Alex Pritz
Director
Cinematography Day (Nov. 12)
A deep dive into various aspects of cinematography including case studies from noted DP’s.
Cinematography Day is co-presented by:
In the NBC News Studios Lounge, the day starts with Breakfast (9-10 AM) and ends with a Happy Hour (4:30-5:30 PM) co-presented by Fever Content.
10am – 11:15am
Case Study: The Territory
The Territory is an intimate look into the ongoing fight between the indigenous Uru-eu-wau-wau people of the Brazilian Amazon and encroaching deforestation brought about by farmers and illegal settlers. Join moderator and producer Liz Nord (formerly of Sundance and No Film School), director Alex Pritz and producer Gabriel Uchida as they discuss the award-winning cinematography featured in the documentary film. Special aspects of the filmmaking process will also be shared: trust building with powerful yet vulnerable people and shaping your film into a true collaboration with the participants.
Alex Pritz
Director
Alex Pritz is a documentary filmmaker focused on human’s relationship with the natural world. Recently, Alex directed The Territory, which premiered in the World Cinema competition at Sundance 2022 where it won both the Audience Award and a Special Jury Award for Documentary Craft. IndieWire described the film as, “Gorgeously and sometimes ingeniously conceived, painting an intimate first-hand portrait of joy, pain, and community.” The Territory is being distributed by National Geographic Documentary Films. Alex also worked as a cinematographer on the feature documentary The First Wave (dir. Matt Heineman), as a cinematographer and field producer on Jon Kasbe’s feature documentary, When Lambs Become Lions (Tribeca 2018), and as co-director, cinematographer, and editor on the documentary short, My Dear Kyrgyzstan (Atlanta 2019).
Gabriel Uchida
Producer (The Territory)
Gabriel Uchida
Producer (The Territory)
Gabriel Uchida is a Brazilian photographer and journalist based in the Amazon and producer of feature documentary film The Territory.
Liz Nord
NYU Production Lab
Liz Nord
NYU Production Lab
Liz Nord is an Emmy-winning producer and documentary filmmaker who has created and shown work across the globe. She is Head of Programs and Creative Development at the NYU Production Lab, where she runs the Feature Film Development Studio. She recently served as Director of Content at Sundance, where she helped develop Sundance Collab into the premiere global learning destination for emerging filmmakers. Previously, she served as the Editor-in-Chief and Lead Producer at No Film School. Liz is also an advisor for several artist development programs including Latino Public Broadcasting’s Emerging Filmmaker Fellowship and the Jewish Writers’ Initiative. She has presented extensively on creative practice and the film and TV industry, notably at TEDx and SXSW.
11:30am – 12:45pm
In Search of the Poetic Image: Creative Choices in Documentary
Learn about the creative process of non fiction filmmaking from four extraordinary directors that created very distinct affective and poetic worlds within the confines of their formal aesthetic decisions. How to convey beauty, innocence, abstraction, a spiritual connection, the essence of violence, or the creation of music? Join DOC NYC 2022 filmmakers Diana Bustamante (Nuestra Pelicula), Tania Ximena (White Night) and James Carson (Cabin Music) in a conversation led by DOC NYC senior programmer Ruth Somalo about how to capture or locate the right images to crystallize the intangible.
James Carson
Director (Cabin Music)
James Carson
Director (Cabin Music)
Pianist and filmmaker James Carson has developed a new form of music and for the last eleven years has been producing and directing Cabin Music, a documentary feature film having its world premiere at DOC NYC 2022. While attending the New England Conservatory in Boston, studies with Joe Maneri, Cecil Taylor, and the poet Robert Creeley led James to walk away from music and backpack and farm overland from Spain to Japan. On his return to Northern Alberta, Canada, he then spent five years designing, building, and practicing in a remote strawbale cabin. The musical result was multilayered, detailed, meditative, and harmonious. Cabin Music is his first film.
Tania Ximena
Director (White Night)
Tania Ximena
Director (White Night)
Tania Ximena was born in 1985 in Cd. Sahagun, Mexico. She is a visual artist and filmmaker who graduated in Visual Arts from ENPEG La Esmeralda. Her video work has been presented in museums around the world and received multiple awards. Since 2011, her works have been oriented towards the sensory study of volcanic landscapes. She has also participated in the Flaherty program of the Ambulante Documentary Festival. She has been part of individual and group exhibitions both in Mexico and abroad. Currently, she is living on the slopes of the Iztaccihuatl and Popocatepetl volcanoes and finishing her second feature film.
