The Auteur Theory and Hype Williams

In the 1950's film directors like Francois Truffaut introduced the Auteur theory. The term auteur originates from France, and translates into author. This means that a director's film reflects their creative vision. An auteur is a film maker whose style is distinctive which therefore creates a particular signature for them. An auteur use to be considered as just a film maker, but now it can also be seen as director's of music videos. An example is Hype Williams.

Hype Williams

Harold Williams, better knows as "Hype" Williams is film/music director and screenwriter born in Queens, New York 1970. He has been present since 1991 and has worked with a variety of different artists such as Ne-Yo, Kanye West, 2Pac and Missy Elliott.

Throughout the vast majority of Williams' video's he has many signature styles and one of them being the fisheye lens which distorted the camera view around the central focus. A great example of this is Will Smith's 'Gettin' jiggy with it'. Another signature style of Williams' involves placing shots in regular widescreen ratio, while a second shot is split and placed in the upper and lower bars. An example of this is Beyonce's Check on it. He has a dynamic and multi dimensional style and frequently utilises ariel and tracking shots which often move backwards or forwards. His style also has include the use of slow motion action, deep focus and smooth cutting.