Empty Mind Films
Empty Mind Films is the leading independent film studio for documentaries on China, Japan and India. In particular, we focus our lens on the martial arts and spiritual health and wellness of the mind and body. Our films are authentic, accurate and full of realism. Our films do not sensationalize or make false claims. In this way, we are regarded as the most accurate independent film source for traditional martial arts. We have worked hard to earn this reputation. We are committed to telling the stories of the world’s top masters of martial arts and the philosophies of China and Japan. We have contributed movie footage to many leading broadcast channels including National Geographic.
Our production studio and offices are located in the USA in a loft warehouse in Wynwood, Miami known as the Art District. Here we handle major editing and post production work including sound recording. Our on-location facility in Asia is in Beijing in the Chaoyang district. From here we are an easy three hour commute to Tokyo or Hong Kong.
Our films are made to a very high creative and technical standard and have won international film festivals, awards and national film critic reviews. Advances in the technology of digital filming have been rapid, and a large part of our investment goes to equipment and the latest post production methods. In 2007, we converted to High Definition using Sony tapeless HD cameras. All of our movies are filmed in High Definition 1080p. Since 2003 all of our titles were available in DVD format, made and shipped in the USA. We distribute to over 40 countries in Europe, the Far East, South America and North America and Australia. In 2012 we moved to a server with Amazon S3. This is a super fast server networked over the internet specifically for the storage of media files. Using CloudFront technology, Empty Mind Films can now deliver HD movies at broadband speeds anywhere in the world for download or streaming.
What’s in a name?
In 2003 we visited the Shaolin Temple during the filming of a martial arts documentary. We were taken into a small room where a monk was painting on an enormous parchment laid on the floor. His brush was the size of a floor mop and with both hands he dipped this into a large bucket of deep black ink. As he moved with difficulty across the large canvas he began painting in a continous sweeping movement. The calligraphy he painted was the representation of no-mind, similar to non-action or wu wei in taoist terms. Through the martial arts of Japan we had always been familiar with mushin – of mu; nothing and shin; mind. But as we watched the Shaolin monk bent over painting with his brush, we knew he had found the name of the documentary and the name of our film company.
