In conversation with Omkar Diwekar a cinematographer and national award-winning film, Unreserved. Don't know what a cinematographer does? This is a continuing dialogue on the different folks involved in the video creation, editing, and distribution process.

[00:00:00 ]Naga S: [00:00:00 ] Thank you so much for taking time to be on the podcast.

[00:00:04 ] Omkar: [00:00:04 ] Thank you. Thank you so much.

[00:00:05 ]Naga S: [00:00:05 ] A good place to start would be to tell us what your passion is and how you're making it manifest.

[00:00:13 ]Omkar: [00:00:13 ] I'm a cinematographer. I work, in Bombay as a freelance cinematographer. I, Majorly love to shoot, nonfiction, the documentary films, but has documentaries. Don't provide a lot of, financial help, in India, especially I, I do, sort of like digital commercials and short films, and I do aspire to, get into fiction filmmaking as well.

[00:00:37 ]that is also a long-term target.

[00:00:41 ] Naga S: [00:00:41 ] Got it. So how is, so there, there are all these terms, right? Like there's a director, there's a producer, there's a cinematographer. So what, what do all these different people do? And, in that, what, what do you specifically do?

[00:00:53 ] Omkar: [00:00:53 ] Okay. So I am a cinematographer. So my department is, camera, lighting, [00:01:00 ] collaborating with the director, before we go on the shoot. my job is to collaborate with the director and, sort of, combine his vision with the technical, know-how that is needed because filmmaking is ultimately, it's an art, but it's a scientific art.

[00:01:16 ]there's a lot of, science that goes behind, how you capture the images, how you record the sound. So, it's filmmaking in itself is a collaboration of various kinds of people who are, who specialize in various different departures. So, Peter, who has a vision for that particular story? He has, he has seen the film already in his head even before, he sets foot on the stage on the, on the set.

[00:01:44 ] So it's the cinematographer's job to really, understand his vision, how he sees the film, and try to get it, on camera. So that's, that's predominantly the job.

[00:01:57 ]Naga S: [00:01:57 ] Got it. the shift from [00:02:00 ] engineering to, you know, something on the creative lens must be, must be a big one. So what, what inspired you, or what pushed you to make that shift happen?

[00:02:08 ]Omkar: [00:02:08 ] okay. So, let me go back B before, engineering to answer your question. So as a child, actually my father used to, so are you, you remember how on-duty version? every Friday and Saturday and Sunday, they would be filmed in the evening. So, so my father and he used to be home, on, on the weekends, he would, Said set me down, before the film would start and he's a huge fan.

[00:02:35 ] So, and every time there would be a film playing, he would sit me down like an half an hour before the film would start. And he would, you know, very, enthusiastically, he would explain, he would tell me this is going to happen in this film. This film is about that. And he's going to do this. He's going to do that.

[00:02:55 ] And it used to be very exciting for me because. my father is in general, a [00:03:00 ] very shy person. So, he was, he's very reserved kind of a person. So this was like a , rare, chance for me to, you know, have some kind of a bond with him. And that's how, this fascination for films really grew for me from my childhood , I used to watch a lot of films as a kid, when I was in my junior college, I used to bunk college and go watch films, at the theater.

[00:03:26 ] And, and then, when I was in engineering college, what happened actually was like, unfortunately, in the first year of my engineering college, I had an accident and, my leg was like burned from a side and I underwent an operation and. Because of that. I had to sit out a year, the, my first year of engineering.

[00:03:47 ] I

[00:03:47 ] Naga S: [00:03:47 ] Oh,

[00:03:48 ] Omkar: [00:03:48 ] I could not. Yeah, I could not give my, second semester exams. It's like the accident happened just a day before, my maths exam on of the second

[00:03:57 ] Naga S: [00:03:57 ] wow. Almost seems like it's on [00:04:00 ] purpose.

[00:04:00 ] Omkar: [00:04:00 ] Yeah, you could say, so like in hindsight, I'm happy about it, but yeah, so I had to sit out there exams and, and so I had one year of nothing that's and, I was pretty clueless.

