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Tin Pang is an Australian director, writer, producer, composer and voice actor best known for the stroke recovery awareness short film Mother, Child.

Education
Pang grew up on the Gold Coast in Queensland with his mother, Kitty, a single parent. He showed a keen interest in filmmaking at an early age. He cites Tim Burton’s Batman (1989) as being the first film that influenced him in terms of filmmaking craft, and would spend many evenings on the piano at home, playing along to Danny Elfman’s signature Batman theme over the main titles.

In 2006, Pang completed an undergraduate degree in multimedia, specialising in film and screen media, at the Queensland College of Art, Griffith University.

On moving to Los Angeles from Australia in 2008, Pang attended the USC/Universal Production & Directing Program, run in conjunction with the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts and Universal Studios. Throughout the six-week course, he worked on several projects until completion, adhering to the rigorous production schedule. He likened it to a mini-studio, where you had a small budget but still had to worry about the producing and the politics. As his first real exposure to the American film industry, Pang finished the program with three short films, including For Melpomene which was chosen to screen at USC’s Summer Program Graduate film series.

The desire to see more of the industry from a closer perspective led Pang to return to USC the following summer and enrol in the Summer Program’s internship course. He was successful in securing an internship under film executives Nina Jacobson and Bryan Unkeless at Color Force, which had a three-year "first look" picture deal with DreamWorks. Pang provided research and pitched projects for development. Although the development experience was valuable, he realised that being creative on set was a better fit for him than sitting in an office.

Keen to expand his horizons, Pang moved to Vancouver in 2009 where he began working as a production assistant on Smallville, a position he continued with for two seasons.

Career
Pang returned to Australia in 2010 and relocated to Sydney for more film and television opportunities.

After a small stint in post-production, Pang began working as a director’s assistant on the popular childrens’ television show William & Sparkles' Magical Tales and Surprises! for two seasons.

In 2012, Pang took on a script and voice coordination role on the ABC 3/Seven Network animated childrens’ series Tashi at Flying Bark Productions. His role would continue at Flying Bark, working on their upcoming development slate, and as post-production editor on Blinky Bill: The Movie.

Pang also fostered an unexpected voice acting career, best known for playing the nefarious Uncle Tiki Pu in Tashi and Jorge the Cockatoo in Blinky Bill: The Movie.  He also served as a voice director on Tashi.

In 2014, he wrote, directed, scored and produced the short film, The Pale Moonlight, a neo-noir sci-fi thriller that enjoyed its world premiere at the Fantasia International Film Festival. Starring Matt Boesenberg, Lauren Orrell and Peter McAllum, the short follows a mysterious figure who descends into an illegal drug den, set in a dystopian future where the world is dying from a crippling disease. Produced under Pang’s THREECOIN Pictures production banner, the short also screened at the HollyShorts Film Festival in Los Angeles.

Pang began freelancing as a director, assistant director and production manager in 2014, working on content, television commercials, television series and feature films.

Mother, Child (2017)
In 2015, Pang put his career on hold after learning that his mother, Kitty, had suffered a stroke. He returned home to the Gold Coast to become her primary carer, supporting her through rehabilitation and her return to home.

As she continued her journey of recovery, Pang began to realise that as people got older, their parents seemed to get younger. Not necessarily in a physical sense, but certainly from a psychological one. Parents became more vulnerable, sometimes more child-like thanks to a lack of inhibition, and more reliant on their children, in the ultimate case of role reversal. Pang described that he and his mother were both living in self-perceived prisons following his move back home, his being psychological and hers being physical.

He began to write a script based on his experiences, which he fashioned as a form of therapy. He recognised that the core of the story revolved around stroke recovery and awareness, something that had not nearly been represented enough in screen arts. He decided to explore the complex relationship between a stroke survivor, who happened to be a single mother, and a carer, who happened to be her adult son. Pang noted that it was important to acknowledge the challenges and sacrifice that brave survivors and carers endured on a daily basis across Australia.

Pang envisioned the film as a single, long take short film, following the two characters as they moved around a tiny housing commission-style apartment, heavily influenced by the unit that he grew up in. The realtime aspect of the long take was attractive to Pang, who wanted the audience to really feel like they were really there. His belief that real life can and will be always more dramatic than cinema was a defining factor in this approach.

The producers ran a crowdfunding campaign via the Australian Cultural Fund in late 2016 to help raise finance for the film. Pang, fellow producer, Sean O’Reilly, and co-producer, Andrea Bedelis, also approached several national and state-based stroke agencies, with the Stroke Recovery Association of NSW, Stroke Association of Victoria, the Stroke Foundation, Synapse and Brain Injury Australia lending their support for the project. The NSW Agency for Clinical Innovation provided support and sponsorship for the film, along with Sydney-based film and television businesses, Tracks Post and Cinoptix.

Early on, Pang planned to have the two lead characters hark from Asian heritage. His mother emigrated from Hong Kong and Pang himself is Chinese-Australian. At the same time, Pang had a unique opportunity to tell a story that deals with stroke recovery and acquired disability through the eyes of CALD (Culturally and Linguistically Diverse) characters.

Pang pitched the core themes and vision of the film to actors Lawrence Leung and Gabrielle Chan, concepts that strongly resonated with both. The approach of shooting the whole short film as a single take also attracted them to the project. Pang described it as a fusion of film and live theatre, and combined with the emotional arcs that both characters achieve over the course of the short, the project provided a unique challenge for Leung and Chan. Several crew members had also been affected by stroke, via family or loved ones. The aim to raise stroke awareness through the film became an inspiring factor in them deciding to come on board the project.

Pre-production of the film called for close collaboration with director of photography Garry Phillips, production designer Louisa Eagleton and Pang, with the director likening the movement of the actors, the camera and the design of the set as a delicate dancing act. Phillips, a veteran cinematographer of classic films including Candy, Catch A Fire and The Railway Man was enticed by the process of capturing a long take, combined with a moving camera that tracked actors within a set. Pang also preferred the traditional application of the camera on a dolly, as opposed to a steadicam rig. The approach allowed for a more intimate environment for the actors, with Chan and Leung admitting that they hardly noticed the camera or the crew during filming.

Eagleton oversaw the design and assembly of the set, with the build taking around a week to complete. Pang, worried that the cast would have to rehearse on a floor marked with tape reminiscent to the film Dogville, was relieved to learn that the set would be ready by the time rehearsals began. The rehearsal period lasted three days, with Pang, Chan and Leung workshopping the scene and blocking movement in close collaboration with Phillips and Eagleton.

Shot over a day in Sydney in an old warehouse that was converted into a studio, the cast and crew recorded seven takes of the scene, with Pang and Phillips aborting only one take due to a technical issue. The final take chosen was take six. Pang described the chosen take as one filled with unique unplanned quirks that added to the realism of the scene.

Pang's mother, Kitty, attended the filming, which acted as both an emotional release and a sense of accomplishment after months of rehabilitation.

Post-production took roughly two and a half months to complete. Although an edit was not required as the film was a single take, a VFX crew worked on adding a digital exterior environment to the studio-based set. Pang composed a simple piano score to accompany the film, although the bulk of the short film relies on diagetic sound.

Running at 15 minutes, Mother, Child, premiered at the Melbourne International Film Festival as part of their 2017 Accelerator program of Australian short films. The film went on to screen overseas in the United States at HollyShorts in Los Angeles and the Legacy Film Festival on Aging in San Francisco. The film was awarded Best Short Fiction (50 minutes or less) at the 2017 SAE ATOM Awards in Melbourne. The film is programmed to screen in competition at Flickerfest 2018 in Sydney.