Vanessa Whyte | Cinematographer

Vanessa Whyte | Cinematographer

The children of a director, Vanessa and her brother loved visiting their dad’s sets when they were growing up, especially when there was fake snow on the ground. Initially Vanessa wanted to be a make-up artist and would even practice on her mum with the cast-offs from the make-up truck. She then thought about becoming an actress, but realised she couldn’t act…

Everything changed when her dad gave her a camera, and Vanessa became hooked on photography. Using a cupboard in the family home as her darkroom, she developed her skills before getting her first job as a camera trainee on TV show NCS: Manhunt with a young Michael Fassbender.

Vanessa gained experience on commercials and music videos, and worked as the second unit DoP on TV shows including Broadchurch and Strangers. She struggled to get the break to switch to main unit, but it was worth the wait when she had the opportunity to help create BAFTA-winning BBC drama Murdered for Being Different. Vanessa hopes to work on feature films in the future, but her main ambition is to continue to work with exciting and interesting people, and to contribute to a mixture of comedy and drama projects.