Will Oates
Cinematographer & EditorWill is Cinematographer and Editor at DotPerformance. He plans, shoots, and edits video and photography content, and brings to that work an eye that is genuinely his own.
He is an award-winning filmmaker, and that recognition reflects something real: a genuine instinct for the image, for light, for the moment worth capturing, and for how a sequence of those moments becomes something that holds an audience. What makes Will distinctive is where his attention goes. He notices the things others walk past. The way light moves through a gap in the trees. The geometry of something small and overlooked. The detail in the background of a frame that most cameras would never find. That sensitivity to the world around him, to texture and light and the quietly extraordinary, is what gives his work its quality. It is not a style he has adopted. It is how he sees.
On set, that translates into something clients consistently value. Will is confident and purposeful, someone who knows what he is looking for and finds it, but who also finds things nobody thought to look for. The shot that was not in the brief but improves the whole piece. The angle that reframes something familiar into something worth watching. That instinct is difficult to brief for and impossible to replicate.
He handles the full process from shoot through to post-production, editing and shaping the material into something that holds together as a whole.
What kinds of projects does Will work on?
Video and photography production across a wide range of briefs, from corporate and brand content through to more creative and cinematic work. Will is equally comfortable across different styles and tones, adapting his approach to what each project and each client actually needs rather than applying the same visual language to everything.What does post-production look like in Will's hands?
Post-production begins before the edit does. Once the data is offloaded, filed and catalogued, the footage is synced to audio using timecodes and the material is methodically processed, naming and filing selects so that when the edit begins, everything is exactly where it needs to be. From there, the spine of the piece is built collaboratively with the team. Once the final timeline is agreed, the film enters its final stage. Colour correction, image cleanup, masking, retiming, frame tweaking, foley, dialogue cleaning, music mixing. Each layer added with care until the film sounds and looks exactly as it should. It's a process that's equal parts technical and creative. The goal is always the same: make sure nothing pulls the viewer out of the story.What is it like working with Will on a shoot?
Focused, collaborative, and unhurried in the way that only comes from genuine confidence in the craft. He works closely with the creative team and with clients, and brings a calm and considered approach to even the most demanding shoot conditions.
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