Skylar Nielsen (born 1975), is an American photographer, cinematographer and director. He heads

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...

-based Vita Brevis Films, a company that creates short

documentary films A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

on a wide variety of subjects. Nielsen was born in Zion, Utah, in 1975. He grew up on his family's farm, and after "an epiphany in the sheep

corral A pen is an enclosure for holding livestock. It may also perhaps be used as a term for an enclosure for other animals such as pets that are unwanted inside the house. The term describes types of enclosures that may confine one or many animal ...

" decided to move away from the farm and into the city to pursue photography and film making in 1993. In 2004, Nielsen established Skylar Nielsen Studio, then in 2008 established Vita Brevis Films.

Selected film projects

* Quick Cuts: Reef Mcintosh * The Prohibition Tour * Professional: Eric Arakawa * We are 138 * Professional * BMW M6 * Riot Racing * Super Bee * Fiz Golf * 3D Enchanted Forest * 3 Form Woven Wall * Gray Davenport

Larger projects

;NEA PSAs In 2009, the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal ...

commissioned Nielsen for two commercials to air during

Oscar Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to: People * Oscar (given name), an Irish- and English-language name also used in other languages; the article includes the names Oskar, Oskari, Oszkár, Óscar, and other forms. * Oscar (Irish mythology), ...

week. The first commercial featured

Chris Botti Christopher Stephen Botti ( ; born October 12, 1962) is an award-winning American trumpeter and composer. In 2013, Botti won the Grammy Award in the Best Pop Instrumental Album category, for the album ''Impressions''. He was also nominated in ...

, a renowned jazz trumpeter. The second commercial, called "I'm Proud", featured actors and actresses delivering lines directly to the audience without a

fourth wall The fourth wall is a performance convention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this ''wall'', the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. From the 16th cen ...

present. Celebrities included

David Hyde Pierce David Hyde Pierce (born April 3, 1959) is an American actor and director of stage, film and television. He starred as psychiatrist Dr. Niles Crane on the NBC sitcom ''Frasier'' from 1993 to 2004, and won four Primetime Emmy Awards and a Screen ...

Kerry Washington Kerry Marisa Washington (born January 31, 1977) SidebarCertificate of Live Birth: Isabelle Amarachi Asomugha(County of Los Angeles Department of Public Health). Gives Kerry Washington birth dateArchivedfrom the original on May 2, 2016.Note: Fi ...

Zooey Deschanel Zooey Claire Deschanel (; born January 17, 1980) is an American actress, singer, and songwriter. She made her film debut in '' Mumford'' (1999) and had a supporting role in Cameron Crowe's film ''Almost Famous'' (2000). Deschanel is known for he ...

and

Alyssa Milano Alyssa Jayne Milano (born December 19, 1972) is an American actress. She has played Samantha Micelli in '' Who's the Boss?'', Jennifer Mancini in ''Melrose Place'', Phoebe Halliwell in ''Charmed'', Billie Cunningham in ''My Name Is Earl'', Savan ...

, among many others. ;PROFESSIONal In 2011, Nielsen partnered with VideoWest to create PROFESSIONal, the first in a series of films that focus on "forgotten trades and practices in an evolving America." The short documentary focused on Neil Youngberg, a third generation

metal worker Metalworking is the process of shaping and reshaping metals to create useful objects, parts, assemblies, and large scale structures. As a term it covers a wide and diverse range of processes, skills, and tools for producing objects on every scale ...

and fabricator from Utah. The video, a

Vimeo Vimeo, Inc. () is an American video hosting, sharing, and services platform provider headquartered in New York City. Vimeo focuses on the delivery of high-definition video across a range of devices. Vimeo's business model is through software as ...

Staff Pick, had Nielsen directing, cinematography by Ian Rigby and Lance Clayton and sound by Michael Hall. PROFESSIONal was reviewed as "a gorgeous short film" and "beautifully crafted". The film won the 2011

Slamdance Film Festival The Slamdance Film Festival is an annual film festival focused on emerging artists. The annual week-long festival takes place in Park City, Utah, in late January and is the main event organized by the year-round Slamdance organization, which als ...

's best short-form documentary award and was also featured at LA Short Fest. ;''Mars One Way'' In February 2014, Nielsen directed a documentary video called ''Mars One Way'', a film that followed five

Mars One Mars One was a small private Dutch organization that received money from investors by claiming it would use it to land the first humans on Mars and leave them there to establish a permanent human colony. From its announcement in 2012 to its ...

hopefuls with their thoughts, contemplations and theories on leaving Earth forever to go colonize Mars. The video was produced by Nielsen, along with Elaine Clark and

Doug Fabrizio Doug Fabrizio (born July 18, 1964) is an American radio host and commentator. He is host of RadioWest, a popular talk show heard on KUER; RadioWest is syndicated by PRI with a focus on the western United States and especially Utah. Fabrizio be ...

. ''Mars One Way'' was a Vimeo Staff Pick and featured on their site, being listed as appropriate for all audiences. Music included on the film was from artists

God is an Astronaut God Is an Astronaut are an Irish post-rock band from County Wicklow, formed in 2002 by Niels and Torsten Kinsella. Their style employs elements of electronic music, krautrock, and space rock, reminiscent of Tangerine Dream. The band currently co ...

with two songs and

This Will Destroy You This Will Destroy You (abbreviated as TWDY) is an American post-rock band from San Marcos, Texas, formed in 2004. They typically compose lengthy atmospheric instrumental pieces, featuring layers of effects-laden guitar and a heavy usage of dy ...

with one.

Yahoo Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds ma ...

featured the video on their site as well. The film was filmed in

720p 720p (1280×720 px; also called HD ready, standard HD or just HD) is a progressive HDTV signal format with 720 horizontal lines/1280 columns and an aspect ratio (AR) of 16:9, normally known as widescreen HDTV (1.78:1). All major HDTV broadcast ...

and lasts 11 min 40 sec.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Nielsen, Skylar 1975 births American documentary film directors Living people People from Salt Lake City Film directors from Utah