Judy Karp shares some of her audio knowledge with NewsDoc students - Spring 2012

Alan Berliner shares some of his insights with NewsDoc students - Spring 2012

Laura Poitras visited NYU News & Doc in Spring 2011 to discuss on the process of filming and filming abroad, interviewing, staging sequences and Cinema Verite.

Poitras is currently working on a trilogy of films about America post 9/11. The first film, MY COUNTRY, MY COUNTRY (2006), follows an Iraqi doctor in Baghdad. The second film, THE OATH (2010), is set in Yemen and Guantanamo and tells the story of Osama bin Laden’s former bodyguard, and Salim Hamdan, a prisoner at Guantanamo facing war crime charges. The final film will focus on domestic surveillance.

MY COUNTRY, MY COUNTRY was nominated for an Academy Award, Independent Spirit Award, and Emmy Award. THE OATH received the Cinematography award at Sundance, the Grand Jury award at Edinburgh Film Festival, Special Jury prizes at Hot Docs and Full Frame, and the True Vision Award at True/False. She received a Peabody Award and was nominated for both an Emmy and Independent Spirit Award for FLAG WARS (2003), a film directed by Linda Goode Bryant.

Poitras is the recipient of a Guggenheim and Media Arts Fellowships. She has attended the Sundance Institute’s Documentary Storytelling Lab as both a Fellow and creative advisor. Her work has received support from the Independent Television Service (ITVS), P.O.V./American Documentary, Creative Capital, Sundance Documentary Film Program, Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund, Vital Projects Fund, NYSCA, Tribeca Film Institute, Rockefeller Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Chicken and Egg Pictures, the MacDowell Artist Colony and others.

Before making documentaries, she worked as a chef. She lives in New York City.

On the process

On staging sequences

On filming abroad

On overshooting

On getting people to talk

On Cinema Verite

Filmmaker, activist and educator Judith Helfand visited NYU News and Documentary program in Fall 2010 where she discussed documentary styles, music and new ways of documentary distribution.

Judith Helfand best known for her ability to take the dark, cynical worlds of chemical exposure and heedless corporate behavior and make them personal, resonant, highly charged, and entertaining. Her films, The Uprising of ’34, the Sundance-award-winning Blue Vinyl, and its Peabody-award-winning prequel A Healthy Baby Girl (a five-year video-diary about her experience with DES related cancer), explore home, class, corporate accountability, intergenerational relationships and the ever shrinking border between what is personal and what is a critical part of the public record.

On ‘B-Roll’

On music

On shooting

On non-broadcast distribution

On non-traditional distribution

Documentary filmmaker, Lixin Fan joined NYU News & Documentary Master Class to discuss his film Last Train Home and talked about the creative process of planning and executing documentaries.

Lixin Fan worked as a producer/journalist at China’s state broadcaster CCTV before he became a filmmaker to live in Montreal, Canada. Born and raised in the period of China’s integration into the world, Lixin had engaged himself in social political filmmaking to document and interpret the vast changes took place in a time of changes. Lixin recently finished his debut feature documentary Last Train Home deals with the world’s largest human migration in the ear of globalization. Lixin worked as associate producer on the acclaimed feature documentary Up the Yangtze, a film about the world’s largest hydroelectric project, the Three Gorges Dam. The film was a best Canadian documentary film at TIFF in 2007, a finalist at IDFA and Sundance 2007. In 2003, Lixin edited the Peabody and Grierson award-wining documentary To Live Is Better Than To Die. The film, recognized as one of the most shocking documentary on the topic, reveals China’s AIDS epidemic and was featured in Sundance Film Festival and was broadcasted on BBC, CBC and PBS.

Lixin Fan on crew and production of Last Train Home

Lixin Fan on shooting Last Train Home

Lixin Fan on the characters of Last Train Home

Lixin Fan on camerawork of Last Train Home

On shooting at the train station in Last Train Home

More on shooting at the train station

Communication strategy at the train station

Lixin Fan on post-production and storytelling

New York-based documentary filmmaker Kirsten Johnson returned to NYU News and Doc’s Master Classes this fall to talk about camera techniques, discussed how to shoot themes and tell stories effectively. Johnson discussed her latest project and watched News and Doc students’ work and offered suggestions.

