shooting
television commercials in the early 90s, which put him on the forefront of the digital/film frontier. He
has continued adding to his hundreds of commercial credits working with cutting-edge directors and ad
agencies. Clark recently completed his highly praised short film Eldorado which he directed and
photographed using Sony’s innovative F65 4K digital motion picture camera.
Clark is a member of the American Society of Cinematographers and its Board of Governors, as well as
chairman of the ASC Technology Committee, an important motion picture industry forum that both
investigates and influences the development of emerging digital technologies that impact filmmaking
practice. Since its inception in 2003, The ASC Technology Committee under Clark’s leadership has
achieved a series of notable successes including its collaborative work with Digital Cinema Initiatives, LLC
(DCI) to produce standardized evaluation material for assessing the performance of digital projectors
and other elements of DCI standards-based digital cinema systems.
Amongst its multiple initiatives, the ASC Technology Committee, at Clark’s instigation, embarked on the
development of a groundbreaking project to create cross platform data exchange for primary RGB
digital color correction referred to as the ASC CDL (Color Decision List). Broad based Industry
acceptance and implementation of the ASC CDL is now well advanced and has been recognized by the
Academy of Television Arts and Sciences with a prestigious 2012 Prime Time EMMY Engineering Award.
Also prominent among the ASC Technology Committee’s achievements during Clark’s tenure as
chairman was the groundbreaking 2009 ASC-PGA (Producers Guild of America) Camera Assessment
Series (CAS) which evaluated the performance of seven digital cinematography cameras compared with
film. The ASC-PGA recently completed their follow-up 2012 Image Control Assessment Series (ICAS),
designed to assess the ACES (Academy Color Encoding System) workflow performance of five frequently
used digital cinematography cameras compared with 35mm film. Clark and the ASC Technology
Committee have been active participants in the development and implementation of the innovative new
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences color management architecture known as ACES (Academy
Color Encoding System). ACES has also been recognized by the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences
with a prestigious 2012 Prime Time EMMY Engineering Award.
Clark is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.