David Antoni Hands is a cinematographer, producer-director, and educator whose career spans more than three decades and four continents. Combining the technical and artistic knowledge and experience, he has built a body of work that moves between long-form documentary, short fiction, and more recently to social media content, while also working as a university lecturer and international trainer.
David began his professional life in Cyprus in the late 1980s, as a photographer and darkroom technical before establishing his own studio specialising in advertising, architecture, and fashion work. During this period he started experimenting with the moving image and worked as a Director of Photography on mainly TV commercials.
In the early 1990s, David moved into news and documentaries, working as a cameraman and editor in some of the most demanding environments in the world. He covered conflict zones in the former Yugoslavia and Lebanon for ABC News and ITN, then served as Bureau Chief for Vanguard Television News in Nairobi, where he managed daily operations and covered East and Central Africa for a roster of major broadcasters including the BBC, ZDF, ARD, CBC Canada, and ABC News. He moved to the Jerusalem Bureau of RTL4 Holland and RTL Germany from 1999 to 2003, where he documented regional events, among them the Second Intifada, the Kosovo War, the IsraelPalestine peace talks, and the Iraq War.
In 2005, he moved back to him hometown of Nicosia and co-founded Crewhouse Media. He has managed long-term service agreements with United Nations bodies, including UNFICYP (2018 to 2027) and UNDP-ACT (2009 to 2013), and continues to collaborate with broadcasters such as the BBC, ARD, Bloomberg, and AP across Europe, Africa, and South America.
In 2012 he was awarded a Master of Arts with Distinction in Film and Television Production from Anglia Ruskin University (Cambridge School of Art, 2012), and has been a lecturer at the University of Nicosia since 2017, teaching documentary production, online television, and video production. A Certified Trainer of the Human Resource Development Authority of Cyprus, he has led workshops and training programmes worldwide for the Thomson Foundation, UNHCR, ICMPD, and the Media Diversity Institute, working with journalists, refugees, and students in settings from Tunisia and Ukraine to China and the United Kingdom. His teaching touch on issues of ethics, media diversity, and storytelling in divided and post-conflict communities, themes central to his MA dissertation on bi-communal filmmaking.
David has contributed to the wider film culture as President of the International Children's Film Festival of Cyprus (2018 to 2024) and as Artistic Director of the Children's and Youth Section of Cyprus Film Days. He has served on international juries in Cyprus, Canada, India, and for the United Nations IOM Global Migration Film Festival. He was the founding editor of TVCameramen.com and he has authored over 300 articles and is a featured filmmaker in the Focal Press volume Roll! Shooting TV News. His is also a founding member of the Mediterranean Turtle Research and Conservation Society and the Cyprus Wildlife Society, for whom he continues to provide communications expertise.
