Halo Post has created a film and TV division and hired former Technicolor UK managing director Simon Wilkinson to work as its joint managing director.

The new division will enable the company to branch out into picture editing for drama and film.

Wilkinson, who joined Halo this week, will look after picture post and work alongside fellow managing director David Turner, who will be responsible for sound.

Halo Post chief executive John Rogerson said: “We made the move into film sound just over two years ago with phenomenal success and for a while we have been looking for the right team to spearhead this expansion into picture post services for film and TV drama.

“This is about trying to fight at the top of tree. We work on top-level audio projects, and we want to be involved at the same level on the picture side of things.

“We are not trying to compete in the middle ground.”

Technicolor head of editing Dominic Thomson will join Halo in December as creative director.

He will be tasked with building a team dedicated to fi lm and drama picture services, including the recruitment of Flame and Smoke artists.

To support the move, Halo is building a digital pipeline to take content from acquisition to effects, online editing, grading, sound design, editing and mixing, through to digital delivery.

New kit to support the film and drama picture department, which will be based at Halo’s Noel Street premises, includes Halo’s first Baselight suite, two Flame Premium suites, four GFX workstations, Final Cut Studio licences, Pro Tools and an AMS Neve PS1 mixing console.

Halo Post managing director Jo Beighton will continue to oversee Halo’s core markets of TV factual, documentary, light entertainment and natural history programming.