Rising Sun Pictures

The company was founded in 1995 by Tony Clark, Wayne Lewis, and Gail Fuller in Adelaide. It is named after the Rising Sun Inn in the Adelaide suburb of Kensington,^[2] where they held their first meeting.^[3]

In 2015, RSP formed a partnership with the University of South Australia whereby nine Bachelor of Media Arts students would work at RSP as part of their degree.^[4] This collaboration continues as of 2022, with graduates in high demand and several subsequently employed at RSP.^[5]

In 2016, the company launched a production office in Sydney, located at Fox Studios Australia. This is intended to support both local Australian filmmakers (many of whom are based nearby and use Fox for shooting, editorial and other production and post-production work) as well as its ongoing work with international clients. Having a base in Sydney would allow RSP to become involved at an earlier stage of production. This office has since been closed down.^[6]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia's relative insulation from the worst effects allowed film and television production to continue in near-normal conditions, including the production of Mortal Kombat in Adelaide.

In March 2021 RSP expanded its offices and studios.^[7] In mid-2021, it opened a small production studio in Southbank precinct of Brisbane, Queensland.^[5]

In April 2021, Los Angeles-based FuseFX acquired Rising Sun Pictures.^[2][8] No operational changes were planned at the company, which would continue to maintain its brand, but the acquisition would allow it to expand further.^[9]

Rising Sun has worked with the Australian Institute for Machine Learning, enabling it to develop some cutting-edge new tools.^[10]

In January 2023, the Pitch Black Company^[11] was founded to encompass all of the brands owned by the now defunct Fuse Group. This includes Folks VFX, FuseFX, Rising Sun Pictures and El Ranchito VFX.

RSP head office is located on Flinders Street, Adelaide.^[12]

As of September 2025^[update], Alexandra Daunt Watney serves as president of the studio, Phil Barrenger as head of operations, and Ian Cope as executive producer.^[13]

The company has won many awards over the years.

It won the Best Video award at the 2003 edition of the ARIA Music Awards, for their work on Rogue Traders' "One of My Kind".^[14]

The company won AEAF Special Merit Awards for Mortal Kombat and the second season of The Boys in 2021.^[15]

In 2022, RSP won two AEAF Bronze Awards, for Jungle Cruise and Cowboy Bebop.^[15] In the same year, VFX supervisor Julian Hutchens was co-winner of the AACTA Award for Best Visual Effects or Animation for the team's work on Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis.^[16]

In 2026, VFX supervisor Guido Wolter and his team are nominated for Best Visual Effects at the 98th Academy Awards for his work on Sinners.^[12]

Source:^[17]

Open source projects sponsored by Rising Sun Pictures include:^[20]

• Earth - a utility for finding files across a large network of machines and track disk usage in real time^[21]
• pyshake - integrates the Python programming language into the compositing package Shake to enable running of Python code from within Shake and exposing the Shake API to Python ^[22]
• Affogato - a plugin for Avid's Softimage XSI 3D animation software which links XSI with high-end 3D RenderMan-compliant renderers ^[23]
• Sun Grid Engine - implemented support for Array Job Interdependencies^[24][25]

• Cospective, software company that started as Rising Sun Research
• List of film production companies
• List of television production companies