About Us

Archive footage colorization and restoration studio, Paris, since 2013

Composite Films is a Paris-based studio specialising in the colorization (colourisation in British English) and restoration of archive footage, founded in 2013 by Samuel François-Steininger. We work for film and television: Netflix, Apple TV, HBO, Disney+, the BBC, Smithsonian Channel, France Télévisions, ARTE and Pathé.

The studio has colorized around a hundred films for broadcasters worldwide.

Our method

Every project starts with historical research. Period costumes, autochromes, postcards and picture archives are used to establish colour references before any technical work begins. Our historians and researchers analyse every shot, and details that cannot be verified are resolved by cross-checking sources.

Since 2018 the studio has developed its own AI-assisted colorization tools. AI remains a tool: our work is to reconcile the precision of manual craft with the power of computation.

Recognition

Composite Films is cited as one of four flagship projects in the French Ministry of Culture's strategy for cultural and responsible artificial intelligence (July 2025). The studio receives support from the CNC (Aide aux Moyens Techniques) and was the industrial partner of the research project PostProdLEAP (2019-2023), funded by the ANR (French National Research Agency, Ministry of Research), with MAP5, LaBRI and IMB.

Selected credits

America in Color (Smithsonian Channel), Australia in Colour (SBS), Tutankhamun in Colour (BBC, National Geographic), Raoul Peck's I Am Not Your Negro, World War II: From the Frontlines (Netflix), Callas – Paris, 1958, De Gaulle – Résistance and De Gaulle – Liberté (Pathé) and Tenzing (Apple TV).

We remain independent, which lets us give each project the time it deserves. For us, restoration is not an industry: it is a responsibility.