The image came first: Abdullah Al Fahim’s instinct-led journey to Cairo

For cinematographer Abdullah Al Fahim, the image came first. 

Growing up in a rural village in Bangladesh, cinema was not part of his everyday world.

His introduction to filmmaking did not happen in a theatre but on a set. 'On my first day on any film set, I saw the guy with the camera. That was it,' Fahim recalls. 'That night, I just Googled: best cinematography films.'

The search led him to The Tree of Life and the work of Emmanuel Lubezki. 'I studied who the DP was. From that night, I knew I wanted to be a cinematographer.' It was a beginning rooted in instinct rather than training—an instinct that would later take him to the Cairo International Film Festival, where his debut feature, Kaffarah, screened in the International Panorama section.

Fahim's technical foundation was shaped under two influential figures in Bangladeshi cinema: Rashed Zaman and Barkat Hossain Polash. He describes their influence in elemental terms. 'Rashed Zaman is like nature—like the philosophy in The Tree of Life. He made me ruthless about passion. Barkat Hossain Polash is like grace. He made me grounded. One gave me the fire, the other the balance.'

That dual education prepared him for his first significant break—a television short film with director Tanvir Ahsan. 'He taught me how to think like a director, not just a DP,' Fahim says. 'That changed everything. A cinematographer's job isn't just to light a scene; it's to unlock the director's mind.'

When director Thanvir Chowdhury approached him with Kaffarah—a script centred on the emotional terrain of a niqabi woman's struggle—Fahim felt an immediate personal connection. 'The character reminded me of my own mother,' he says. 'I told him, "This is personal for me."'

The decision to shoot the film in black and white sealed the collaboration. A longtime admirer of films such as Ida and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, Fahim was drawn to the form's expressive discipline. 'Black and white isn't the absence of colour. It's a different language. It's about texture, shadow, and the pure shape of emotion.'

Preparing for the shoot, he adopted a monk-like visual discipline, setting his iPhone to greyscale to train his eye. The film's modest budget became a creative catalyst. 'Constraint is the key,' he says. 'At night, soft light from practicals. By day, one key light—maybe a backlight. Always use negative fill. I avoided anything that felt like safe, sandwich lighting. We had to make bold choices.'

The most important lesson, however, was not technical but collaborative. 'My biggest mistake was not realising how visual my director was before we started,' Fahim admits. 'I learned that walking with a director is more important than walking with a camera. You have to get inside his head. That takes curiosity, trust, and a shared sense of humour. It's not about copying a style it's about sharing a brain.'

Kaffarah's selection in Cairo proved transformative. 'You don't know a festival's power until you're there,' he says. 'Walking the red carpet, talking to audiences—it rewires your ambition. It showed me my own benchmark was too low.'

Energised by the experience, Fahim embraced a new openness about ambition. 'I have this obsession,' he says with a grin. 'I want to shoot in every corner of the earth. In Cairo, I was handing my card to directors like a kid, saying, "I want to work with you." Some laughed. Some didn't. But you have to put it out there.'

Alongside this global aspiration, he continues to work in commercials, which he describes as a creative laboratory. 'It's a playground to test ideas and gear. You see results fast. That's how you learn what you truly enjoy,' he says. 'A feature film is different. That's a divine drive.'

Looking ahead, Fahim is clear about his next goal. 'I want to shoot a highly stylised teen drama—gritty realism, but cinematic. A total reinvention of the genre.' His current inspirations range from the provocative colour palette of Ema to the vast world-building of Dune.

He carries with him a guiding principle from Rashed Zaman: 'If you don't feel a thrill in the work, the work is not yours. Your provision is fixed so go crazy. Shoot what you love.'

For Abdullah Al Fahim, Kaffarah's journey to Cairo validates an instinct-first path—proof that a powerful visual voice can emerge from anywhere, shaped by mentorship, driven by passion, and aimed at the world. As he puts it, his goal is simple: 'To keep the thrill alive, and to find the next director worth walking with.'