Mei Ah Entertainment

Background
Mei Ah (美亞), like its competitor Universe (寰宇), has a humble beginning as a distributor of VHS and LD, later VCD and DVD, witnessing the revolution of visual storage media in the past 30 years. Established in 1984 by Li Kuo-hsing (李國興), Mei Ah Group step into film production and distribution in mid-1990s, and listed in the Hong Kong stock exchange in 1993. Joe Ma (馬偉豪) has been one of the active directors under the Mei Ah umbrella. Mei Ah also has a subsidiary Brilliant Idea Group (天下電影製作, later renamed as Big Pictures 天下影畫).

1st Logo (1980's-1990's?)
Logo: On a space background, we see three colored bars (one blue, one green and one red. One is rounded at the top and one is rounded at the bottom) flying and stopping on the center, stacked. The Mei Ah globe appears, flipping and zooming out until it stops right on the bars. The Chinese letters zoom in via "rollercoaster" effect below. The red words "MEI AH VIDEO PRODUCTION LTD."wipe in and a blue trail appears behind them.

Variant: On Laserdiscs, the animation is a little different, the Chinese words are 3D and gold, and the red text is 3D and says "MEI AH LASER DISC". There's no trail behind them.

FX/SFX: Everything. Seems a bit dated for today.

Music/Sounds: A triumphant fanfare (which is "Opening Fanfares 3" by Alfred Kluten, a production music off the album 81 Fanfares!), with whooshes and laser sounds.

Availability: It's seen on home videos and Laserdiscs on the time.

Editor's Note: None.

2nd Logo (1990's)
Logo: On a blue space background, we see the same three bars, but 3D and with filmstrip-like holes, flipping and placing themselves. Then the Mei Ah globe (now gold, without text) zooms out and flips. After a few seconds, the MEI AH text appears by a light. The Chinese letters and "MEI AH VIDEO PRODUCTION CO LTD." fade in and shine in rainbow colors, while stars appear on them. The words then turn white.

Variants:


 * On Laserdiscs, the English text now says "MEI AH LASER DISC CO. LTD.".
 * On movies, English text now says "MEI AH FILM PRODUCTION CO. LTD."

FX/SFX: A recreation of the 1st logo with 90's CGI.

Music/Sounds: Another triumphant fanfare, but not as loud as the 1st one.

Availability: Same as before. The Laserdisc variant makes an appearance on the 1st Mei Ah DVD of The Mission (since it uses the exact same transfer made for the Laserdisc).

Editor's Note: None.

3rd Logo (Mid 1990's-Late 1990's?)


Nicknames: "The Mei Ah Rectangle", "Robotic Mei Ah"

Logo: On a black background, the words "MEI AH", in a blue color, zooms out and spin. A rounded rectangle, lines and four dots zoom in behind the text, and a flash occurs, making the logo 3D. A light appears, moves to the right and the words "MEI AH FILM PRODUCTION", with the Chinese translation over it, appears with a glow effect.

FX/SFX: All done in good-looking 1990's CGI.

Music/Sounds: A synth drone, with robotic engine sounds and whooshes.

Availability: Seen on movies made by Mei Ah.

Editor's Note: None.

4th Logo (Late 1990's?-Early 2000's?)


Nicknames: "The Mei Ah Rectangle II", "Robotic Mei Ah II"

Logo: On a black background, we see three glowing lines zoom out, then the logo from the 3rd logo gets revealed, but more darker and smaller. Then the logo fades out and the glowing lines appear again and zoom in.

FX/SFX: Simple animation.

Music/Sounds: Same as before, but with the ending cut-off. A few films had the opening theme playing.

Availability: Same as before.

Editor's Note: None.

5th Logo (Early 2000's?-Mid 2000's?)
Logo: TBA.

FX/SFX: Everything.

Music/Sounds: A dramatic fanfare with whooshes.

Availability: TBA.

Editor's Note: None.

6th Logo (Mid 2000's?-Late 2000's)


Logo: We see the Mei Ah logo from the 1st, 2nd and 5th logos along with the Chinese text. They move up so we can see a rectangle moving down with the black words "MEI AH ENTERTAINMENT". After a few seconds, more Chinese text appears below.

FX/SFX: Simple animation.

Music/Sounds: None.

Availability: TBA.

Editor's Note: None.

7th Logo (Late 2000's-Early 2010's)
Logo: On a space background, we see a crystal version of the Earth spinning. It zooms in and dissapears, and we now see the Mei Ah logo zooming out and spinning. The logo and the Chinese text appears and a light moves behind them. Then the rectangle with the company's name wipes in, with another light moving behind.

FX/SFX: Everything, done in great CGI.

Music/Sounds: A calm fantasy-themed orchestral tune.

Availability: Common. Seen on DVDS from the time period.

Editor's Note: None.

8th Logo (Early 2010's-2018)


Logo: On a dark blue background with some light specks at the top-left corner, the result from the 5th, 6th and 8th logos wipes in and zooms out a bit.

FX/SFX: Simple animation, but good-looking.

Music/Sounds: None.

Availability: Common.

Editor's Note: None.

9th Logo (2018-)


Logo: In front of a galaxy on a space background, three streaks of light, each of them colored red, blue and green, fly and collide to form the Mei Ah logo, now having a transparent hole on it. The company name, in English and Chinese, which is bordered in gold, appears below.

FX/SFX: An improvement over the CGI from the previous logo.

Music/Sounds: A majestic horn fanfare.

Availability: Current.

Editor's Note: None.