As this year’s awards season heats up, the Academy Award that we’re most excited about has just been handed out to the great Curt O. Schaller. Congrats, Curt! Schaller is set to receive a Scientific and Engineering Award from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences in recognition of his pioneering work in camera stabilization with the TRINITY 2.
As the Product Manager of Camera Stabilizer Systems at ARRI, Schaller was the man behind the concept, design, and development of the TRINITY 2 camera stabilizer system, which is being honored by the Academy for its innovation and importance to the greater filmmaking and video production communities across the world.
The ARRI TRINITY 2
As we’ve covered in the past, the ARRI TRINITY 2 is a phenomenal piece of filmmaking equipment that deserves all the recognition coming to it. The Academy itself recognizes the TRINITY 2 as “a body-worn system that combines a traditional inertial camera stabilization system with electronic gimbal technology, allowing unprecedented freedom of camera movement for acquiring shots with multiple transitions that are otherwise unobtainable.”
“This award goes to all TRINITY operators around the world! Their trust and commitment in the TRINITY concept and their extraordinary, innovative, and boundary-pushing work is what made this recognition possible in the first place. I would also like to thank the ARRI team in Munich, Vienna and the FoMa team for our many years of collaboration and I accept the award on their behalf. ARRI is a special place to work, and the ARRI spirit is reflected in the products we make. The entire organization and our technology partners are driven by innovation and a passion to produce the best to serve the industry we love.” — Curt O. Schaller
This is ARRI’s 20th award honoring the company’s engineers and is a great showcase of the company’s dedication to technological innovations for the industry. Alongside Schaller, Dr. Roman Foltyn is also recognized for the software and hardware design of TRINITY’s motorized stabilized head.
Curt O. Schaller’s Legacy
Curt O. Schaller began training as a camera assistant in 1984 and then as a cameraman at the Bavaria film and television studios in Munich, Germany. Following his training, Schaller worked as a cameraman in series productions and as a Steadicam operator in TV series, films, shows, and documentaries. By the mid-1990s, Schaller would use his experience as a cameraman and Steadicam operator to begin to develop his own camera stabilization systems, from which the ARTEMIS series of the company Sachtler / Vitec Videocom emerged in 2001.
In 2015, Schaller developed the TRINITY system together with Dr. Roman Foltyn, a Doctor of Engineering. The TRINITY would become the world’s first camera stabilization system to combine a mechanical and electronic stabilization system. In April 2016, ARRI took over the stabilizer business from Vitec. Since then, Schaller, as Product Manager of Camera Stabilizer Systems, has been responsible for driving the further development of ARRI’s stabilizer portfolio.
“We are very grateful to the AMPAS for recognizing the groundbreaking work of so many engineers and scientists behind the scenes. This award marks the 20th time ARRI has received such a recognition from the Academy, and we are beyond humbled. A special congratulation to Curt for his achievements. He is a gifted professional who has his finger on the pulse of what the industry needs. His tools have helped countless filmmakers around the world and demonstrate ARRI’s commitment to providing excellent equipment and services for the motion picture industry.” — ARRI Managing Director Walter Trauninger
Curt O. Schaller and other award recipients are set to be honored at the Academy’s Scientific and Technical Awards ceremony in Los Angeles on April 29, 2025.
Author: Jourdan Aldredge
This article comes from No Film School and can be read on the original site.
