Micah Barber is a filmmaker and youth media specialist in Austin, Texas. Previously, he taught media literacy and video production programs in Chicago Public Schools in addition to producing and directing his own work. Micah has served as a filmmaking coach for Christopher Coppola's PAHFEST, and his films have played at the Gene Siskel Center, Texas Black Film Festival, IFP Short Cuts (Chicago), and with 10 Under 10 (Austin). He is a M.F.A. candidate at the University of Texas at Austin.
Filmmaker and musician Tray Duncan has worked in a wide array of positions on projects ranging from independent documentary (co-editing John Fiege's Mississippi Chicken) to effects-driven blockbusters (previsualization animation on I am Legend and Zathura). Tray is the co-founder and creative director of Self Assembly Films, a post-production, visual effects, and animation company that has recently finished work on Geoff Marslett's animated feature, Mars. He is currently working as Post Production Supervisor on Skateland, an Austin-based narrative feature. Tray holds a M.F.A. in film production from the University of Texas at Austin.
John Fiege is a filmmaker and photographer based in Austin, Texas. As a director, he works in both documentary and fiction, and his films have played at the Cannes Film Festival, The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Miami International Film Festival, and Austin Film Festival, among many others. His latest film, Mississippi Chicken (distributed by Watchmaker Films), was nominated for a Gotham Award for "The Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You." His film awards include the Princess Grace Graduate Film Award, Kodak's Eastman Scholarship, the Texas Filmmakers' Production Fund Grant, and the Carole Fielding Documentary Award. As a director of photography, he has shot films that have played at festivals around the world, including Tribeca, Clermont-Ferrand, Edinburgh, San Francisco International, and LA Film Festival. He is a co-founder of Live Oak Collective, which creates films and photographs that help progressive organizations tell their stories. He holds a B.A. from Carleton College, a M.S. in cultural geography and environmental history from The Pennsylvania State University, and a M.F.A. in film production from the University of Texas at Austin.
Anita Grabowski is a community organizer based in Austin, Texas, where she also moonlights as a producer. Since 2002, she has produced films in collaboration with her husband, director John Fiege. Their most recent film, Mississippi Chicken, is based on Anita's five years of community organizing work in Mississippi, where she co-founded a workers' center to support African American and Latino poultry processing workers in their battle to improve workplace conditions. Anita currently works as a community organizer for the Center for Community Change, where she collaborates with workers' centers and other community organizing groups across the country on worker justice campaigns and grassroots lobbying efforts. She has worked on community-union campaigns with poultry workers in Tennessee, Texas, Georgia, Arkansas, and Kentucky. Anita holds a M.A. in Latin American studies from the University of Texas at Austin and a B.A. in political science and Latin American studies from New York University.
Amy Grappell's work as casting director includes films such as: The Order of Myths (IFC / 2009), which screened in documentary competition Sundance (2009) and won an Independent Spirit Award (2009); Freshman Documentary Project (Showtime/2004) for which she did principal "real people" casting for R.J. Cutler's reality television show; and Boy's Don't Cry (Fox Searchlight 2000) for which she cast local principal and supporting roles (Texas). Her documentary Light from the East aired on PBS affiliate KLRU and was released theatrically at the Pioneer Theater in New York City (2007). She produced, co-wrote, and acted in narrative feature film Shady Grove, which premiered at the SXSW Film Festival and won the audience award at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival in the Czech Republic. Her video installation Quadrangle was recently selected for the 2009 national art exhibition New American Talent at Arthouse, in Austin,Texas. She holds a B.F.A. in film from New York University and a M.F.A. in acting from The North Carolina School of the Arts.
Neil Halloran produces independent films and new media projects through his companies based in Austin, TX. Working across traditional and interactive mediums, his projects include OurBombs.com, a website created in tandem with the "Our Bombs" documentary film, and AidsinAfrica.net, a site featuring the web-based documentary "5 Heroes of AIDS in Africa". Through Climbing Tree Productions, Inc., his independent film company, and Higher Media Inc., a digital design firm providing web, database, and online video solutions, Neil is involved in numerous film and web projects across the country.
