iQIYI Revives 90-Year-Old Lost Film with NadouPro, Shortlisted for the AI Unit at the Golden Rooster Awards
Key Highlights
- ➤iQIYI’s NadouPro restored a lost 90-year-old film from archival materials
- ➤Eight-person team completed the AI reconstruction in two months
- ➤Project shortlisted for the 2026 Future Images AI Unit at Golden Rooster Awards
- ➤NadouPro uses locked digital assets to maintain character consistency across scenes
- ➤iQIYI has explored AI film restoration since 2017 through proprietary ZoomAI
Expert Statements
Zidong JIANG, Member of iQIYI-XMU Joint Laboratory and iQIYI’s Director of AI Restoration Technology
“NadouPro allowed us to step outside the conventional restoration mindset. With no surviving film prints to restore, we used AI to undertake a creative reconstruction of the film based on available historical materials.”
Enji YANG, Director of the new film
“NadouPro helped us move from relatively random image generation toward shots with clear directorial intent. In the early stage, we still followed traditional methods: script analysis, character design, scene design, and storyboard planning. We always believe the audiovisual design of a film must come first, before considering how AI can realize it.”
Aigong ZHANG, Chief Planner of the new film and Director of the iQIYI-XMU Joint Laboratory
“NadouPro shares something in common with the production of this short film: the organic integration of traditional filmmaking craftsmanship with AI.”
iQIYI Revives 90-Year-Old Lost Film with NadouPro, Shortlisted for the AI Unit at the Golden Rooster Awards PR Newswire
BEIJING, Nov. 6, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- iQIYI, China's leading online entertainment platform, is pioneering a new path in AI-powered film restoration through NadouPro, the company's AI platform built for professional film and television production. NadouPro has enabled the creative restoration of "Visiting Shanghai after Sixty Years", a short film lost for nearly 90 years. This shows how AI can restore films with almost no surviving original footage, bringing them back to life.
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