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Theo Van de Sande, a graduate of the Dutch Film Academy and an award-winning Cinematographer, started working professionally while still in school. At an early age, Theo found his passion in still photography and earned his first camera by working in the strawberry fields. He decided to try his luck and changed his studies from Biochemistry to Cinema after seeing the films of Ingmar Bergman and other European Directors, as well as the Japanese film WOMAN IN THE DUNES.

Amsterdam’s roaring years, filled with optimism, excitement and creative freedom had a big impact on Theo’s new found passion and he chose to work on the rock-concert film STAMPING GROUNDS, (the European WOODSTOCK) instead of going to his graduation ceremony at THE DUTCH FILM ACADEMY.

In the beginning of his career he mainly concentrated on shooting feature films but he couldn’t let go of the adventure of making documentaries, and shot a personal chronicle of a voyage that he took with his fellow adventurer Aat Den Ouden to follow an unknown river in South America.
The film ORONOQUE was awarded Best Expedition film at the Trento Film Festival

In the early eighties, Theo shot a quarter of the Dutch Cinema and he received THE GOLDEN CALF (the “Dutch Oscar”) for Best Cinematography twice, both in 1982 and 1987— in that time the award was only given once every five years for a body of work.

Numerous feature films shot in Europe by Theo Van de Sande got international attention including; THE GIRL WITH THE RED HAIR and THE ILLUSIONIST (which received the Dutch Film Critics Award and Best Dutch Film Award,) and THE POINTSMAN, which won the award for Best Cinematography at the Madrid Film Festival.

THE ASSAULT, Theo’s last film in the Netherlands, won the Golden Globe and became the first Dutch feature film to receive the ACADEMY AWARD for Best Foreign Language Film.

By this time, Theo was already scouting his first American film, MIRACLE MILE, starring Anthony Edwards & Mare Winningham and directed by Steve De Jarnatt, which had been listed as “one of the 10 best unmade scripts” in Hollywood and after it’s release, became an instant cult film. After 27 years MIRACLE MILE was re-mastered and re-released on Blu-Ray and won in 2016 the SATURN AWARD FOR- BEST DVD / BLU-RAY CLASSIC RELEASE, followed a year later by a release in Europe and the USA.

After more than 25 feature films and documentaries in Europe and around the world, Theo settled in Los Angeles and continued to work on more than 35 features, a great variety of both studio and independent films. He has shot for such directors as: Gary Fleder, Mick Jackson, Carl Franklin, Lasse Hallstrom, Garry Marshall, Joan Micklin Silver, and the legendary Robert Wise.

His critically acclaimed and iconic work includes: BLADE, CRUEL INTENTIONS, MIRACLE MILE, CROSSING DELANCEY, ONCE AROUND, VOLCANO, OUT OF TIME, TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE, and HOMEFRONT.

While Theo has worked in virtually every genre, WAYNE’S WORLD was his first comedy, which led to many more successful comedies including BIG DADDY and GROWN UPS.

In 1998, exactly 20 years before BLACK PANTHER, the first Marvel Comics superhero film known as BLADE made its theatrical debut, and its main character was black.

Theo has continued his love for documentaries and has co-produced several award-winning documentaries with Michèle Ohayon, including COLORS STRAIGHT UP which was nominated for an ACADEMY AWARD, DGA AWARD and SPIRIT AWARD for Best Feature Length Documentary along with winning 13 national awards, STEAL A PENCIL FOR ME, which received the prestigious Yad Vashem award, Sonoma Festival Audience Award and screened at the United Nations, and COWBOY DEL AMOR, which won the Jury and Audience award at the SXSW festival, an IDA Nomination and several other national awards.

In the television world, he started to work with director Mick Jackson on the pilot for THE PRACTICE, TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE starring Jack Lemmon, which won an Emmy, a DGA award and was nominated for a Golden Globe, and THE MEMORY KEEPER’S DAUGHTER starring Emily Watson, which was also nominated for an Emmy

Lately Van de Sande works more frequently for TV Series, and from 2015 he shot for Director Gary Fleder and Director Mark Waters: 3 features, 7 TV-Pilots & 7 TV Episodes in 4 different countries and 8 different Cities, New York, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, Budapest London and Los Angeles, with 9 different camera crews.
For AMAZON PRODUCTIONS he finished this year in Prague the final 2 episodes of CARNIVAL ROW directed by Jon Amiel and again another AMAZON PRODUCTION an Episode of the Series: BOSCH in Los Angeles

In 2015 he received an ASC Nomination in the category TV Movie, for DELIVERANCE CREEK, a period piece set during the Civil War (Lifetime, 2014), also directed by Jon Amiel.

Since 2015 he started to teach in between productions International ASC Master Classes & Seminars all over the world: Toronto, Los Angeles, Poland, The Netherlands, Beijing, Las Vegas, Kuala Lumpur, Dubai and in Bogota, Columbia.