Johnson, a Brown University graduate is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and cinematographer known for her versatility and fairness. Her 1999 film Innocent Until Proven Guilty examined the numbers of African American men in the U.S. criminal justice system. Her film credits include Derrida, the 2002 documentary on French philosopher Jacques Derrida, the 2006 documentary Darfur Now and the 2008 Pray The Devil Back to Hell, which won the Tribeca Film Festival Best Documentary. Her most recent work is The Oath, directed by Laura Poitras, about Osama bin Laden’s driver, Abu Jandal, for which Johnson won an award from Sundance.

On the triangulation of relationships

On shooting themes

On the importance of listening as a filmmaker

On listening with your camera

Cinematographer Kirsten Johnson joined NYU News & Doc’s Master Classes to discuss her filming techniques, how to shoot effectively in the field, and how she became a human tripod. She offered her experiences and anecdotes about her role as a cameraperson in a larger production, and a great deal of technical advice on camerawork.

Kirsten Johnson graduated from Brown University in 1987, with a BA in Fine Arts and Literature. After two years in West Africa working on local fiction and documentary film projects, she attended the FEMIS (the French National Film School) in Paris. Since graduating from the FEMIS cinematography department in 1994, she has directed 4 shorts and works frequently as a cinematographer. Kirsten is editing her first feature film “Foreign Body”. Her most recent film, “Deadline” (co-director and cinematographer) premiered at Sundance 2004 and was picked up for an NBC primetime broadcast (details at www.deadlinethemovie.com). “Asylum”, a short documentary, she shot in Ghana, was nominated for an Academy Award in 2004.

Kirsten Johnson - Continuous Shooting from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Kirsten Johnson - Shooting Everything at Once from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Kirsten Johnson - Letting What Happens Happen from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Kirsten Johnson - The Camera at the Center of Attention from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Kirsten Johnson - The Human Tripod from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Non-fiction filmmaker Alan Berliner joined NYU News & Doc’s Master Classes to discuss his career, his creative process, and to offer critique of student work.

From his website:

Alan Berliner’s uncanny ability to combine experimental cinema, artistic purpose, and popular appeal in compelling film essays has made him one of America’s most acclaimed independent filmmakers. The New York Times has described Berliner’s work as “powerful, compelling and bittersweet… full of juicy conflict and contradiction, innovative in their cinematic technique, unpredictable in their structures… Alan Berliner illustrates the power of fine art to transform life.”

A recipient of Rockefeller, Guggenheim and Jerome Foundation Fellowships, Berliner has received multiple grants from the NEA, NYSCA, NYFA and in 1998, won his third career Emmy Award (he has also received six nominations) from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. He was the recipient of a Distinguished Achievement Award from the International Documentary Association in 1993, and was honored with a “Storyteller Award” from the 2001 Taos Talking Picture Film Festival. In 2002, Berliner was awarded a “Cultural Achievement Award in the Arts” by the National Foundation For Jewish Culture.

Alan Berliner - On Making Nobody’s Business from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Non-fiction filmmaker Alan Berliner speaks about his father and the making of Nobody’s Business.

Alan Berliner - On Process and Workspace from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Alan explains the importance of workspace and comments on some of his creative processes.

Documentary filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi spoke to NYU News & Doc about making political films with humor.

Alexandra Pelosi - On Making Journeys With George from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Alexandra Pelosi - On Career Paths from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Alexandra Pelosi - On Narration from NYU News & Doc on Vimeo.

Acclaimed non-fiction filmmaker Susan Froemke joined us in the Fall 2009 semester to speak about her work with the Maysles, making films like Grey Gardens and Laylee’s Kin, and her philosophy on documentaries.

From The Huffington Post:

Susan Froemke has more than 27 non-fiction films to her credit, from the classic Grey Gardens (1976) to Lalee’s Kin, an HBO film nominated for a 2001 Academy Award® and honored at the Sundance Film Festival. A four-time Emmy® Award winner, Froemke won a 2001 Grammy for her work as director and producer on Recording the Producers: A Musical Romp with Mel Brooks. Before starting her own company in 2003, Froemke was the principal filmmaker of Maysles Films Inc. for more than two decades.