Don Howard is an editor and director who has been based in Austin for the past 20 years. His own films, Letter From Waco (1997) and Nuclear Family (2003), have played in many film festivals and have been broadcast nationally on PBS. His editing work for other directors has included a wide range of projects, from feature films like Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused (1993) to more recent documentary work in films like Margaret Brown's Be Here to Love Me (2005) and Harry Lynch's Imax film Ride Around the World (2006). He is Assistant Professor in the Radio-Television-Film Department at the University of Texas, where he has been teaching film and video editing since 1998.
Kathryn Nowlin is a filmmaker and producer based in Austin, Texas. She holds a M.A. in Radio-Television-Film from the University of Texas at Austin and a B.A. in Cinema/TV Studies from the University of Southern California. She produced Salvatore Botti's feature film, Dreams of Her (2002), which premiered in 2003 SXSW Film Festival. Her producing and casting experience also includes Student Emmy winner Roadside Assistance, starring Rashida Jones and Adam Brody. Kathryn interned for the Austin Film Society, where she was also a coordinator for the Texas Filmmakers Production Fund, and during her undergraduate studies, she was the co-founder of Deep Focus, a film appreciation group conducting screenings and interviews with well-known directors.
Christina Ramos is currently an undergraduate student at the University of Texas at Austin where she is majoring in Theatre with a focus on costume design and technology. In 2009 she was the assistant costume designer for teh Dance Reparatory Theatre piece, "Brier Wood," two Cohen New Works Festival pieces, "Footprints" and "The Poet and the Philosopher," and she is currently the assistant costume designer for "Pride and Prejudice." Christina was the head of costumes for eight theatrical performances from 2004-2006.
Lucas Schaefer is a writer and teacher in Austin, Texas. He was executive director of the Austin Gay & Lesbian International Film Festival and is co-founder of Live Oak Collective with John Fiege. Lucas became involved in film work while photographing and writing about the families of death row inmates in North Carolina. He subsequently directed a short film, Follow Me, about one of those families and has worked on other documentary projects about Brazil, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, and Haiti. In 2004 and 2005, Lucas worked as an instructor at Duke University's Talent Identification Program camp for young writers. His play Hangman, which he wrote while a student at Duke University, was named one of the (Durham) Independent's top ten scripts and top ten productions of 2004.
Daniel Stuyck recently completed The Past is a Foreign Country, an experimental documentary about forged historical documents, murder and the allure of scenic time travel. He has written on film for a variety of publications, including Film Comment, Vertigo and Cinema Scope.
Nathanael Vorce is an Austin-based cinematographer, whose work includes independent films, commercials, documentaries, and music videos. After receiving a B.S. in film production from the University of Texas at Austin, he was nominated for the Charles B. Lang Jr. Heritage Award from the American Society of Cinematographers. The music videos that he photographed for artists Johnny Hallyday and Pat Green have appeared on MTV Europe, CMT's top 20 and Canal Plus. Most recently, he worked as second unit director of photography on Terrence Malick's Tree of Life, under the vision of award-winning cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki.
Hillary Andujar, Location Scout
Amy Bench, Additional 1st Assistant Camera
Alanna Bielke, Production Assistant
Huay Bing Law, Grip/Electric
Jeffrey Buras, 1st Assistant Camera
Brian Bush, Web Campaign Producer
Joy Chiang, 2nd Assistant Camera
Greg Clark, Production Assistant
Traci Duran, Digital Imaging Technician
Laura Garcia, Web Campaign Producer
Eric Hochhalter, Post Production Assistant
Johannah Hochhalter, Casting Assistant, Production Assistant
Jo Huang, Production Assistant
Lisa Jaugarai, Makeup Consultant
Ben Kullerd, Production Assistant
Homer Leal, Gaffer
Joseph Mitchell, Assistant to the Director
Karlo Montano, Production Sound Mixer
Ben Powell, Web Campaign Producer
Matt Smith, Grip/Electric
Zoja Ulesoo, 2nd Assistant Director