Diana Bustamante Escobar
Director (Nuestra Película)
Diana Bustamante Escobar
Director (Nuestra Película)
Diana Bustamente Escobar is a filmmaker and programmer that studied cinema and fine arts at the National University of Colombia. As a producer, she is known for supporting authors with or without experience whose vision and voices explore new perspectives. She has produced films like Ciro Guerra’s Journey of the Wind and La Tierra y La Sombra by Cesar Acevedo. She also produced the film Memory by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Cannes 2021 Official Competition, Jury Prize. In 2020, she received the creative grant from the Ministry of Culture to create a documentary piece based on archives, with the project “El Leon”. Nuestra Película is her first feature documentary, supported by the Colombian Film fund and the Cinema Fund from Aquitane Region in France.
Ruth Somalo
Senior Programmer, Features
Ruth Somalo
Senior Programmer, Features
Ruth is a Spanish programmer, curator and filmmaker. She has worked with DOC NYC for twelve years, programs for the Architecture and Design Film Festival and often curates independent nonfiction programs like “Holy Fluids” (UnionDocs), “Broken Senses” (Anthology Film Archives) and “The Limit Of Our Gaze” (KJCC). Ruth has programmed for International Festivals like DocumentaMadrid, was the co-director of Impugning Impunity Human Rights Film Festival and serves as President of The Flaherty Board of Trustees.
1:45 – 3:00pm
Getting the Shot
National Geographic’s reputation for non-fiction filmmaking is unparalleled. In a conversation moderated by veteran producer Jane Root (Limitless), join cinematographers Michael Cheeseman (Life Below Zero), Jim Jolliffe (Limitless), Tim Grucza (Retrograde), Kimberly Jeffries (Planet Sharks) and Janet Han Vissering (National Geographic) who will share stories on how they got THE shot and discuss their filmmaking tools and techniques. Become immersed in their worlds, learn how they face cinematic challenges and gain insights that will elevate your filmmaking, and hear how Nat Geo is working to expand representation in the field with their Field Ready program.
Jane Root
Founder and Chief Executive, Nutopia
Jane Root
Founder and Chief Executive, Nutopia
In 2008, Jane Root founded Nutopia. Known for award-winning documentary series on a global scale, Nutopia created a new genre of television, the “mega-doc,” which combines epic cinematography and action-driven drama with A-list talent.
Nutopia has become synonymous with high-quality content for a diverse group of broadcast and streaming platforms, including Netflix, Disney+, CNN, National Geographic, BBC, PBS, HBO Max and A+E Networks. Prior to founding Nutopia, Root was president of Discovery Networks and controller of BBC2, where she commissioned shows such as “The Office” and “Shark Tank”. Root was a co-founder of Wall-to-Wall Television, where she guided the company through its first 10 years.
Upcoming projects include LIMITLESS with Chris Hemsworth and WELCOME TO EARTH with Will Smith for Disney+. Nutopia has also produced National Geographic series ONE STRANGE ROCK, A WORLD OF CALM for HBOMax, THE LAST CZARS for Netflix, and Emmy® Award-winning series HOW WE GOT TO NOW and AMERICA: THE STORY OF US for PBS.
Janet Han Vissering
SVP of Development & Production, National Geographic
Janet Han Vissering
SVP of Development & Production, National Geographic
As SVP of development and production at National Geographic, Janet Han Vissering oversees the natural history slate and animal content across the channel and Nat Geo on Disney+. She is responsible for hundreds of hours of programming commissioned each year across platforms worldwide, including the Emmy-Award winning Secrets of the Whales.
Vissering manages the development teams, working with the world’s leading independent producers, distributors, creative agencies and strategic broadcast partners.
Michael Cheeseman
Director of Photography (Life Below Zero)
Michael Cheeseman
Director of Photography (Life Below Zero)
Born and raised in the Blue Ridge Mountains of West Virginia, I fell in love with cameras and filming early on. I found the passion through the action sport of skateboarding. I loved the deconstructed aspect of finding the perfect angle to tell the best story. While attending Shepherd University I started my first production business. I filmed, produced and edited my own skateboarding content and sold DVD’s to local shops in the surrounding towns. Gaining enough money from that business I quickly moved to Los Angeles to start my career. Now after 17 years working on dozens of television shows and 10 years working with Life Below Zero and the 3 spin off shows, I still have that same passion I did while filming skateboarding. At 36 years old and 6 Emmy’s later I am still pushing my own boundaries to make the best show(s) I can.
