The movie business has misplaced considered one of its most influential figures with the passing of Otto Nemenz, founder and CEO of Otto Nemenz Worldwide. Nemenz died peacefully at his residence in Kaanapali, Maui, abandoning a legacy that reworked digital camera rental providers in Hollywood and earned him the respect of cinematographers worldwide. Waving a tragic goodbye – right here is our Otto Nemenz obituary.
Otto Constantin Nemenz was born on November 12, 1941, in Judenburg, Austria. His journey from a technical faculty pupil in Vienna to changing into considered one of Hollywood’s most revered figures in cinematography gear is a testomony to willpower, technical experience, and an unwavering dedication to customer support.
An business in mourning
CineD is headquartered in Austria, and as a fellow Austrian, everybody working within the movie business right here knew of Otto as a legend who actually “made it” in Hollywood along with his rental enterprise. I used to be personally fortunate sufficient to satisfy him as soon as about ten years in the past once I went on a tour of his facility along with a category of scholars from the Vienna Movie Academy who I knew. Otto Nemenz was probably the most welcoming and forthcoming man you could possibly think about, and he was really completely happy to see so many younger filmmakers from his residence nation. The person had zero perspective and was all smiles, and I’m not shocked that so many individuals converse extremely of him – which is why I felt compelled to dive into his historical past on this Otto Nemenz obituary.
Otto Nemenz at his interview for ZEISS in 2023. Picture credit score: ZEISS
Information of Nemenz’s passing has prompted an outpouring of tributes from throughout the cinematography neighborhood. Gregory Irwin wrote, “Yesterday, I misplaced an expensive good friend. My business additionally misplaced an icon. My good friend, Otto Nemenz, peacefully handed away at his residence in Kaanapali, Maui. He not solely made the enterprise of cinematography higher, he personally made me higher.”
Michael Hofstein mirrored on Nemenz’s character: “For many who knew Otto, he was a rare individual with nice integrity, movie information, and private perception. He beloved the movie business and helped its progress by the years. His movie legacy will dwell on by his pals, his technological digital camera developments, and the honors bestowed upon him by the years.”
Ryan Avery shared a private reminiscence that captures Nemenz’s strategy to buyer relationships: “He was one of many first individuals in Hollywood that I met once I began within the business. He invited me into his workplace and talked to me, a 26-year-old child, as if I used to be his most necessary consumer. I believe he made most of individuals really feel that manner. He taught me quite a bit about movement image expertise. Otto at all times gave greater than he obtained.”
From Vienna to Hollywood
Nemenz’s path to Hollywood started with humble origins. Rising up between Vienna and Istanbul because the son of an Austrian father and Greek mom, he spoke fluent Turkish, German, and English. As an adolescent in Istanbul, he demonstrated entrepreneurial spirit by providing his providers as a tour information to American naval troopers from the sixth Fleet and buying and selling nylon items throughout import restrictions.
After attending technical faculty at HTL Mödling, the place he studied precision mechanics and optics, Nemenz briefly labored on the Austrian Broadcasting Company (ORF). Nevertheless, when pressured to affix a political celebration for profession development, he refused and made a life-changing choice: in 1964, at age 23, he emigrated to Los Angeles along with his first spouse.
Not only a businessman, but in addition an inventor: Otto Nemenz with a 65mm Panavision digital camera that was ready for aerial pictures. Picture credit score: Monika Nemenz
Breaking into the movie business
Arriving in Hollywood with desires of changing into a cinematographer however with out union membership, Nemenz confronted important limitations to entry on the main studios. He discovered his first alternative at Panavision, working as a digital camera technician. This place would show foundational to his future success.
In 1966, Nemenz bought his breakthrough when he was assigned to work on John Frankenheimer’s System 1 movie Grand Prix. Working alongside pioneering digital camera mount specialist John M. Stephens, Nemenz specialised in developing specialised lenses and digital camera rigs for high-speed filming with race vehicles, plane, ski races, and speedboats.
Throughout a wet race sequence in Spa, Belgium, when cameras bought moist and threatened to close down manufacturing, Frankenheimer’s frantic calls of “The place is Otto?” echoed throughout the racetrack. Nemenz saved the day by drying the cameras with a hair dryer, cementing his status for problem-solving below stress. From that second, he grew to become Frankenheimer’s trusted technician.
Nemenz mounts a 65mm digital camera on a System 1 automobile. Picture credit score: Nemenz
In 1969, Nemenz participated within the first movie shoot inside a Boeing 747 with an open cabin door throughout flight. All through the next years, he labored as a digital camera assistant on movies together with Hell’s Angels ’70 and The Evening God Screamed, and finally as a director of pictures on episodes of tv collection.
