Descendant Films, LLC has announced that Vedant Dave will serve as Director of Photography for the upcoming premium television series Rivals to Lovers. Directed by Erik Lu and produced by Karpit Patel, the series is slated to enter production in early 2027. This announcement is significant because the project is positioned to redefine visual and emotional storytelling in serialized formats, with a dual-format production strategy designed for both traditional global streamers and mobile-first vertical platforms.
The series follows Ananya, a bold entrepreneur in the tech-fashion world, and Daniel, a charismatic but ruthless CEO of a competing startup. Their intense professional rivalry evolves into an equally charged emotional relationship, exploring themes of ambition, betrayal, and the blurry line between competition and connection. What sets Rivals to Lovers apart is its innovative dual-format production strategy, capturing content in both horizontal (16:9) and vertical (9:16) formats simultaneously. This approach maximizes global and cross-platform reach, targeting traditional platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Disney+, as well as mobile-first platforms dominating Asian markets such as Tencent, iQIYI, and Youku.
As Director of Photography, Vedant Dave will lead the visual development of the series, uniting cinematic storytelling with technical precision. His responsibilities include defining the show's visual identity across both capture formats, ensuring aesthetic consistency and emotional resonance regardless of screen orientation. Working with multi-camera setups including the ARRI Alexa 35 for cinematic visuals and the Sony FX3 for mobile-oriented framing, Dave will craft an immersive world balancing sleek corporate precision with intimate, character-driven vulnerability.
According to Director Erik Lu, This series is built around contrast—between love and rivalry, intimacy and ambition, big-screen spectacle and mobile immediacy. Vedant's mastery of light and visual tone makes him the ideal collaborator. His ability to create worlds that are both cinematic and emotionally accessible ensures that Rivals to Lovers will resonate with audiences everywhere.
Filming will take place in iconic Los Angeles and San Francisco locations, with Dave supervising lighting design, lens aesthetics, and camera movement. His approach emphasizes modern color palettes, reflective surfaces, and evolving visual motifs that mirror the power struggles and emotional arcs of the protagonists.
Post-production will include parallel editing workflows to shape both horizontal and vertical versions concurrently, a process supervised closely by Dave to preserve performance nuance and visual coherence across formats. With sleek corporate hues, naturalistic lighting, and emotionally tuned framing, Dave's photographic direction will serve as the visual backbone of the series. Production runs from January 16, 2027, through January 23, 2028, with post-production concluding in early 2028. The series is positioned as a flagship cross-market production, built to engage both Western premium streaming audiences and the rapidly expanding Asian serialized drama landscape.
Erik Lu, director and head of Descendant Films, LLC, continues to push boundaries in cinematic storytelling for global markets. More information about Lu and his work can be found on his website and IMDb page. With Vedant Dave's leadership in cinematography, Rivals to Lovers aims not only to tell a compelling story of love born from rivalry but also to set a new industry standard for multi-format global storytelling.
