FOR US, BY US FILMMAKER INCUBATOR TEAM
Jennifer Crystal Chien – Program Director
Jennifer Crystal Chien is a documentary filmmaker with a focus on personal storytelling from immigrants and people of color. In 2017, she co-founded Re-Present Media, a grassroots nonprofit that advocates for personal storytelling in documentary film and nonfiction media. In addition to presenting films with community dialogues by established filmmakers, Re-Present Media also offers professional development for emerging filmmakers and coordinates field-wide advocacy campaigns to support and elevate voices from underrepresented communities. Jennifer was the Program Director for Re-Present Media’s Re-Take Oakland program, a two-year public education and filmmaker mentoring program that supported documentary filmmakers of color creating personal films featuring stories of Oakland communities. Jennifer was named a DOC NYC Documentary New Leader in 2022. Jennifer also serves as the Board President of Filmmakers Collaborative SF.
Kevin White – Program Director
Kevin White is an award-winning documentary filmmaker with a focus on environmental and social issues. He has more than a dozen films that are in distribution, including his most recent film, Wilder than Wild: Fire, Forests and the Future, which has had 450+ community screenings and more than 850 broadcasts on PBS, plus educational distribution with Video Project. Kevin is the Co-Founder and Executive Director for Filmmakers Collaborative SF, and frequently consults with filmmakers on story approach, fundraising, and distribution. He is also on the Board of several media nonprofits.
Spencer Nakasako – Presenter/Mentor
Spencer Nakasako has four decades of experience as an independent filmmaker. He won a National Emmy Award for a.k.a. Don Bonus, the video diary of a Cambodian refugee teenager that aired on the PBS series P.O.V. and screened at the Berlin International Film Festival. His other works include Kelly Loves Tony, Refugee, and Life is Cheap…but Toilet Paper is Expensive. Nakasako is the founder of the Media Lab at the Vietnamese Youth Development Center in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District where he collaborated with youth on filmmaking for seventeen years. He has lectured in the Social Documentation graduate program at the University of California at Santa Cruz, and at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley. Nakasako is a member of the Writers Guild of America and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Steve Ladd – Presenter/Mentor
Steve Ladd served for three years as Distribution Director and later seven years as Executive Director of an Oscar-winning documentary production and distribution company, responsible for acquiring and promoting several hundred films. More recently, he has been an independent media consultant, supporting and helping to launch dozens of documentary films, including Emmy winners and Oscar nominees. He has raised over $2.5 million for production, distribution and engagement campaigns from a variety of foundations and individual donors.
Brenda Ávila-Hanna – Presenter/Mentor
Brenda Ávila-Hanna is an award winning, Mexican-born filmmaker whose work focuses on immigrant stories. Her work has been showcased at HotDocs, Lakino Berlin, PBS, Fusion Network and more. Brenda was part of the inaugural cohort of DOC NYC’s “Documentary Industry New Leaders” and a 2021 Rockwood/Just Films Fellow. She is a member-owner of the film distribution cooperative New Day Films, where she served in the Steering Committee as their first team lead for Equity & Representation. Brenda has worked as a reviewer for film grants with multiple organizations including the IDA and BAVC. Brenda is a current Research Fellow at UCSC’s Film & Digital Media Department, where she also received an MA in Social Documentation. She is also the Artist Development lead for Watsonville Film Festival’s Cine Se Puede filmmaking fellowship. Brenda is currently a producer for the ITVS supported film Emergent City and in post-production on her first documentary feature, Libertad.