The Principle
Richards is the direct heir of Almendros and Malick β the magic-hour tradition brought into the digital age, where the extraordinary sensitivity of modern sensors allows him to shoot in light levels that would have been impossible on film. His work with ChloΓ© Zhao constitutes the most sustained commitment to available-light naturalism in contemporary American cinema: three features shot almost entirely with natural light, in real locations, with non-professional actors, using the actual sun as primary illumination.
His Academy Award nomination for Nomadland (2020) β a film about a woman living in a van, shot in the actual landscapes of the American West with available light β represented a victory for a kind of cinema that Hollywood rarely rewards: quiet, observational, beautiful without being pretty, true without being bleak.
Richards and Zhao shoot FAST β they chase the light rather than controlling it. When golden hour arrives, they shoot. When it passes, they wait for the next one. The film bends to the sun's schedule, not the other way around. This is the Almendros doctrine updated for the era of the Arri Alexa.
Light
The Golden Hour Commitment
Nomadland (2020, Zhao): Fern (Frances McDormand) in the Badlands at sunset. In her van at dawn, the first light cutting through the windshield. Standing in the desert at golden hour, her face lit by the last warm light of the day. Richards and Zhao scheduled their shooting days around the twenty minutes of extraordinary light at each end of the day β and the film's visual identity is built from these moments. The result is a portrait of America that looks like a Terrence Malick film but feels like a documentary.
The interiors of the van β Fern's domestic space β are lit by whatever enters: dawn light, overcast daylight, the warm glow of a headlamp. Richards used no supplemental lighting inside the van. The space is so small that any film light would have been visible and would have destroyed the intimacy. Instead, he worked with the Alexa Mini's low-light capability and fast lenses, exposing for what was there.
The Rider (2017, Zhao): Brady Jandreau (playing a version of himself) training horses on the Pine Ridge Reservation at golden hour. The dust kicked up by hooves catches the low sun and turns the air amber. Brady's silhouette against the sunset β the cowboy myth rendered in the actual light of actual South Dakota. Richards didn't create this image. He was present when it happened, and he had the sensitivity to recognize it and the skill to capture it.
The Overcast Alternative
Not all of Richards's work is golden. God's Own Country (2017, Lee), shot in Yorkshire, is almost entirely overcast β the grey, flat, harsh light of Northern England farming country. Richards brings the same naturalist ethic to this environment: the light is what it is. Grey sheep under grey sky on grey hillside. The beauty is in the textures β wet wool, mud, stone walls β that the flat light reveals with democratic clarity.
Practical Interiors
Richards's interiors are lit by practicals and available light β kitchen fluorescents, table lamps, the blue glow of a television. On Nomadland, the community gatherings of van-dwellers are lit by campfire and string lights. The warmth of these scenes is REAL β the community's light, not the cinematographer's. Richards's digital work has a warmth and grain structure (often added in post) that recalls the 16mm films of the 1970s American indie tradition.
Color
The Malick palette. Richards works in the same color world as Almendros and Lubezki's Malick films β amber gold, deep blue twilight, the warm-to-cool transition of dusk. But where Days of Heaven and The New World aestheticize the landscape, Richards's palette is more documentary: the colors are truthful, not heightened. The gold is the actual gold of sunset, not a pushed grade.
Earth tones. Richards's palette is grounded in the landscape β the rust red of Badlands soil, the sage green of prairie grass, the weathered grey of fence posts and barn wood. His human subjects exist WITHIN this palette: Fern's earth-toned wardrobe, Brady's worn denim. The people and the land share a color world, inseparable.
Camera
Handheld intimacy. Richards shoots handheld with a closeness that feels like a friend standing nearby β not invasive, not distant, just present. The camera breathes with the subject. On Nomadland, he's close enough to McDormand to see the weathering on her face, but far enough to see her within the landscape. The balance is delicate and perfect.
The landscape hold. Richards lets landscape shots breathe β holding on the American West for seconds longer than narrative efficiency demands, allowing the audience to SIT in the space, to feel the wind and the distance. These aren't establishing shots. They're the film's equivalent of meditation.
Non-professional actors. Working with non-actors demands a specific camera approach: you can't ask for another take the way you can with a professional. Richards shoots reactively β the camera finds the moment as it happens, adjusts to follow the performance, accepts imperfection as authenticity. This is documentary discipline applied to fiction.
Specifications
- Chase the light. Schedule around golden hour. Build the shooting day around the
twenty minutes of extraordinary light. Everything else is coverage.
- Available light only. If the Alexa can see it, that's enough. The low-light
capability of modern digital sensors is your lighting kit.
- The van interior rule. In a small space, ANY supplemental light is a lie. Use
what enters through the windows.
- Handheld at human distance. Close enough to see the face, far enough to see the
place. The camera is a companion, not a surveillance device.
- Hold the landscape. Give the audience time with the space. The land is not a
backdrop. It's the story.