We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Bixuan Zhang a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Bixuan, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Are you happier as a creative? Do you sometimes think about what it would be like to just have a regular job? Can you talk to us about how you think through these emotions?

Being a creative is when I feel most alive.

Some people think creatives are all about self-expression, detached from the real world. But filmmaking, in particular, is the exact opposite—it thrives on human connection. It’s not just about personal expression; it’s about giving voice to emotions others struggle to articulate and bringing to life ideas that might otherwise never exist.

A few days ago, I worked as the DP on a short film, Death’s A Drag, a dark comedy about a group of drag queens. Before this project, I knew next to nothing about drag culture. But as we prepped and shot the film, I found myself stepping into their world—seeing their daily routines, hearing their stories. I watched them backstage, carefully adjusting their wigs, perfecting their makeup, then transforming on stage with incredible confidence and charisma. That boldness, that humor, that over-the-top self-expression—it once felt so distant to me. But day by day, I started to understand their struggles, their joys, their ambitions, and beneath all of that, the same kind of vulnerability we all share. This constant expansion of my perspective is one of the things I love most about creating—it makes me more open, more understanding of people.

But creativity isn’t just about exploring the world; it’s also a mirror that forces me to examine myself. A camera never lies. Even the slightest hesitation, the smallest insincerity—it all gets caught on screen. It pushes me to stay sharp, to be honest with myself, and to be honest with the world. If there’s one thing this path has taught me, it’s the value of truth and integrity.

Strangely enough, I’ve never seriously considered what it would be like to have a “regular” job.

Sure, filmmaking isn’t easy. Long hours on set, late nights packing gear, tight budgets… Those 3 a.m. wrap-ups or the mornings when you’re dragging yourself out of bed before sunrise, someone jokes, “Dude, why don’t we just work a 9-to-5 and call it a day?” But every time I hear that, I just smile—because honestly, I’ve never even entertained the thought.

Every time I step onto set, watching the light hit the scene just right, hearing the camera roll, seeing an actor fully inhabit a character—I know. There’s nothing else that makes me feel more alive.

This is what I want to do. That’s all there is to it.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m Bixuan, a filmmaker developing my craft as both a writer-director and a DP.

As a kid, I was a total bookworm—so much so that I practically lived in the free reading sections of bookstores during summer breaks. One of the first books that really stuck with me was Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, which I read when I was five. I’d get lost in its surreal imagery, constantly picturing those fantastical scenes in my head. Naturally, I wanted to be a writer. By middle school, I was writing fiction and even getting published in local magazines—something I was incredibly proud of at the time.

When I was sixteen, I joined a summer program in the U.S., traveling to New York, Boston, and finally, Los Angeles. That last night in LA is still vivid in my memory. The heat of the day had faded, leaving the night crisp and cool. My friends and I sat on a bench, waiting for the sunrise, talking about what we wanted to do in the future. It’s the kind of conversation that feels huge when you’re a teenager—like you’re deciding who you’re going to become. Staring at the distant ridge, lost in thought, I said, “I want to be a filmmaker.”

I don’t remember exactly why I said it. Maybe it was because I had spent that summer rewatching Kubrick’s Lolita over and over. Maybe it was just being in LA, the city of film. But that answer felt like something delivered to me—less of a decision, more of a calling.

When I got back to China, I told my parents, and from that moment on, I started preparing. In China, students pursuing film must take a specialized arts exam before the national college entrance exam, so I began my formal training.

At first, I thought I’d stick to screenwriting. I had a solid literary foundation and a strong instinct for storytelling. But directing? That felt completely foreign—cameras, lighting, monitors, orchestrating an entire set. But as I progressed, I realized writing alone wasn’t enough. I knew exactly how everything should look and feel, down to the smallest detail, and I wanted to be the one making those decisions.

So, during the summer of my sophomore year, I reached out to some old high school friends and shot my first short film. It was rough, messy, far from perfect—but it was a film. And that was enough to push me forward—to make another, then another. By the time I applied for graduate school, I had fully committed to directing.

Becoming a DP, though? That was unexpected.

In undergrad, I shot a few documentaries and indie projects, but I never saw myself as a cinematographer. It’s a field still largely dominated by men, and honestly, I wasn’t sure if I had a place in it.

That changed when I met one of my professors in grad school. He saw potential in me before I saw it in myself. He encouraged me, pushed me, and introduced me to other students who needed a DP. And that’s how, last May, I shot my first real project—Last Night, directed by my friend Xinran.

As two women on set, we gave each other unwavering trust and support. The shoot was unforgettable. Atlanta was just stepping into summer—everything felt alive. I remember our last shot: a Ferris wheel against the setting sun. We caught the frame we wanted at the very last second, wrapping completely exhausted but elated.

The best part of being a DP is helping a director bring their vision to life. That moment when they check the monitor, see the shot, and you just know they’re happy—that’s what makes it worth it. Filmmaking is a collaborative art, and the bond built through that shared creation is something I find deeply fulfilling.

