Meet Jingkun Huang

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jingkun Huang. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jingkun below.

Jingkun, appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?

To maintain creativity, I believe the key is keeping an open mind and a continual sense of curiosity. During my undergraduate studies, I focused on documentaries, capturing many real-life stories, which taught me to find inspiration in reality. The documentary-making process is filled with unpredictability, requiring a keen sensitivity to surroundings and people. This experience taught me how to capture subtle moments and weave them into visual storytelling. Then, during graduate school, I began working more on narrative films and music videos, allowing me to explore more visually expressive storytelling. This shift from documentary to narrative film has driven me to continuously experiment with new visual styles and narrative techniques.

Beyond this, maintaining creativity also requires engaging with different types of art. I make it a point to watch films of varying styles, visit photography exhibitions, listen to music, and read literature. These cross-disciplinary artistic experiences provide me with fresh perspectives. Sustaining creativity is, in essence, a process of constant input and output.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

I am a cinematographer, and my story began with studying documentary in China. During my undergraduate years, I filmed documentaries in real environments, capturing many unguarded moments that earned me some awards. At that time, I focused on expressing emotions in real life. Documentary filmmaking trained me to find stories within authentic settings and honed my adaptability and observational sensitivity. This experience still influences my visual language and understanding of storytelling today.

In 2021, I came to the United States to pursue a graduate degree in film production, and I am currently studying cinematography at Chapman University. This journey has led me to gradually shift from documentary filmmaking to narrative films and music videos, expanding my vision and technique. In narrative filmmaking, I can use camera work and lighting to delicately express the inner world of characters; in music videos, I have the opportunity to explore bolder visual styles. This variety of experiences allows me to stay creative and adaptable across different types of projects.

For me, what makes cinematography so special is its power to connect audiences to characters’ emotions—it’s a form of art that transcends language. I am particularly passionate about using light and composition to capture the subtle emotional nuances of characters and to guide the audience’s feelings through visual storytelling. Whether in documentaries or narrative films, my core focus is always to capture genuine emotional moments and tell stories in the most sincere way possible.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

I firmly believe that technology is a tool for art, not the end goal. Documentaries taught me how to shoot without disturbing the real environment, and later in narrative films and music videos, I combined these technical skills with artistic expression to create images that are both technically supported and emotionally resonant. Mastery of techniques like lighting, camera work, and composition not only allows you to complete tasks but also helps you find your own artistic language in the creative process.

Alright, so before we go we want to ask you to take a moment to reflect and share what you think you would do if you somehow knew you only had a decade of life left?

As a graduate student in cinematography, I also face the challenge of realizing my creative vision within limited resources and time. Every project has its unique constraints, and when facing these limitations, finding ways to maintain high creative standards while maximizing the use of available resources becomes another important problem I need to solve.

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Still frames from recent works, Close, Summer Wedding, Winter Psalm, and future project Snow Dharma.

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