After the success of Avatar, a Beijing film school is stepping up its efforts to cultivate 3-D animation talent by establishing the first ever related major.

Beijing Film Academy will start the new major in September, titled New Technology in Movie Production. 3-D photography will be a primary subject, said Mu Deyuan, director of the photography department at the academy.

He said the academy plans to enroll 10 students into the major. The department will invest 10 million yuan in specialist equipment.

"After Avatar's box office results, the central government and education authorities stressed a need to strengthen China's moviemaking level," he said. "We want to support the transformation of China into an advanced movie production country."

Lei Zaixing, a photography lecturer with the film academy, is shooting a 3-D short film at Hengdian World Studios with Reed Smoot, a veteran cinematographer from the US whose 3-D works include Grand Canyon: The Hidden Secrets.

Lei believed 3-D film is the way forward for motion pictures, but Chinese movie-makers are a long way behind Hollywood. "We are lagging in many areas, such as proficiency, professional ethics, experience and production flow," he added.

"After Avatar, those in the business learned how lucrative 3-D films could be and rushed in to have a bite of the cake," he said. "But at least two productions failed from a lack of technology and expertise."

However, he hoped China would be able to produce a 3-D movie in just four to five years. "Everything should be authentically Chinese, from the storyline to the crew members," he said.

Chinese director Zhang Yimou raised a proposal during the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference session in March. He suggested the Beijing Film Academy establish a postgraduate course on high-tech movie making.

"We need to spice up our stories with advanced technology and make them more appealing," he said.