Exploring Life & Business with Christopher Scheimann of Gradient Pictures

Today we’d like to introduce you to Christopher Scheimann.

Hi Christopher, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I’m Chris, I’m an Executive Producer and Partner at Gradient Pictures LA.

Born in Germany, I did my Bachelor’s Degree in Film in Hamburg and moved to Berlin right after to start working in an ad agency which back then was just named the worldwide agency of the year. I was good at copywriting but I quickly figured out that I’d rather produce and direct or write for Film and TV so I went on working in film productions, post productions and even on corporate side in the marketing / in-house production department.

Eventually, I produced a game trailer that needed to be shot in Europe for an LA-based agency for their client Bethesda. It was this project that brought me in touch with my now business partner, Olcun Tan. He’s also originally from Germany but has been in LA for almost 20 years and owns a VFX house, Gradient Effects. We hired his company for the post-production on the game trailer and he came over to Prague to supervise the shoot. After that, he brought me on as a Producer for his company and we started building out the advertising and live-action branch of Gradient since he was mainly focused on VFX for Marvel, Warner, Netflix, etc.

Now we gave this part of Gradient its own name, Gradient Pictures and it’s my third year in LA as a kid from Germany running a production company and shooting for brands like Audi and Nestle as well as with celebs like LeBron James, Charles Barkley or Jason Tatum.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Not at all. I moved to LA on Christmas 2019 and in March 2020 the whole world was in lockdown from Covid. We had projects lined up for a total of almost seven figures and we could not shoot any of them. Plus my wife was still in Germany and did not have her visa yet so with the travel ban we were separated for seven months.

I was sitting here burning through my savings and really thought I’m in a movie. But I kept my hopes up and kept pushing and eventually we booked a commercial that even made it to the AdWeek top ten most effective TV ads of 2020. At the same time, my wife and I had to get creative to be able to see each other and had to work around the travel ban, so we met up in Mexico a couple of times and eventually got married during the pandemic in a Zoom ceremony. Now that lockdown is over we could finally get my wife’s visa approved, too and she is now working with me as my Associate Producer.

Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Gradient Pictures?
We are a film production company specializing in commercials, music videos and documentaries and we are developing entertainment formats for film and TV. My own background is music, basketball and fashion and our Directors and Photographers are all rooted in these areas style-wise.

We also combine this with our extensive VFX capabilities. So you get the hottest young Director with a VFX team that worked on The Revenant, The Avengers and many more. What more can you ask for?! Overall I think we are the most proud of our work with LeBron James and other NBA athletes for Ruffles / FritoLay. It’s a whole thing to even get vetted by LeBron’s management and being in this league working with one of the greatest of all time feels amazing. The kid from Germany and the kid from Akron.

Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?
Mainly coffee! I don’t use any special productivity apps but I love notes on my iPhone / MacBook. I use them all the time and love how they sync and you can share them and add docs and it’s easy and integrated. Also – of course Zoom is a vital part. I don’t really read books but draw a lot of my inspiration from Instagram, from movies, series, music and art. And I need my fitness routine which helps me clear my mind and keep my energy up.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://gradientpictures.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gradientpicturesla/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gradientpicturesla/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-scheimann/?locale=en_US
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/GradientLA

Image Credits
Image Credits: Gradient Pictures