Biography
Christian Blaze was born in San Salvador, El Salvador, Central America in 1979. Amid the country's bitter civil war, his family fled to Canada in 1986, where Christian spent most of his childhood studying computers & electronics. He created his first software program at the age of 9 and sold his first program commercially at the age of 14, after returning to El Salvador in 1994.
In 1999, after graduating from high school and studying at the University of Central America (UCA), Christian returned to Vancouver, BC, and began his acting career at The Gastown Actors Studio under the direction of veteran instructor Mel Tuck. After graduating in 2001, Christian met his wife & future co-producer Crystal-Dawn Rosales on the set of a VFS student film, and the couple tied the knot shortly after.
In May 2003, Christian starred in the couple's directorial debut "SPANK" (2003). The short film went on to premiere at the 2003 Santa Fe Film Festival, and screened at over 20 other festivals in the 2004/2005 circuit, receiving impressive audience reactions and reviews. The film was later licensed to the CBC and aired in the spring of 2005 on the national network's late night ZeD TV program.
In April 2004, Christian & Crystal incorporated their new media company, Crystal Insight [ca] and began production on their first feature, a sci-fi thriller entitled "Alien Agenda: Project Grey" (2007). The film acquired initial DVD distribution in Japan, Russia, Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam & in the USA on VOD, but after several years in circulation the directors decided to re-cut the film in 2010. The director's cut of "Project Grey" was released in 2011 at the 6th annual Int. Sci-Fi & Fantasy Film Fest in Athens, Greece, and screened at several cult film festivals before finding a home with a new distributor (Reality Ent.) in the USA.
In the spring of 2010, Crystal Insight's first Stereoscopic 3D short film, a comedy entitled "Defending Maldito 3D" (2011) was produced. The film took Christian's acting in a new direction, playing a comedic latino gang member seeking some much needed legal advice. Christian required 8 hours in the spfx makeup chair, having custom tattoos painted all over his body & shaved head. "Defending Maldito 3D" was released on Oct 9th, 2011 as one of the first stereoscopic films on YouTube's new 3D platform. By this time, Christian was so heavily involved in the directing, editing & VFX of their own projects that he began to receive offers for other commercial projects around the world. This eventually resulted in him taking a break from acting to pursue work in directing, producing, visual effects and post-production.
In early 2012, Christian started working at Gloo Studios, where he embarked on his professional VFX career. During this time he earned compositor credits on episodes of "Edge of War" (Military Ch.) and "The Incredible Crew" (Cartoon Network) in addition to several CollegeHumor viral shorts such as "Batman vs. Scarecrow", "John Mayer's Hologram" and "Sherlock Blue's Clues" starring Thomas Middleditch. By late 2012, Christian quickly moved onto VFX Supervision at GFZ Studios, where he supervised a team of VFX artists on 60 shots for the Chinese feature "Switch" (2013) starring Andy Lau. Other VFX Supervisor credits include; Hallmark Channel's "A Bride for Christmas" (2012), Carl Bessai's remake of "Embrace of the Vampire" (2013), David Rosenthal's thriller "A Single Shot" (2013) starring Sam Rockwell, and the vfx breakdown for "Final Girl" (2015). Other VFX career highlights include; developing the pipeline and VFX / editing process for 180 degree flying theaters, editing and VFX Supervising for the 4D attraction "FlyOver Canada" (2013) and an entire season of VFX Artist work on the hit TV series "Supernatural" (2013-2014) for 23 episodes.
On January 21st, 2014, Christian and Crystal welcomed their daughter Lyra Aurora Blaze into the world. Shortly after her birth, they created the politically charged TV series "Death Row Democracy" (2015) starring indie darling Tristan Risk. The show's theme song "Uh OH" was mixed & recorded by Christian using a pseudonym, along with several talented musicians performing on the track, marking his venture into electronic music producing.
In late 2014, Crystal Insight, in conjunction with HTC, produced a series of 12 commercial spots shot in Vancouver BC, promoting the Eye Experience software upgrade, and the M8 and Desire Eye mobile devices. Christian starred in 2 out of the 12 commercials alongside his (real-life) 8 month old daughter Lyra, marking his return to the screen. Christian also co-directed, edited and VFX supervised the HTC commercial series, which also featured the family's cat, Khaleesi, in the #1 aired spot "Split Capture Cat".
Most recently as CEO and CTO of Crystal Insight, Christian has been busy developing AURORA, a blockchain powered royalty payment system for the film industry. A prototype of the system was successfully launched on Dec 21st, 2015 with the release of the 90 sec series intro for "Death Row Democracy". Christian is currently working on developing the beta version of AURORA, in addition to several other ventures and projects that merge filmmaking with cutting-edge technology. Christian is a dual Canadian / Salvadoran citizen, speaking fluent English and Spanish, in addition to several programming languages.
