Every Frame a Painting Is Back (For Now)

If you consider yourself a film lover to any degree, then do yourself a huge favor and check out Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou’s Every Frame a Painting. The YouTube channel features a bunch of wonderful video essays that explore various filmmaking topics, including Jackie Chan’s blend of action and comedy, Akira Kurosawa’s use of movement, and the Coen Brothers’ approach to capturing conversations, to name just a few.

Ramos and Zhou stopped publishing videos to the channel in 2016, though they continued to produce video essays for The Criterion Channel and Netflix. Thankfully, the duo have revived their YouTube channel with a video essay on the sustained two-shot, a classic method employed by filmmakers to capture two actors and their conversation from a single angle. Though clocking in at just under six minutes, the video — like all of the duo’s videos — is filled with information and examples from throughout film history.

Every Frame a Painting’s revival is just for a short time, though, and serves as a lead-up to the release of Ramos and Zhou’s own short, The Second, starring Paul Sun-Hyung Lee (The Mandalorian, Kim’s Convenience). But given the depth and passion in their videos, any new amount of Every Frame a Painting is a very welcome thing.