Constructing an empire
In 1979, at age 38, Nemenz based Otto Nemenz Worldwide, Inc., specializing in rental and upkeep of movement image and digital cinema cameras, lenses, and equipment. Beginning with simply two staff, together with Alex Wengert (who would turn out to be normal supervisor and stay with the corporate for over 40 years) and his second spouse Monika, a former helicopter pilot from Vorarlberg, Austria, Nemenz constructed his firm on a easy European precept: “the client is king.”
The corporate’s breakthrough got here with Terminator 2 in 1991, which propelled Otto Nemenz Worldwide into the ranks of Hollywood’s main gamers. The movie utilized a particular zoom lens developed by Nemenz’s workforce, an optomechanical development for which he obtained recognition from the Academy of Movement Image Arts and Sciences. In 1992, staff Dick Cavdek and Steve Hamerski obtained an Oscar for Technical Achievement for the optical-mechanical development and growth of the Canon/Nemenz digital camera zoom lens, initially developed on the request of legendary cinematographer Haskell Wexler.
Otto Nemenz with an ARRICAM. Picture credit score: Unknown
Innovation and adaptation
All through his profession, Nemenz remained on the forefront of technological development. The Otto Nemenz Swing & Tilt lenses had been first used within the 1994 movie Killing Zoe, the place they created perspective distortion for heroin scenes relatively than their meant objective of perspective correction.
When digital cinema emerged, Nemenz demonstrated exceptional agility. The corporate transitioned from movie to digital gear in roughly three months. As of 2023, about 85% of their work was digital, although Nemenz maintained a complete stock of movie cameras for administrators who most well-liked the normal format, together with Martin Scorsese.
The corporate grew to become unique distributor of the Ottoblad lenses (our report from 2023 right here), a reconception of Hasselblad lenses by P+S Technik that permits selective depth-of-field adjustment in particular person components of the body. These progressive lenses had been first used on Joker 2.
Buyer relationships and philosophy
What distinguished Otto Nemenz Worldwide from opponents was its personalised strategy. Having labored as an assistant cameraman, operator, and director of pictures, Nemenz understood filmmakers’ wants intimately. “What’s particular with my firm is that I went by all of the phases within the enterprise,” he defined. “If a director of pictures desires to do one thing to create a particular form of look, I can just about decide what he desires.”
Cinematographer Robert McLachlan, who labored on Ray Donovan and Lovecraft Nation, praised the corporate’s service: “I’ve used Otto Nemenz completely for my digital camera rental wants since 2013. The service was so spectacular we continued to make use of them when the present moved to New York in 2018. Although they don’t have an workplace there, the service was impeccable.”
Michelle Lawler, director of pictures on Insecure, described the diploma of buyer security measures as “subsequent degree,” significantly throughout the pandemic adaptation interval.
Nemenz’s worker retention was legendary in an business recognized for turnover. Many key staff remained with the corporate for many years. His philosophy was easy: “It’s essential to maintain the individuals who be just right for you completely happy. If somebody doesn’t like their work, much more cash gained’t do it.” Throughout business strikes or gradual durations, Nemenz by no means laid off employees or lower salaries, fostering extraordinary loyalty.
Increasing operations
In 1982, Nemenz designed and constructed the corporate’s facility in Hollywood. By 2020, after 38 years at that location, the enterprise had grown so considerably that it required a brand new 38,000-square-foot facility in Culver Metropolis with 21 prep bays. The corporate additionally established a second location in Atlanta, serving the burgeoning manufacturing market in Georgia.
The brand new Otto Nemenz facility in Culver Metropolis, CA. Picture credit score: Otto Nemenz Worldwide
At its peak earlier than the pandemic, Otto Nemenz Worldwide provided gear to roughly 20 productions concurrently, together with tv collection like Lucifer, The Good Place, Gray’s Anatomy, and Bones, in addition to main movies just like the Jumanji and Quick & Livid franchises. Their largest venture so far was Quick & Livid 7, which required a full yr of apparatus assist.
The corporate’s stock grew to incorporate a whole lot of cameras from producers like ARRI, Sony, and RED, together with roughly 3,000 lenses spanning 16mm, 35mm, and enormous format choices. The brand new facility included workshop house for gear preparation and a 3D printer for prototype customization.
Otto Nemenz’ recognition and honors
Nemenz’s contributions to the movie business earned him quite a few accolades:
- 1992: Oscar for Technical Achievement (awarded to staff Dick Cavdek and Steve Hamerski for the Canon/Nemenz digital camera zoom lens)
- 2014: Bud Stone Award of Distinction from the American Society of Cinematographers
- 2023: Invited to membership within the Academy of Movement Image Arts and Sciences
- 2023: Legacy Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Cinematographers
- Legacy Award from the South East European Movie Competition in Los Angeles
- Golden Badge of Honor for Companies to the Republic of Austria
When Tom Hanks introduced Nemenz along with his Academy Award, Nemenz quipped with attribute humility: “I’ve an Austrian award too. I used to be shocked. My identify isn’t Schwarzenegger in any case.”
