Conversations with Idil Eryurekli

Today we’d like to introduce you to Idil Eryurekli.

Hi Idil, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story? 
I was born in Ankara, Turkey, in 1997 and relocated to Istanbul when I was 2. My dad always has been an admirer of photography, and when I was young, we would take photo classes together, walking through Istannbul’s highly textured old city, Golden Horn. It was there, within two continents and countless civilizations worth of history, that I developed a deep appreciation for documenting – mostly focused on the locations themselves: how people interact with them, and what context that interaction (or lack thereof) showed about the spaces within the rich historical fabric of the city. 

By the time I was in high school, I realized photography wasn’t quite cutting it for me: I needed the images to move. Moving from that to cinematography felt like a natural progression of events, and five years later, I found myself at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts studying Film & TV Production. Naturally, this brought on an intercontinental move at the young age of 19. Little did I know then the alienation I would feel during my freshman year would inform much of my future work and how I approach capturing feelings of isolation. 

Having graduated in 2020 into a film & tv industry in hibernation, I had to claw my way up slowly. I had a couple of student shorts under my belt, but most of my income was AC’ing for other DPs. Over the course of four years, this started changing, and I got lucky enough to collaborate with fantastic writers and directors. Slowly but surely, my work started getting more recognition, first at NFFTY, then at Aspen Shortsfest, then Outfest, and then Telluride, Cannes, Tribeca, and SXSW. Again, I feel the need to emphasize how slow this process felt as it was happening: there’s a good four years between my first premiere at NFFTY and SXSW. Countless shorts, music videos, and spots were shot over those years. I’ve also cam opped on two feature-length documentaries and AC’d and operated on every good shoot I could get my name on. 

While I mostly live and work in NYC, I do occasionally work in LA, thanks to friends from college who have since been living in LA and hosted me so I can work locally. Over the summer of 2023, I shot a beautiful proof of concept all over LA titled Prologue (dir. Eric Palmer & Cassandra Due) and am hoping to go back in 2025 to shoot the rest of the feature. 

I’m now preparing for my first feature here in the city, scheduled to start shooting in Late March. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It really hasn’t been a smooth road no. Putting aside all the immigration challenges (that gave me a steady stream of anxiety for 3 years), being a young creative is hard, and even harder when you’re freelancing. You have to be just vulnerable enough at all times to create images that touch audiences but not vulnerable enough, especially as a woman, to seem overly sentimental or weak. 

You constantly have to be reading up on the latest developments in the technology of cinematography, watching movies, writing about them so you don’t forget what you liked and didn’t, looking at stills, reading, going to museums, looking at photos and paintings, while also trying to sustain yourself in a city that is far too expensive to live in without a steady paycheck every month. 

You have to constantly and steadily use Instagram to catch up on current work and also to market yourself. And you absolutely have to know when to delete Instagram because every post you see starts depressing you and making you question every life choice you’ve ever made because you haven’t had paid work in 2 months. Balancing my mental health with my work has been hard, to say the least, and on top of that, living in a country without universal healthcare is a huge struggle. 

Being a woman in the industry also has its numerous challenges, but this goes without saying, and I’m sure I don’t need to expand further on this when only three women have been nominated for a Best Cinematography Oscar in the history of the Academy. The industry is just now starting to warm up to the idea of women DPs shooting bigger-budget films instead of little indies. While I haven’t faced any open sexism on set ever (and I know not everyone can say this), I know I will never be the first choice for many directors simply because I’m not a “bro.” I’m actually completely okay with this. I don’t think I’d want to work with them anyway, but it is an added weight on my shoulders. 

And lastly, a big struggle has been finding, developing, and cultivating my own artistic voice throughout the years. What’s my style? Do I even have one? Do I need to have one? I used to strongly believe at the stage I’m in right now, it’s in my best interest to let the story dictate the visual style, but lately, I’ve been feeling a sense of disappointment looking at some of my past work: “If only I’d followed my instincts…” I’m now trying to put into words and pictures what I feel that my style is and can be, and I will let that inform the next couple of projects I shoot more than working backward from the script. Like with any artistic medium, self-doubt is a natural steppingstone on the path, and I’m hoping it will eventually become one that I depend on instead of fear. 

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m a cinematographer. While I shoot all kinds of live-action (fashion, branded commercials, documentaries, etc.), my heart lies with narratives. While in the past, this has been limited to short films and pilots, I’m beyond excited for my first feature-length film that I’m prepping for and the other 3 that are currently in development. 

I approach every script I read by trying to first find a personal connection to it before anything else. I read all of it before I look at any deck, or even talk to the director. I read it so I can pinpoint that honest, undiluted feeling that I get from the pages before my perception is filled with excitement for the images I can create with the director. Most times, that feeling is informed by my past, whether that’s growing up as a young queer girl in Turkey or witnessing political instability and a failed coup d’etat in Istanbul, or, my favorite, the complex beast that is displacement and immigration. 

Once I’ve honed in on a feeling or set of vague memories, I re-read the script and visualize it in my head with that feeling at the forefront of the imagery; I decipher the visual language that makes sense to me. And then I talk to the director. Most times, we are on the same page, and that’s great. I can immediately start the next phase of prep. Other times we have different approaches, and then it’s a dialogue until I can further dissect and engross myself in their memories and the nooks and crannies of their minds. This is actually also a wonderful experience, and some of my favorite work I’ve done has been after conversations like this – it’s very intimate, and you really get good at being vulnerable very quickly with someone you’ve perhaps just met. 

Once the director and I are on the same page, I start my absolute favorite part of prep: pulling together references across multiple platforms, mainly stills, but also music, literature, other films, photographs, and paintings. I could talk about this for hours because it is that fun: the possibilities are endless, and the excitement is like no other. After weeks of meetings and scouts, I end my prep by making a photography deck that I send out to my gaffer, key grip, grips & electrics, and camera team. This includes everything from project-specific guidelines of lighting and exposure (like daylight is always 6200K; the protagonist is only keyed from far side, we only use practicals in the bedrooms, expose 1/3 stops over to get a denser negative, etc…) to visual language and camera movement, references for every scene/shot, floorplans, and rough lighting diagrams. It’s the bible of the shoot, basically, and I can pull it up on set any time to help myself make any decisions in the event of an unknown. I’m very proud of this because I strongly think having everyone in my camera & G&E team on the same page as me results in a not only better-looking film but also in a work environment where everyone is more invested and focused on the vision. 

Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
I was very curious and funny, according to my parents. I wanted to learn everything and do everything. Interest-wise, I spent most of my life thinking I was going to be a surgeon (and I don’t have any doctors in my family). Once I met cinematography, that quickly changed, but I still feel like little me had the personality of a surgeon. 

I’ve also loved technology and cameras ever since I held my first camera at the age of 4. I’m extremely lucky to have parents who supported that passion in me, and I definitely wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for them. 

Contact Info:

• Website: www.idileryurekli.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/idileryurekli/
• Other: https://vimeo.com/idileryurekli/narrative

Image Credits
Emmet Luciano
Isabella Evans
Moises Uriarte
Yuki Ledbetter
Eric Palmer
Sarah Nocquet