An Exploration of Deep Color & Light
Director & Editor: Nathan Byrne
Creative Director: Matthew Axe
Line Producer: Lauren Avallone
Production: MOSS
Cinematography: Mark Sherman
Hair & Makeup: Leanne Hirsh Beauty
Visual Effects: Yaso Mizoi and Junko Kitano
Scanner is a self-funded beauty film directed and edited by Nathan Byrne. Made over the course of an afternoon in a small studio, the project brought together a group of friends and collaborators to explore lipstick through color, light, movement and abstraction.
Working without a client brief, the team treated the product as raw visual material. Mark Sherman’s cinematography moves between intimate beauty imagery, sculptural product arrangements and deep areas of shadow. Yaso Mizoi and Junko Kitano extended the material through graphic visual effects, transforming the lipstick into patterns, silhouettes and fields of saturated color.
Nathan shaped the film through the edit, creating a tightly controlled progression between the model, the physical product and its increasingly abstract forms. Changes in scale, repetition and contrast give the 30-second piece its rhythm while allowing individual images to remain bold and precise.
The project was made possible by the generosity of its collaborators, particularly Mark, who contributed his time, equipment, planning and eye. The result is both a beauty film and a study in what can emerge when a small team is given the freedom to experiment.