Remember the picturesque visuals of Gavi in the superhit Sugeeth movie ‘Ordinary’? The man behind the stunning images, Faisal Ali, who showed the world the beauty of Gavi, is back with ‘Madhura Naranga’, directed by Sugeeth. ‘Madhura Naranga’ will hit the screens by May end.
“I feel very comfortable working with director like Sugeeth, who offered me my first independent venture. As he is one of my best friends, before ‘Ordinary’, it is very easy to share the ideas and work with him,” says Faisal.
It is his passion for photography that dragged Faisal into the tinsel town. “I was addicted to photography from childhood. After my studies, I joined for photography course in an institute in Ernakulam,” says Faisal hailing from Velloor near Thalayolaparambu in Kottayam district.
Later, he shifted focus to cinematography. “After attending basic classes on lighting and framing, I felt that I should start my career in cinema as a cinematographer. Within months, I joined the cinematography institute run by KSFDC in Thiruvananthapuram,” he says.
After the course, he moved to Chennai where he joined as an assistant to noted Tamil cinematographer Rajavel Olhiveeran. “I assisted him in some feature films in Tamil and a Malayalam movie ‘By the People’ along with some advertisement films,” says Faisal who later worked as an associate to noted cinematographer Krish Kaimal in his commercials.
He has also assisted ace director Rajiv Menon and actor Narain in their cinematographic ventures.
“It was during my Chennai days as associate cinematographer that I worked with Narain in some of the ad films. He was then known as Sunil Kumar and was one of the associates with Rajiv Menon Sir. We worked together for several commercials including that of Bay Watch water theme park and Red Label,” says Faisal.
It was producer Sathish B Sathish who introduced Faisal to director Sugeeth. “Sathish and I were batchmates in the media school in Ernakulam. Later, he joined film industry as assistant director and became friends with Sugeeth. It was through him I came to know about Sugeeth,” he says.
“I was with Sugeeth during the planning session of ‘Ordinary’. I was not sure that I would be the cinematographer of the movie, though we had joined hands for some short-project. All of a sudden Sugeeth told me to crank the camera for his debut venture, which apparently was mine too,” says Faisal.
After ‘Ordinary’ he has wielded camera for Sugeeth’s ‘Three Dots’, ‘Onnum Minadathe’, M Mohan’s ‘916’ and M Sasiskumar-starrer Tamil movie ‘Brahmman’.
On ‘Madhura Naranaga’, Faisal says that the movie was a challenging project for him. “It was a challenging project as the locales chosen for the movie were of different colour tones. The locations are of different contrast as the movie was shot in Dubai and Srilanka. While the Dubai gives a deserted look, the Kandy in Sri Lanka is a greenish locale which resembles Munnar here,” he says.
The cinematographer, who is now busy with the post production work of the movie, says that he is not choosy about projects, but gives importance to good scripts. “I am not concerned whether it is an art house movie or commercial one. My first preference would be for good script and of course good director,” Faisal says.