Twenty-plus videos I directed, shot and cut myself before I moved into direction — fifteen of them here. I keep them for one reason: when I brief a creator or an editor now, I know exactly what I'm asking for and what it costs to deliver. Every card plays its cover and opens the video on Instagram; the address sits under each one if your browser blocks the jump.
Twenty-plus made. Fifteen kept. The bad ones taught more.
Seven rooms around the valley, each selling a different thing — the char, the crowd, the view, the price. The work was deciding which, then shooting only that.
Directed, shot and cut — the grill carries the whole argument.
A night room, lit by whatever was already there.
Slow pace, wide frames — here the view is the product.
Cut to the music, because the room already was.
A whole day trip compressed into thirty seconds.
Close, hot and loud — sound design doing half the work.
Menu breadth told through hands, not captions.
Someone else's guidelines, someone else's product, a deadline attached to the brief. Useful training in fitting a voice that isn't yours — the thing I now ask creators to do.
Event coverage cut the same week for a delivery brand.
A product that needs tact more than gloss.
Retail spot: features shown, never listed.
No lighting, no second take, no control over anything but where I stood. Documentary work teaches you to decide fast — the habit direction runs on.
A longer edit — eight years told as one continuous mood.
Handheld in a moving crowd. No second take exists.
Smoke, ash and available light at the busiest hour.
Two griddles and a pair of hands that had done this longer than I'd been alive. Shot close, cut slow, nothing styled.
Shot during service, one pass, nothing styled.
A technique older than the camera, filmed plainly.
Personal work lives in the highlights at @_.anuraaag.