Best Half-Hour Single-Camera Cinematography is a new category at the Emmys this year. Half-hours have seldom been nominated when competing opposite hour-long programs. The last were “Everybody Hates Chris” in 2006 and “Doogie Howser, M.D.” in 1992. A general Best Half-Hour Cinematography category existed from 2008 to 2010, with slots reserved for multi-camera comedies; this is the first time that single-camera half hours will fill an entire category.
The cinematography categories employ a two-step nominating process. Instead of a popular vote of the relevant branch of the academy determining the nominees like in most other categories, a popular vote of the cinematographers’ branch narrows the ballot to ten, then a panel of branch members votes for the nominees after viewing clips from those contenders — four continuous minutes each (indicated by the submitters) for this category.
None of the 59 series — represented by 66 episodes — on the ballot has ever been nominated for its cinematography (opposite hour-long shows for Best Single-Camera Cinematography) at the Emmys and only two have been nominated at the industry-voted American Society of Cinematographers Awards (in the defunct Best Half-Hour Cinematography category): “Modern Family” for 2011 and “Drunk History” for 2013, with the latter winning.
Submissions include:
- “Atlanta” season 1: “The Streisand Effect” (Christian Sprenger)
- Pictured: “Dear White People” season 1: “Chapter I” (Jeffrey Waldron)
- “Divorce” season 1: “Pilot” (Reed Morano)
- “Divorce” season 1: “Another Party” (Richard Rutkowski)
- “Drunk History” season 4: “Legends” (Blake McClure)
- “Documentary Now!” season 2: “Globesman” (Alex Buono)
- “Girls” season 6: “Goodbye Tour” (Tim Ives)
- “I Love Dick” season 1: “Cowboys and Nomads” (Jim Frohna)
- “Insecure” season 1: “Racist as Fuck” (Anette Haellmigk)
- “Just Add Magic” season 2: “Just Add History” (Mark Doering-Powell)
- “The Last Man on Earth” season 3: “Got Milk?” (Carl Herse)
- “Master of None” season 2: “Buona Notte” (Mark Schwartzbard)
- “Modern Family” season 8: “Snow Ball” (James Bagdonas)
- “Mozart in the Jungle” season 3: “Now I Will Sing” (Tobias Datum)
- “Silicon Valley” season 4: “Success Failure” (Tim Suhrstedt)
- “Transparent” season 3: “If I Were a Bell” (Jim Frohna)
- “Veep” season 6: “Qatar” (David Miller)
- “Vice Principals” season 1: “A Trusty Steed” (Eric Treml)
- “Z: The Beginning of Everything” season 1: “Lights, Camera, Fitzgerald” (David Franco)
- “Z: The Beginning of Everything” season 1: “Playing House” (Eric Moynier)
