Autumn Durald Arkapaw

Arkapaw was born Autumn Cheyenne Durald in Oxnard, California,^[2] grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and is of Filipino descent on her mother's side and Black Creole on her father's side.^[3][4] The Filipino side of her family is Catholic.^[5] She has described her maternal grandfather, Guillermo Pagan Bautista of Pampanga, who was a resistance fighter during the Japanese occupation of the Philippines and a survivor of the Bataan Death March, "the most important man in my life" and "one of the biggest influences on my childhood and my family".^[3] She has a tattoo of her grandfather’s initials, in Baybayin script, on her wrist.^[3]

Arkapaw graduated from San Ramon Valley High School in Danville, California in 1997.^{[6][unreliable source?]} She graduated in 2002 from Loyola Marymount University where she studied art history.^[7] She graduated from the AFI Conservatory's cinematography program in 2009.^[8]

After graduating from college, Arkapaw worked in advertising and later as a camera assistant on films.^[7] In 2019, she was invited to join the Cinematographers Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.^[9] In 2022, she became a member of the American Society of Cinematographers.^[10]

Arkapaw shot the 2025 film Sinners on 65 mm film using a combination of IMAX 15-perf and Ultra Panavision 70 cameras,^[11][12] which made her the first female director of photography to shoot any movie on large format IMAX film.^[13][14] For her work on Sinners, she became the first woman of color (Arkapaw is of Filipino and Black Creole descent) to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Cinematography.^[15] She won the award at the 98th Academy Awards, becoming the first female cinematographer, first black person, and first Filipino, to win in the category.^[16][17][18]

Arkapaw married Australian cinematographer Adam Arkapaw in 2015.^[19] They have one child.^[20]