Kyle Kelley

I’m an Emmy Award winning Director of Photography with credits that have spanned from capturing the horrors of the surreal in fiction features to filming real-life heroes and monsters in my documentary work. No matter the project, I bring the precision and thoughtfulness of fiction cinematography to my documentary work, and the efficiency, naturalism and problem solving techniques of documentary shooting to my fiction work. I’m comfortable in run-and-gun verite situations, highly stylized fiction setups, and everything in between.

I also work as a colorist on everything from music videos to feature documentaries. I bring my background as a cinematographer to the color suite — both in understanding how light, shadow, and color affect an image, and in respecting the original intent of the director and cinematographer. Likewise, my deep knowledge of the color grading process informs my cinematography in that I intimately understand the artistic and technical details of image creation from initial look design through final delivery.

My credits include: Uncle Peckerhead (Panic Fest, Cinequest, Florida Film Festival); It Cuts Deep (Salem Horror Fest, Brooklyn Horror, Grimmfest); Maggie Black (JDIFF, Flyway); Good Ol Girl (SXSW, Virginia, Seattle International); While I Breathe, I Hope (Southeast Emmy winner, New Orleans Film Festival, Hot Springs, DocNYC); Grandpa Was An Emperor (DocNYC, Doclands), and my directorial debut, Train Keeps A Rolling. Recent television work includes Axios on HBO, History's 9/11: The Legacy, ABC’s The Con and multiple episodes of American Experience on PBS.

I got my start making short films with my friends in my high school's Imaging Lab, and I try to maintain the spirit of those early collaborations in my everyday work. There are very few occupations that allow you to choose the people you work with, and I pride myself on being an excellent teammate that people want to work with time and time again.