Actor Tom Hanks presenting Otto Nemenz along with his Academy Award in 1992. Picture credit score: Monika Nemenz
Nemenz was an affiliate member of the American Society of Cinematographers and a member of I.A.T.S.E. Native 600.
Adapting to challenges
Even in his eighties, Nemenz remained actively concerned in his enterprise. When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, the corporate carried out complete security measures in its spacious new facility, together with temperature checks, necessary masks, and social distancing protocols that had been simpler to keep up with wider hallways. The workshop might flip round pandemic-friendly customizations inside hours, together with personalised digital camera viewfinders appropriate with face shields required on many units.
Fritz Heinzle, head of selling who labored with the corporate for over 20 years, famous that enterprise recovered to about 80% of pre-pandemic ranges comparatively rapidly, testomony to the corporate’s resilience and the loyalty of its consumer base.
Otto’s private life and legacy
Regardless of his success, Nemenz maintained a life-style that mirrored his love of each work and rest, splitting his time between his residence in Pacific Palisades with its beautiful ocean view and his residence in Hawaii, the place he finally handed away peacefully. He was recognized to come across shoppers like Whoopi Goldberg on the native grocery store in his intimate Pacific Palisades neighborhood, the place German actor Armin Mueller-Stahl lived close by.
At age 80, when most individuals can be lengthy retired, Nemenz instructed ZEISS in a 2023 interview: “Lots of people usually retire at this age, however I get pleasure from what I achieve this a lot. My work grew to become my passion.”
He maintained relationships with quite a few cinematographers who grew to become each shoppers and pals, together with legendary DP Roger Deakins (who labored with Otto since Barton Fink in 1991) and Adam Greenberg (Terminator 2). Cinematographer Stephen F. Windon, who shot the Quick & Livid franchise and Star Trek Past, was described by Nemenz as somebody who “has us very gerne” (likes us very a lot).
Nemenz was keen on drawing parallels between technological development in filmmaking and automotive efficiency: “A couple of years in the past, you used to have the ability to do 120 miles per hour in a quick automobile. At present, you do 150. That’s about the identical factor with the lenses. They’re larger efficiency, they usually’re lighter, smaller, larger high quality.”
Imaginative and prescient for the long run
Even in his closing years, Nemenz remained forward-thinking about cinema expertise. Whereas skeptical about 3D cinema (having witnessed it come and go at the least thrice throughout his profession), he was enthusiastic about different potentialities: “I can see having completely different irises in lenses and making a sure look, particularly an autofocus look that you simply’ll have the ability to management by altering irises.”
He predicted that “the largest problem goes to be the way in which we’ll have a look at footage. I believe 360-degree cinema is coming and I want to go that route.”
Otto Nemenz celebrating the fortieth anniversary of his firm in 2019. Picture credit score Otto Nemenz Worldwide
An enduring affect
Otto Nemenz’s story embodies the American dream: an immigrant who arrived with technical expertise, willpower, and a imaginative and prescient, finally remodeling a whole sector of the movie business. His firm outfitted a few of the most iconic movies and tv collection of the previous 4 many years, from Star Trek to Terminator, from A Lovely Thoughts to No Nation for Previous Males, from Sister Act to the music video for Michael Jackson’s Thriller.
Greater than only a businessman, Nemenz was an innovator who understood each the technical and inventive points of cinematography. His hands-on expertise as a cameraman gave him insights that purely business-oriented opponents might by no means match. His dedication to customization, high quality, and private service set an ordinary that elevated your complete digital camera rental business.
The corporate Otto Nemenz Worldwide continues to function below the management of long-time normal supervisor Alex Wengert and operations supervisor Marc Gordon (with the corporate for over 30 years), together with Fritz Heinzle heading advertising and marketing and a workforce of over 40 full-time skilled staff. His grandson has additionally joined the household enterprise, making certain a connection to the founder’s imaginative and prescient continues.
As Gregory Irwin eloquently concluded his tribute: “Aloha, Otto. E moe mālie, e hoa aloha. A hui hou, e ʻike hou ana kākou. Relaxation peacefully, pricey good friend. Till we meet once more.”
Otto Nemenz leaves behind not only a thriving enterprise, however a legacy of technical innovation, distinctive customer support, and proof that zeal and experience can construct an empire. The movie business owes him a debt of gratitude for greater than 40 years of supporting the artists who deliver tales to life on display screen. How do you assume Otto Nemenz’s strategy to customer support and technical innovation will proceed to affect the digital camera rental business?
