George Willis has been elected the new president of the Canadian Society of Cinematographers (CSC), following the society naming the winners of the 57th edition of its annual awards.

Willis, who has been a member of the CSC since 1988 and previously served as a VP of the CSC, was elected president at the society’s annual general meeting on March 31. Willis will replace Joan Hutton, who held the position of CSC president for 22 years.

The society also unveiled its board of directors, which includes Carlos Esteves and Ron Stannett are VPs, Joseph Sunday continuing to serve as treasurer, and Antonin Lhotsky ongoing as secretary. Membership chairs are Phil Earnshaw and Alwyn Kumst, and education chairs are D. Gregor Hagey and Dylan Macleod.

Meanwhile, those honoured at the annual CSC awards include Jon Castell, who won the Roy Tash Award for his piece for CBC’s The National titled “Argentina’s Pope.”  The Stan Clinton Award for news essay cinematography was given to Peter Szperling for his segment “Hat Maker” for CTV Ottawa, while the news magazine cinematography award went to Kirk Neff for his work on the 16:9 episode “Stolen Faces.”

The corporate/educational cinematography award went to Sharon Ron Sim for The Elemental Messenger project for the Dow Chemical Company, and Kristoff Rochon picked up the award for lifestyle/reality cinematography for the Tessa & Scott episode “Life at the Arctic Edge.” Jon Simonassi won the award for webisode cinematography for It Can Wait.

In the director of photography award categories, Benjamin Litchy won for docudrama cinematography for the Brainwashed episode “Covenant of Hate,” while James Klopko took home the Robert Brooks award for documentary cinematography for Kaha:wi: The Cycle of Life. The prize for music video cinematography went to Bobby Shore for Majiccal Cloudz’s “Childhood’s End”, and the award for performance cinematography went to Jeremy Benning for Lost in Motion II.

Guy Godfree picked up the dramatic short cinematography award for The Archivist, with Kris Belchevski winning the Fritz Spiess Award for commercial cinematography for his work for Toronto’s Gears Bike Shop. The prize for TV series cinematography went to Pierre Gill for the Copper episode “Aileen Aroon.” Gill also took home the award for theatrical feature cinematography for Upside Down.

Elsewhere, Antonin Lhotsky was honoured with the President’s Award for outstanding service to the CSC. Cyril Drabinsky received the the Bill Hilson award, which recognizes outstanding service that contributes to the development of the motion picture industry in Canada.

The Kodak new century award was given to Eric Cayla, for outstanding contribution to the art of cinematography,  while the camera assistant award of merit was awarded to Mark Giles. Finally, the student cinematography award was given to Henrique Wallau.