NHdocs presents:

How to Thrive as an Independent Documentary Filmmaker with Jennifer Boyd, Tracy Heather Strain, Karyl Evans and Jenifer McShane

This workshop features independent filmmakers who will discuss strategies for successfully navigating all phases of your career – from starting your production company and finding clients to growing your business and eventually working on only the projects you are passionate about all while making enough income to continue to work in a field you are passionate about.

Panelists:

BIO: Jennifer Boyd is a multiple Emmy Award winning producer, director, writer and owner of Boyd Productions, LLC. She has produced more than 25 documentaries and 40 music entertainment shows. Jennifer is currently producing and directing The Street Project, an inspiring story about a massive movement across the US and around the world to reclaim our largest public spaces, our streets. In addition, she’s directing a 5-part series on the history of Las Vegas and a documentary on Mesa Verde National Park. Her website is: boydproductions.net/

BIO: Tracy Heather Strain, co-founder of the Middletown-based production company The Film Posse, is an independent filmmaker specializing in documentary production. She won a 1999 Peabody Award for her first two feature documentaries and another last year for the American Masters television broadcast of her latest directing effort, “Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart”. The film netted Tracy a 50th NAACP Image Award for Motion Picture Directing last year. A Harvard Graduate School of Education and Wellesley College graduate, Tracy is a Professor of the Practice teaching documentary production, storytelling and history at Wesleyan University’s College of Film and the Moving Image and co-directs the newly established Wesleyan Documentary Project.

BIO: Karyl Evans is a six time Emmy Award-winning producer, director, writer, and editor. She has produced more than 100 documentaries over the past 25 plus years; most recently directing Meryl Streep. Her documentaries include films on the history of African American in Connecticut, the history of Connecticut Cities, and the history of the Yale School of Medicine. Ms. Evans has taught all aspects of filmmaking at the college level and is currently a Yale Fellow. She owns her own production company, Karyl Evans Productions LLC based in North Haven, CT. Her website is KarylEvansProductions.com.

BIO: Jenifer McShane is an independent filmmaker committed to using film to bridge understanding in situations where structural, cultural or religious divisions typically keep people apart. Her most recent film, Ernie & Joe: Crisis Cops won the Jury Award for Empathy & Craft at SXSW in 2019 and is currently streaming on HBO. She spent nearly five years visiting Bedford Hills Correctional Facility to make her previous documentary, Mothers of Bedford (Hot Docs premiere), which reveals the impact of incarceration on jailed mothers and their children. Jenifer lives in Guilford, CT with her family and rescue dog, Finn.

©2020 NHdocs: the New Haven Documentary Film Festival