When Richard Prasad came on board for Oh! Baby , he was clear that the cinematography should neither be too realistic nor in the fantasy zone; it should be a bridge between the two. “I had worked on a few films where I was required to give a glamorous look; I wanted to break free of it. This was a project where things fell in place beautifully. Director Nandini Reddy, production designer Jayashree Lakshminarayanan and Samantha Akkineni were on the same page as to what is required for the film,” he says.
For this story, Richard felt the cinematography should work around Samantha’s character and not seek attention to itself. “That wasn’t easy for me since I come from an advertising background where the requirements are different,” he says.
Chennai-bred Richard debuted with the Telugu film Swamy Ra Ra (2013) directed by Sudheer Varma, followed by Kotha Janta and a few other projects. He believes that cinematography is a form of expression, and life experiences contribute to it.
- During his college days, friends called him ‘Panavision Prasad’ for his fascination for Hollywood and world cinema of the era when Panavision cameras were in vogue.
- Richard’s Twitter bio reads ‘Internal server error’. Asked whether it speaks of his nonconformist methods, he brushes it off with a laugh.
With Nandini and co-writer Lakshmi Bhupala having the script ready, he says it was easy for the unit to plan. For the first 20 minutes where veteran actress Lakshmi is in focus, Richard used stark, raw lighting to show her going through a troubled phase. When she steps into the carnival-like Soul Sante, there’s a shift in the colour scheme.
Richard explains that in most films, the colour tones are decided and costumes are planned, but they worked with a reverse technique for Oh! Baby . Baby takes fashion cues from the 60s when she turns young. “Stylist Preetham Jukalker did a good job of dressing up Samantha in contemporary-retro clothes in pop colours. Then, I chose the colour scheme according to what Samantha is wearing and where she is,” he explains.
The cinematographer was inspired by American realist painter Edward Hopper: “He is a master in depicting [urban loneliness] isolation and lighting; I felt a similar technique will work for this film.”
Richard studied visual communication in The New College, Chennai, and initially wanted to be a director. Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List inspired him to take up cinematography. Richard has a fair understanding of editing and assistant direction, which he feels adds to his method of work. “I don’t like shooting the same scene from too many angles. And it was good to work with Nandini who also knew to edit and didn’t waste time with extra angles.”
After visual communication, Richard took up a three-year cinematography course at Adyar Film Institute (now renamed M G R Government Film and Television Training Institute) during which he also won a Tamil Nadu state award. “But there’s a jinx for many people from that institute who win state awards; it takes a long time to establish themselves in cinema,” laughs Richard, stating how his senior, cinematographer-turned-director C Prem Kumar of 96 (the Tamil film starring Trisha and Vijay Sethupathi) also took nearly a decade to make a mark.
Richard used to shoot backend stories for reality television shows in Tamil before the feature film opportunity presented itself through Swamy Ra Ra . Lyricist Krishna Chaitanya who was studying engineering in Chennai was a common friend to both Richard and Sudheer Varma and felt they would vibe together, given their common interest in world cinema.
Since Swamy Ra Ra , Richard hasn’t looked back and is happy to have his base in Telugu cinema.
