Nicholas de Pencier

Nicholas de Pencier is a Canadian cinematographer and filmmaker. The spouse and professional partner of filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal in Mercury Films, he is the cinematographer and producer on most of her films as well as codirector of the films Long Time Running. and Anthropocene: The Human Epoch. He was also solo director of the 2016 documentary Black Code.

He won a Genie Award in 2007, alongside Baichwal, Gerry Flahive, Daniel Iron and Peter Starr for Manufactured Landscapes and a Canadian Screen Award in 2011 alongside Baichwal, Iron and Edward Burtynsky for Watermark, and was an Emmy Award nominee for Outstanding Nature Programming in 2010 for "The Incredible Journey of the Butterflies", an episode of Nova.

In 2025, de Pencier and Baichwal worked with the indie rock band Rheostatics to create a multimedia video presentation for the band's concerts to promote their new album The Great Lakes Suite.

Personal life He is the son of magazine publisher Michael de Pencier, and the brother of film and television producer Miranda de Pencier.

Filmography

Let It Come Down: The Life of Paul Bowles (1998) - cinematographer, producer The Uncles (2000) - producer The Holier It Gets (2000) - cinematographer, producer The True Meaning of Pictures: Shelby Lee Adams' Appalachia (2002) - cinematographer, producer Manufactured Landscapes (2006) - cinematographer, producer One Week (2008) - producer Act of God (2009) - cinematographer, producer Payback (2012) - cinematographer The End of Time (2012) - cinematographer Watermark (2013) - producer, cinematographer The Ghosts in Our Machine (2013) - cinematographer Al Purdy Was Here (2015) - cinematographer Black Code (2016) - director, producer Long Time Running (2017) - director, editor Anthropocene: The Human Epoch (2018) - director, producer, cinematographer Into the Weeds (2022) - producer, cinematographer The Colour of Ink (2022) - cinematographer An Optimist's Guide to the Planet (2024) - executive producer