bio

David Kinniburgh is a freelance director, cinematographer, character animator and composer based in Queens-by-way-of-Brooklyn. Earning his degree in Music Theory and Composition at NYU, he spent the majority of his twenties working marketing for record labels, including VICE Records, Columbia Records and EMI, all the while playing in indie groups in NYC. David began making music videos for his bands in his late twenties, which included experimenting with stop-motion animation. His first music video as a director—”Ghosts,” for the band Los Encantados—debuted in 2012 to positive reviews in the press and media. The success of the video made it clear that filmmaking and animation which were the passions he should be pursuing. He bought a small DSLR and, with the help of friends more advanced in the field (as well as the venerable University of Youtube), taught himself the crafts of cinematography and directing while leaving the sickly fluorescence of the office space behind forever.

David now owns and primarily works with RED digital cinema cameras. His main artist focus as a cinematographer revolves around his work with dance and dancers—capturing the body in motion as it travels from the urban to the pastoral and from the intimacy of a small dance studio to a busy city street. He has produced and directed four music videos that revolve around dance and is currently in production for a short-form video series called “Shed,Light,” which is a part documentary, part staged cinema series that focuses on working dancers in the city. He is also currently in the studio working on an animated short film to be released in 2018. Professionally, he has created stop-motion animation advertisements, DP’d and edited video for Business Insider, and as well DP’d the pilot episode of the travel-documentary series, “Inspired By,” which is currently in post-production. His first stop-motion advertisement (which he produced, directed, animated and scored) went live earlier this year, made for Coucou French Classes, Brooklyn.