The BEST episodes of Every Frame a Painting
Every episode of Every Frame a Painting ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Every Frame a Painting!
An online series of video essays about film form.
#1 - The Marvel Symphonic Universe
Season 2016 - Episode 3 - Aired 9/12/2016
Off the top of your head, could you sing the theme from Star Wars? How about James Bond? Or Harry Potter? But here’s the kicker: can you sing any theme from a Marvel film? Despite 13 films and 10 billion dollars at the box office, the Marvel Cinematic Universe lacks a distinctive musical identity or approach. So let’s try to answer the question: what is missing from Marvel music?
#2 - Lynn Ramsay - The Poetry of Details
Season 2015 - Episode 5 - Aired 5/7/2015
What can one detail tell us about a scene? If you’re Lynne Ramsay: absolutely everything. Today I consider the poetic possibilities of cinema and one of our finest contemporary filmmakers.
Watch Now:Amazon
#3 - In Praise of Chairs
Season 2015 - Episode 6 - Aired 5/29/2015
One of the great things about detailed production design is that it pays off in unexpected ways. So today I explore the weird possibilities of that most common of objects: the chair.
Watch Now:Amazon
#4 - Chuck Jones - The Evolution of an Artist
Season 2015 - Episode 7 - Aired 7/16/2015
If you grew up watching Looney Tunes, then you know Chuck Jones, one of all-time masters of visual comedy. Normally I would talk about his ingenious framing and timing, but not today. Instead, I’d like to explore the evolution of his sensibilities as an artist.
Watch Now:Amazon
#5 - Vancouver Never Plays Itself
Season 2015 - Episode 8 - Aired 9/9/2015
Perhaps no other city has been as thoroughly hidden from modern filmmaking as Vancouver, my hometown. Today, it’s the third biggest film production city in North America, behind Los Angeles and New York. And yet for all the movies and TV shows that are shot there, we hardly ever see the city itself. So today, let’s focus less on the movies and more on the city in the background.
#6 - Buster Keaton - The Art of the Gag
Season 2015 - Episode 9 - Aired 11/21/2015
Before Edgar Wright and Wes Anderson, before Chuck Jones and Jackie Chan, there was Buster Keaton, one of the founding fathers of visual comedy. And nearly 100 years after he first appeared onscreen, we’re still learning from him. Today, i’d like to talk about the artistry (and the thinking) behind his gags.
Watch Now:Amazon
#7 - Memories of Murder (2003) - Ensemble Staging
Season 2015 - Episode 10 - Aired 12/30/2015
How do you emphasize to the audience that something is important? Well, you could always cut to a close-up, but how about something subtler? Today I consider ensemble staging — a style of filmmaking that directs the audience exactly where to look, without ever seeming to do so at all. NO SPOILERS. Eight Ways to Get the Audience to Look at a Character: 1) Let Them Speak 2) Make Them Brighter or Bring Them Closer 3) Let Them Move (Especially Hands or Eyes) 4) Put Them in the Center of Frame 5) Turn Them Towards the Lens 6) Separate Them from the Group 7) Isolate Them by Moving the Camera 8) Have Other People Look at Them
Watch Now:Amazon
#8 - Joel & Ethan Coen - Shot | Reverse Shot
Season 2016 - Episode 1 - Aired 2/25/2016
How do you film a conversation? Most likely, you’re going to block the actors, set up the camera, and do shot/reverse shot. But where do you put the camera? What lens do you use? And how do you cut back and forth? Today, I consider the Coen brothers — Joel & Ethan — and see how these choices lend a particular feel to their version of shot/reverse shot.
Watch Now:Amazon
#9 - How Does an Editor Think and Feel?
Season 2016 - Episode 2 - Aired 5/12/2016
For the past ten years, I’ve been editing professionally. Yet one question always stumps me: “How do you know when to cut?” And I can only answer that it’s very instinctual. On some level, I’m just thinking and feeling my way through the edit. So today, I’d like to describe that process: how does an editor think and feel?
#10 - F For Fake (1973) - How to Structure a Video Essay
Season 2015 - Episode 4 - Aired 3/31/2015
If you want to make video essays, there’s no better film to study than Orson Welles’ 1973 masterpiece, F for Fake. There are a million lessons to take away from it, but today, let’s see what it has to teach us about structure. NO SPOILERS.
Watch Now:Amazon#11 - The Sustained Two-Shot
Season 2024 - Episode 1 - Aired 8/26/2024
What do you do when you’ve got two actors, a bunch of dialogue, and only enough time to get one camera angle? Consider one of the oldest tools in the filmmaking toolbox: the sustained two-shot.
#12 - What Would Billy Wilder Do?
Season 2024 - Episode 2 - Aired 10/7/2024
In the annals of filmmaking, we have great writers and great directors, but then there is Billy Wilder – one of the greatest who did both.
