Foto © Marion von der Mehden

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Fiction

After being mentored by Michael Ballhaus ASC at “Aufbaustudium Film” in Hamburg and following the festival success of my final film there, I was ready to embark on my career as a feature film DP. The TV series “Hinter Gittern” taught my how to cope with the tight daily routine of serialised TV production. On my first feature film “Sophiiiie!” (shown in competition at the Locarno Film Festival) my background shooting documentaries was highly relevant to a film shot very spontaneously in a style inspired by the Dogme 95 movement. This was followed by various films and series for TV, including two TV-movies for the primetime crime series “Tatort”, a very experimental adaptation of Bertolt Brecht’s play “Baal,” crime dramas, comedies, family and children’s films, and the feature film “Unter Strom.”

Non-Fiction

It was never my intention to leave documentary filmmaking behind me. After completing my cinematography course I divided my time between narrative and documentary films. More recently, I have been working exclusively on documentaries.

Unadulterated Reality

The Arte series “Durch die Nacht mit…” (“Into the night with…”) was described by the jury of the prestigious Grimme Prize jury as “unique on German TV, as it allows insights into the work and psyche of well-known people from the cultural sphere that cannot be seen in any other format.” A significant reason for this is the camera concept that I co-developed in the early episodes. Based on the principles of Direct Cinema, it involved filming two artists uninterruptedly over the course of one evening with two handheld cameras. Nothing was staged for the camera, we never interrupted or repeated the action. Our goal was that the camera operators act as unobtrusively as possible, so that the events would not to be influenced by the presence of the cameras, and that over time the protagonists would forget about them. This purist form of documentary filmmaking has become rare, which is why it was always a stimulating and enriching experience to shoot over 50 episodes.

Staged Reality

Raymond Ley’s docudramas “Eschede – Zug 884” and “Die Kinder von Blankenese,” were hybrid films, for which my background had prepared me particularly well. Ley’s films are not historical narratives spiced up with reenactments but feature films with a documentary foundation. The dramatic scenes are shot using all the tools of narrative filmmaking, but with a documentary approach to camera work. This does not necessarily mean handheld cameras, it is rather more a matter of attitude. While filming, we constantly grappled with the responsibility we felt towards the viewer not to distort anything in the dramatization of historical events. Truth and authenticity also relate to the subjective and emotional perception of the people who lived through the events we portrayed..

Subjective Reality

“Stroke,” a multiple award winner at DOK Leipzig, is a very personal “diary film.” I was responsible for the visual design of an additional level consisting of memories, dreams, thoughts, and visions. Together with director Katarina Peters, I developed an aesthetic that clearly differed from the pre-existing video footage. We even developed a custom rig consisting of two linked 35mm cameras to film the POV of a patient with double vision. We were looking to add an inner, subjective level to the raw reality of the main storyline.

Rough Reality

Finally, there is reportage, the daily bread of most documentary filmmakers. Despite constraints imposed by formats and the need to serve a prefabricated storyline, reportage can be a very free form that allows the use of various stylistic approaches and can be an exciting experience for the cinematographer. Through my work on 360° – GEO Reportage (20 films, one nomination for the German Camera Award) and other programs, I have met and portrayed a huge variety of people worldwide.

Reproduction of Reality

I am always grateful to temporarily participate in the lives of my protagonists and, in turn, feel a responsibility to portray them in an unbiased fashion. Even when the conditions are far from ideal, sometimes even dangerous, working in a small team makes it possible to build an intimate connection with people you would otherwise never have met. I find it fascinating to create insights which help the viewer experience worlds outside of their own experience.

Accelerated Reality

In recent years I have intensively explored the possibilities of time-lapse photography and can quickly and easily use this exciting stylistic device with my own equipment whenever it suits the story.