[00:04:13 ] I mean, first year you have no idea what to do in life., I was just home jobless and, this friend of mine from college, he, one day he would, he just came up to me and he said, why don't you join the theater circle of the college? And, you know, instead of doing that thing, you could just watch films, like, read books or something like that.

[00:04:37 ] So that kind of, just gave me something to do. So pony has a lot of, theater culture, especially into college competitions. So I did that. And while doing that, I got in touch with some people from FTI. And then I got to know about the pony international film festival.

[00:04:57 ] So that kind of set me off on [00:05:00 ] that path, where I started watching a lot of cinema. I made some friends at FTI. I started assisting them on their projects at FDI, all this while being pretty absent, in college. like by the end of my, by the end of final year of engineering, I was pretty much clueless as to what I want to do.

[00:05:19 ] I just knew that I didn't want to do anything related to engineering. I had, certain other options, but, So like, around the end of the final year of engineering, I sort of knew that I wanted to pursue filmmaking. then I didn't know what exactly I wanted to do in filmmaking. Like there are different avenues.

[00:05:39 ], I, for sure I knew that, direction is not for me or acting is not for me. I knew that because.

[00:05:46 ] Naga S: [00:05:46 ] If I can

[00:05:47 ] Omkar: [00:05:47 ] Yeah, because see, acting is something that is, it requires a lot out of you. You need to really put yourself out there for the world to see. Right. , I'm a pretty reserved kind of a person.

[00:05:57 ] I like to be in the background. I [00:06:00 ] like to be a little bit low profile, you know? So, and again, direction is sort of the same in a different way, because again, everybody's looking at you and everybody, you are answerable to a lot of people, and again, you are also, managing a lot of people, you're managing all the departments and it's a very responsible kind of a job.

[00:06:23 ]so I sort of knew that I don't want to go there, but I want to be involved in filmmaking, but I also want to, do something that really, is important. To do the basic basics of filmmaking. So I thought of editing and cinematography. and then when I was assisting people at FTI that sort of, gave me a lot of, understanding and learning.

[00:06:46 ] As to, what each department means. I literally, after I completed engineering, some projects, I, that I assisted at FTI, I was literally just like a production assistant. and my jobs were job would be simply [00:07:00 ] to, get the food from place to place, be to all the group. So that's literally where I started from and doing all of that really gave me an understanding of each and every department, what each and every person is supposed to do.

[00:07:13 ] And it also taught me like FKA. The environment is so good. FDA usually gets a very bad name, but the one thing that it really taught me there that, every student over there really values each and every person's job, like even, taking that food from place to place B, was an important job and they understood the value of it.

[00:07:35 ] So, but while doing that I understood what, his department, does, to achieve that final goal of the final film. And, so I sort of, gravitated towards the camera. And then, the I, a couple of projects I assisted, the cinematographers over there. And then in 2013, I attempted the FDA entrance exam.

[00:07:59 ]until then [00:08:00 ] I did not have a camera or anything as such. And, and still, I got through for the, interviews of both, TV, cinematography course and film, cinematography course at FDA. And that's when my parents were suddenly like, okay, he has potential. He's not just wasting his years. And that's when I got my first camera.

[00:08:21 ]I got selected for the TV course that year, but it's a one-year course. And I was like, I thought, I'll wait it out. And I'll try again next year. so I didn't take up admission in 2013. And in 2014, they did not have admissions because they had to clear out the 2008 batch, which was still not cleared up.

[00:08:41 ] So, unfortunately I could not get into FDI and, but then 2014, I shifted to Bombay because by then it was like, I have to do something. I can't just sit at home and not do anything. So my family was pretty concerned because I was, [00:09:00 ] it was really not doing anything. till the summer of 2014, it was just, watching films, going to FTI, watching films over there and just yeah, 2012.

[00:09:12 ] Naga S: [00:09:12 ] Okay.

[00:09:12 ]Omkar: [00:09:12 ] for two years, I was not doing anything that just watching films was all that I was doing. I was literally watching like at least two films every day. and, so then 2014, one of my friends who's n