What’s been especially inspiring is the response I’ve gotten from the people around me. Since stepping into cinematography, I’ve had so many women look at me, nod, and say, “Good. We need more female DPs.”

And I couldn’t agree more.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

During undergrad, I found my creative focus—mother-daughter relationships. My connection with my mother is both incredibly close and deeply complicated. She has been my greatest supporter, backing my creative journey more than anyone else. She’s my most loyal audience, my friend, my champion.

But growing up, her parenting was far from ideal. She lacked the patience, gentleness, and understanding that children often need. For a time, we hurt each other like adversaries—yet, somehow, we always found our way back to forgiveness. Through her, I saw the systemic violence embedded in our society: the crushing pressures women face in the workplace, in marriage, in motherhood—burdens that inevitably pass down to the next generation. Daughters inherit their mothers’ wounds, yet they are also each other’s only refuge. It’s an unspoken but universal truth among women.

So, on my 23rd birthday, I shot Sleep All Day, a short film about a high school girl struggling with depression, spending most of her days asleep, and her single mother, who watches helplessly, unsure of how to reach her. After cycles of frustration and conflict, the mother eventually stops trying to “fix” her daughter. Instead, she lies down beside her—just as she did when her daughter was a baby—choosing to be with her in this long, nightmarish emotional darkness.

I approached the story with a Southern Gothic aesthetic and an unsettling, eerie score to capture the unease and torment that define their relationship. It was a bold experiment, and when I finally screened it, the response was overwhelming. People told me it reminded them of their own mothers. But the most unexpected reaction came from my own mother. After watching it, she turned to me and said, “It’s like looking at my younger self.” That was when I knew I was on the right path.

I continued exploring this theme in Crybaby, which follows a girl escaping an abusive home and working at a rundown motel, where she encounters two figures: a young girl suffering the same abuse she once endured and a female meditation instructor trying to help. This time, I leaned even further into genre storytelling, using thriller elements and surreal imagery to depict the invisible nature of psychological abuse and its devastating impact.

Many male directors have explored twisted mother-daughter relationships, but I believe female directors bring something inherently different to these stories. We navigate the subtleties of emotional struggle, the quiet, suffocating weight of these relationships—not just the external violence, but the deep-seated wounds that are often overlooked or turned into spectacle.

This is what drives me: to tell these hidden stories, to explore the quiet, raw, and often painful dynamics between women—not just as victims, but as each other’s only sanctuary.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

My favorite director, Michael Haneke, once said that he always works the same way: write a storyboard, a very precise storyboard, and stick to it. The only time he ever improvised on set, he ended up cutting that shot in post. I completely agreed with him.

I’ve always been the kind of filmmaker who needs a meticulously planned shotlist. Every angle, every lens, every prop—I map it all out in pre-production. I never trusted improvisation. To me, it wasn’t some magical spark of inspiration born from the perfect convergence of time and place—it was a disaster, a sign of poor preparation rather than creative genius.

But a few months ago, that mindset completely changed.

It happened during the second-to-last shot of Crybaby—a crucial one. During location scouting, my DP and I had planned to shoot an extreme wide shot of the motel, framing it like a miniature model, a labyrinth where the actress would move through its hallway, reinforcing the sense of mystery and entrapment.

But on the day of the shoot, we discovered a problem: the hallway lights couldn’t be turned off. They were controlled by the local fire department, and even the motel manager had no access to the switch.

For a moment, I froze. Our entire lighting setup was now impossible to execute. Keeping the lights on would completely ruin the shot. My mind went blank for a solid five minutes. Desperate to buy time, I told the team we’d push the shot to the last day of filming, hoping we’d find a solution by then.

Then, something unexpected happened.

That night, DP and I were taking a break on the motel’s stairwell, casually chatting about the problem. As we leaned against the railing, we both instinctively looked down. A few seconds of silence passed. Then we turned to each other—at the exact same moment—the same idea had hit us.

What if we shot from above, using a bird’s-eye view?

We could frame the stairwell as a geometric maze, letting the actress run from off-screen into the stairwell and disappear out of frame. It would evoke the same claustrophobic, labyrinth-like atmosphere we had originally envisioned—without the hallway lights ruining the shot.

It was a perfect, last-minute save—and the shot turned out even better than our original plan.

That moment completely changed my view on improvisation.

Improvisation isn’t about showing up unprepared and making impulsive decisions on set. It’s about having a strong foundation—being so well-prepared that when an unexpected challenge arises, you have the mental clarity to adapt. It’s about being ready, but also being open.

If I had stayed trapped in my own frustration and anxiety that night, the idea never would have come to me.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://vimeo.com/user211616597
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ivy_xuanxuana?igsh=MnF5eHV3eDQxczBm&utm_source=qr
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bixuan-zhang-584870347/

Image Credits

Images from a film project directed, shot, and edited by Bixuan in collaboration with talented creative teams