#13 - Where Do You Put the Camera?
Season 2025 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/13/2025
If there’s one question that every filmmaker asks themselves, it’s “Where do I put the camera?” Today, we consider the things that really matter when answering that question.
#14 - Every Frame x Lackadaisy - Interview with Tracy J. Butler & Fable Siegel
Season 2025 - Episode 2 - Aired 11/14/2025
A few weeks ago, we were invited onto a livestream to interview Tracy J. Butler & Fable Siegel of Lackadaisy. (https://www.youtube.com/@LackadaisyComic) For those who don’t know, Lackadaisy is an indie comic that became an indie animated series. It’s about a group of cats who run a speakeasy in St. Louis during Prohibition. We thoroughly enjoyed the experience and want to share the results. This conversation was put together with the support of Eat Your Peas (https://www.youtube.com/@EatYourPeas_Acc) an animation coaching collective run by Lindsay Knowler. Our conversation with the Lackadaisy team focused on three major topics. The first - a guide through the opening sequence of the pilot, available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vffu6FG4YP4 The second - what it was like for them to run an indie animation studio remotely. And the third - the current state of the animation industry itself. So come join us by the fire and enjoy!
#15 - The Visual Comedy of ISLE OF DOGS
Season 2026 - Episode 3 - Aired 5/2/2026
A video essay by Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou, the duo behind EVERY FRAME A PAINTING, exploring how Wes Anderson’s career-long experiments with visual humor reach new heights in his 2018 animated film, ISLE OF DOGS.
#16 - NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD: Limitations into Virtues
Season 2026 - Episode 1 - Aired 2/19/2026
The duo behind EVERY FRAME A PAINTING, Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou, analyze how–with a small crew banded together under the production company Image Ten–George Romero used a tight $100,000 budget to create the radical cinematic style of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968), one of the most haunting and influential films ever made.
#17 - THE BLADE (1995): The Edges of Wuxia
Season 2026 - Episode 2 - Aired 4/11/2026
Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou, the filmmakers behind EVERY FRAME A PAINTING, reveal how Tsui Hark radically reimagines the wuxia genre in THE BLADE (1995), a visceral tour de force of a martial-arts movie.
#18 - Ozu in Color
Season 2026 - Episode 4 - Aired 5/5/2026
The creators Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos are the duo behind the celebrated YouTube channel “Every Frame a Painting”, a collection of visual essays on matters of movies. With Tony narrating, the duo reveal new insight and a richer appreciation of Ozu’s use of color in his films.
#19 - Robin Williams - In Motion
Season 2014 - Episode 10 - Aired 9/9/2014
Robin Williams was a genius, but he was also a dedicated craftsman who explored how an actor could express character through movement. Join me in honoring this tiny facet of his work.
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#20 - The Imposter (2012) - Looking into the Lens
Season 2014 - Episode 2 - Aired 4/25/2014
A brief analysis of Bart Layton's The Imposter (2012). WARNING: SPOILS EVERY GODDAMN THING.
#21 - The Spielberg Oner - One Scene, One Shot
Season 2014 - Episode 3 - Aired 5/6/2014
One overlooked aspect of Spielberg is that he's actually a stealth master of the long take. From Duel to Tintin, for forty years, he has sneakily filmed many scenes in a single continuous shot.
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#22 - Wolf Children (2012) - The Lateral Tracking Shot
Season 2014 - Episode 4 - Aired 5/16/2014
Looking for a unique lateral tracking shot? Consider this example from Mamoru Hosoda's excellent film Wolf Children (2012). NO SPOILERS.
Watch Now:Amazon
#23 - Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy
Season 2014 - Episode 5 - Aired 5/26/2014
If you love visual comedy, you gotta love Edgar Wright, one of the few filmmakers who is consistently finding humor through framing, camera movement, editing, goofy sound effects and music. This is an analysis and appreciation of one of our finest comedic voices.
Watch Now:Amazon
#24 - Martin Scorsese - The Art of Silence
Season 2014 - Episode 6 - Aired 6/14/2014
Even though Martin Scorsese is famous for his use of music, one of his best traits is his deliberate and powerful use of silence. Take a glimpse at fifty years of this simple technique from one of cinema's masters. SPOILERS for Shutter Island (2010), Superman (1978) and Man of Steel (2013)
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#25 - Michael Bay - What is Bayhem?
Season 2014 - Episode 7 - Aired 7/3/2014
There are filmmakers we love and then there's Michael Bay. Even if you dislike him (as I do), Bay has something valuable to teach us about visual perception. This is an exploration of "Bayhem" — his style of camera movement, composition and editing that creates something overblown, dynamic and distinct.
Watch Now:Amazon