The 39th edition of the Manaki Brothers International Cinematographers’ Film Festival in Bitola, Macedonia, took place from 22-29 September and screened 95 films across 14 sections.

The festival’s top three awards all went to Cannes competition titles. The Golden Camera 300 went to South Korean cinematographer Kyong-Pyo Hong for Lee Chang-dong's Cannes FIPRESCI Award-winning Burning. Another Asian film got the Silver Camera 300, but this time it went to a French cinematographer, Eric Gautier, for Jia Zhangke's Ash Is Purest White [+leggi anche:
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trailer
scheda film].

"It was truly a wonderful experience to shoot in China; the main actors were very inspirational, but the rest of the crew was as well. However, I would like to dedicate this award to one of the people who were a great inspiration to me when I became a cinematographer, and who was also a great friend of this festival, Robby Müller. If you look closely in the film, you can clearly see his influence," Gautier said as he accepted the award. The recently departed Müller received the festival's honorary Golden Camera 300 for Lifetime Achievement in 2016. 

Lukasz Zal, the DoP of the Cannes Best Director Award winner, Pawel Pawlikowski's Cold War [+leggi anche:
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Q&A: Pawel Pawlikowski
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The jury was chaired by Greek cinematographer Olympia Mytilinaiou, and included DoPs Rainer Klausmann (Switzerland) and Mattias Troelstrup (Denmark), talent agent Rebecca Fayyad Palud, of London- and Paris-based agency Lux, and Macedonian director Gjorce Stavreski.

Among the winners of the festival's traditional honorary awards, Roger Deakins received the Golden Camera 300 for Lifetime Achievement, and Claudia Cardinale was presented with the Special Golden Camera 300 for Outstanding Contribution to World Cinema Art.

The gathering also featured master classes by Deakins, DoP Christian Berger and production designer Christoph Kanter, who spoke about creating the visual style on three films by Michael Haneke. This master class was hosted by the training programme First Films First, currently in its third year. 

In addition, the Federation of World Cinematographers IMAGO held its Balkan conference at Manaki Brothers, and Gorjan Tozija, director of the Macedonian Film Agency, and Massimiliano Nardulli presented the collaboration between the agency and the Less Is More programme, created by Le Groupe Ouest (France).  

Here is the full list of award winners: 

Golden Camera 300
Kyong-Pyo Hong – Burning (South Korea) 

Silver Camera 300
Eric Gautier – Ash Is Purest White [+leggi anche:
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trailer
scheda film] (China/France/Japan)

Bronze Camera 300
Lukasz Zal – Cold War [+leggi anche:
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Q&A: Pawel Pawlikowski
scheda film] (Poland/UK/France) 

Small Golden Camera 300 for Short Film
Adric Watson – All These Creatures (Australia) 

Golden Camera 300 for Lifetime Achievement
Roger Deakins

Special Golden Camera 300 for Outstanding Contribution to World Cinema Art
Claudia Cardinale