Kimberly Jeffries
Director of Photography
Kimberly Jeffries
Director of Photography
Kimberly Jeffries, a Hawaii-based cinematographer and technical dive instructor, specializes in underwater cinematography with a focus on charismatic megafauna. Her recent credits include Emmy award-winning productions like Chasing Coral, World’s Biggest Great Whites, and Amazing Animal Adventures, where she tells compelling stories about our connection to nature.
Jim Jolliffe
Director of Photography (Limitless)
Jim Jolliffe
Director of Photography (Limitless)
Jim Jolliffe started his career in film working his way through the ranks of the camera department, working on films and TV commercials. After learning composition and storytelling from many years as a Camera Operator he progressed to become a Cinematographer.
Jim quickly established his own look shooting hundreds of TV commercials. His cinematic documentary style earned him many accolades and awards in the world of TV commercials. His work has taken him all around the world, from shooting with the eagle hunters of the Altai mountains in Mongolia, to living with a Masai Mara tribe in northern Tanzania, to learning artic survival skills from the Sami tribes people of northern Lapland.
Recently Jim has moved away from TV commercials into more long form work, recently shooting the finale episode of ‘Limitless’ starring Chris Hemsworth and Executive Produced by Darren Aronofsky.
3:15pm – 4:30pm
Case Study: All That Breathes
Directed by Shaunak Sen, All That Breathes follows two brothers who run a bird hospital dedicated to rescuing injured black kites, an at-risk bird of prey essential to the ecosystem of New Delhi, India. Grace Remington (Story Syndicate) guides the conversation with director Sen and cinematographer Ben Bernhard as they talk about the poetic photography that defines the relationship between the birds and the brothers, and the challenge of working with three cinematographers who together create a singular visual language in this film.
Grace Remington
Freelance director and producer
Grace Remington
Freelance director and producer
Grace Remington is a producer and director who has worked in documentary film and television in the United States, Mexico, and Peru. Her work has screened at the Sundance Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, and HotDocs, among others, and has broadcast on POV, Netflix, and National Geographic.
Shaunak Sen
Director (All That Breathes)
Shaunak Sen
Director (All That Breathes)
Shaunak Sen is a filmmaker and film scholar based in New Delhi, India. Cities of Sleep (2016), his first feature-length documentary, was shown at various major international film festivals (including DOK Leipzig, DMZ Docs and the Taiwan International Documentary Festival, among others) and won 6 international awards. Shaunak received the IDFA Bertha Fund (2019), the Sundance Documentary Grant (2019), the Catapult Film Fund (2020), the Charles Wallace Grant, the Sarai CSDS Digital Media fellowship (2014), and the Films Division of India fellowship (2013). He was also a visiting scholar at Cambridge University (2018) and has published academic articles in Bioscope, Wide screen and other journals.
Ben Bernhard
Director of Photography (All That Breathes)
Ben Bernhard
Director of Photography (All That Breathes)
Ben Bernhard graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (Camera) before he started his Masters degree in Cinematography at the Deutsche Film-und Fernsehakademie Berlin (dffb). Since then he realised various fiction and documentary films as Director of Photography. In 2014 he received a scholarship at the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles.
Since 2009, Ben has been working with renowned director Victor Kossakovsky. Their project Aquarela got shortlisted for the Oscars 2020. In 2022, his feature with Annika Pinske Talking About the Weather premiered at the Berlinale Film Festival and New Directors/New Films Festival New York, the series Neymar – The Perfect Chaos was released on Netflix, and documentary All That Breathes by director Shaunak Sen won among others the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival and the L’Œil d’or “Golden Eye” in the Official Selection of the Cannes Film Festival.
To experience the DOC NYC PRO lineup, purchase an individual PRO Day Pass (via the Buy Ticket button) to hone in on a specific subject, or benefit from discounted pricing when you purchase Multi-Day Pass Packs to an assortment of topic strands.
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DOC NYC PRO is co-presented by:
