Biography
Ulf Behrens was born in Wolfsburg in 1973. Between 1992 and 1994, he studied sociology and later philosophy in Darmstadt. From 1994 to 1996, he trained as an assistant DoP at IPM Film- und Fernsehproduktion, and subsequently enrolled at the "Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg" (Hamburg School of Fine Arts), where he studied visual communication. From 1997 on, he worked freelance as an assistant DoP on several film and TV productions and also as a cameraman for MTV. In 1998, he entered the "Kunsthochschule für Medien" in Cologne, where director Wolfgang Becker was one of his teachers. He graduated in 2003 with a degree in film and television and the feature-length film "Exploding Ego", which got him a nomination for a First Steps Award.
During the following years, he worked as DoP on several shorts and commercials, including campaigns for Nike and Porsche. He also photographed the short documentary "Was übrig bleibt", which went on to win several international awards, and the feature-length documentary "Rosia Montana – Ein Dorf am Abgrund" which was directed by Fabian Daub.
In 2009, Ulf Behrens and Timo Jacobs started working as co-directors on their underground comedy "Klappe Cowboy". The film about an aspiring filmmaker who is looking for his big break in Berlin premiered at the 2012 Max Ophüls Preis film festival and was released in Germany in the Summer of the same year.