Stories of Celluloid series
Stories of Celluloid series
Stories of Celluloid is an ongoing, multi-chapter film project that traces camphor—the early material base of cinema—to explore the past lives and present condition of the moving image in an age of digital generation. Today’s AI images are built on vast archives, recombining fragments like memories from a previous life; images no longer appear in the instant of exposure but take shape through data and code. This structure isn’t unique to the digital era—it reaches back to cinema’s own origins in the forests where camphor was first harvested.
In the early twentieth century, camphor produced in Taiwan was essential to celluloid film stock, giving it flexibility and resilience. Yet camphor remained an invisible agent within image production, and with it a largely unacknowledged history—one entangled with colonial surveys, modernization projects, and Indigenous resistance.
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Stories of Celluloid: The Exhibited Factory of Cinema
Single-channel video, Super 8 transferred to 2K digital with AI-generated imagery, 12 min, 2025
At the 1935 Taiwan Exposition, alongside a dazzling display of camphor products, an actual camphor distillation shed was constructed on site, allowing visitors to witness the production of camphor firsthand. It was the first time that cinema appeared in an exhibition through the lens of “production,” and this moment was captured in the 8mm home movies of photographer Deng Nan-guang. In this reimagined temporal loop, the scent of camphor permeates the workroom: the exhibition becomes both a tangible site of material manufacturing and a hallucinatory vision assembled from datasets and archival fragments.
——full credits——
Archival footage in this work was made available with the support of the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute (TFAI).
The Old Man Masaki BABA
The Camphor Balm Po-Hao Tseng
Director Wu Chi-Yu
Assistant Director Zhou Xin
Cinematographer Steve Tsai Wei Long
1st Assistant Cameraman Hamburger
2nd Assistant Cameraman Tai Yu-Shan
Gaffer Yu,Tai-Wei
Best Boy Li Hao Shiao
Electrician Chen Kuan Chieh, A Ming
Lighting Equipment, Tai-sheng Lighting Design Studio
Sound Recordist Feng Chih Ming
Production Designer Yin-Chiao Liao
Art Assistant Hu Bo-Deng, Yuan Wei-Chun
Stylist Edna Chinan Hung
Costume Assistant Wu Ding-Sheng
8mm Projector K.D. Darkroom
Producer Zhou Xin
Line Producer Claire Tan Ke Er
Negative Film Post-Production Modern Cinema Production Co.
Negative Film Supervisor Shaun Chen
Negative Film Coordinator Kathy Chen
Negative Film Secretary Huang, Yi-Chi, Wen Huang
Film Processing Ali Chen, Al Chen, Linn C
Film Scanning Roy Chen
GVFX Fan Cheuk Hang
Music Zi-Ming Feng
Color Grading Persist Film Studio
Colorist Ben Chan
Colorist Assistant Willy Huang
Location Liang Shih Chiu House
Archival Footage Courtesy of Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute
Special Thanks Allen Lin, Eden Lee, Modern Cinema Production Co.
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Stories of Celluloid: Phantom Gaze
Single-channel video, Super 8 transferred to 2K digital with AI-generated imagery, and drone footage, 12 min 40 sec, 2025.
Fox Movietone News once shot an unreleased newsreel depicting Taiwan’s camphor industry. The journey begins as the camera lands at Keelung Harbor, follows rail carts deep into mountain valleys, and ends with a phantom ride shot along a suspended bridge. Yet the voyage does not conclude there. The gaze ultimately originates from a fortress perched atop the hills, where the rifle slits reveal more than camphor forests—they frame a layered, time-folded colonial frontier.
——full credits——
Archival footage in this work was made available with the support of the University of South Carolina’s Moving Image Research Collections (MIRC).
Director Wu Chi-Yu
Producer Zhou Xin
Cinematographer Steve Tsai Wei Long
1st Assistant Cameraman PinYen,Liu
Infinite Vision Production
Aerial Photographer Peter Hsiao
Assistant Aerial Camera Operator Kuno Kang, Yao-Wen Yin
GVFX Fan Cheuk Hang
Music Zi-Ming Feng
Color Grading Persist Film Studio
Colorist Ben Chan
Colorist Assistant Willy Huang
Archival Footage Courtesy of University of South Carolina: Moving Image Research Collections (MIRC)
Special Thanks Allen Lin, Eden Lee, Modern Cinema Production Co.
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⬆Stories of Celluloid Series, Installation view at Thailand Biennale, Phuket, 2025
⬆Stories of Celluloid Series, Installation view at Taichung Art Museum, 2025