Meet the 2020-21 SEADOC Cohorts
The Seattle Documentary Association is proud to announce our 2020-2021 Cohorts and their current projects. Learn more about the Cohorts program.
Ekta Dokania
Ekta moved to Seattle from India in 2015, and recently began filmmaking. I want to tell stories about people and how they change through their lived experiences. She is currently a graduate student of Master of Communication in Digital Media (MCDM), specializing in storytelling and marketing and analytics at the University of Washington (UW). Ekta worked for a leading global PR agency in Seattle, supporting communication campaigns for Microsoft Philanthropies.
Documentary: Celebrating Strength
This short documentary is the story of the transformation of a person’s perceived weakness into a source of strength. We often underestimate people with different abilities than us, and miss out on a huge talent pool at our workplaces. In recent months, there's been a lot of emphasis on creating more diversity at the workplaces and developing empathy. How can we develop that empathy? This short film offers a peek into the life of a differently abled person, creating an experience for the viewer that underlines that being different is not a sign of weakness, but a source of great strength.
Clea Eppelin
Eppelin studied photography and video production in San José, Costa Rica. She moved to Seattle in 2015. "Filmmaking has been one of my biggest passions," she says. Her short films have received several 'Best of' awards at international film festivals.
Documentary: Orbita
ORBITA is an intimate personal documentary about Eppelin’s family story.
Annette Frahm
Annette Frahm is a Seattle-based independent filmmaker. Her award-winning films include short documentaries as well as videos for marketing, branding and education. She uses film, video and writing to tell stories that educate and inspire. Annette is an independent consultant and owns FrahmComm, which provides content strategy, video and writing with a focus on environmental communications.
Documentary: Fast Tracks (working title)
Fast Tracks follows a group of powerful women as they coach young skiers of the Methow Valley Nordic Team to become champions and lifelong athletes. https://www.frahmcomm.com.
David Franklin
David Franklin is an Emmy award-winning producer and editor, a feature film and music video director, and a visual effects artist. David received a 2015 News and Documentary Emmy Award for producing and editing "Perilous Journey," an episode of 48 Hours which aired nationally on CBS. Between 2004-2014, David edited over 40 episodes of 48 Hours. Other editing credits include the documentary feature films Drops In The Ocean (2020) and Screenagers: Next Chapter (2019), narrative features As Far As The Eye Can See (2018) and The Condemned (2013), television series like Britney and Kevin: Chaotic (2005), and CBS Sunday Morning, as well as music videos for Ed Sheeran, Cardi B, Camila Cabello, Macklemore, Why Don’t We and others.
Documentary: Firestorm
In the 1980s, Bushwick, NY was the epicenter of a firestorm that burned through the neighborhood. Thirty years later what lasting impact do the fires have on the neighborhood and those Bushwick residents who remember them?
Elliat Graney-Saucke
Elliat Graney-Saucke (she/they) is a white queer femme documentary filmmaker, cultural organizer and educator. Currently completing a second feature documentary, “Boys on the Inside” is about three Latinx ‘boys’ who have experienced incarceration in women’s prisons, as well as being in production for the short doc “Safta,” about a holocaust survivor and her close and complex relationship to her granddaughter. Elliat has produced over 20 short films and one completed feature, screening work in 13 countries. Pending publication, Elliat is editing the international essays on arts and heritage for Innovate Heritage in Berlin/Rome and leading the SeaDoc Cohort program.
Documentary: Boys on the Inside
Boys on the Inside is a feature documentary that follows three formerly incarcerated Latinx ‘boys’ and a white queer femme documentary filmmaker over a decade of triumph, tragedy and new chapters of life that bring everyone’s stories together in ways no one could ever have anticipated.
Nikolina Horvat
Documentary: TBA
Derrick Lamere
Derrick LaMere is a Native American Filmmaker (Rocky Boy, Little Shell, Sinixt, Entiat, Wenatchi) from Spokane Washington. He is an award winning documentary filmmaker who's recent films have been an official selection to more than 50+ film festivals internationally. Derrick’s recent film Older Than The Crown, was selected for Vision Maker Media’s post production funding and will be in national distribution through PBS in 2021.
Documentary: Older Than The Crown
After the deliberate separation and an unjust declaration of extinction, the Sinixt people return to their ancestral land in Canada to continue practicing and protecting their aboriginal rights.
Milan Lawson
Milan is an innovative documentary and narrative filmmaker who resides in Seattle, Washington. A detailed and imaginative storyteller, Milan seeks to weave authentic and genuine stories about the human experience with a focus on the vibrant diversity found within communities of color. For the past three years Milan has worked in television and film production in New York, New Jersey and Los Angeles. Her time working with brands such as Nickelodeon, MTV, and more, has given her hands-on experience in nearly every aspect of production. Now, her passion for film and television has led her to begin sharing her own stories. She looks forward to expanding her scope as a director.
Documentary: Untitled
TBA
Misael A. Martínez Melo
Born from Puerto Rican-Dominican ancestry, Misa is a latte-fueled director, documentarian, and media content producer. He's the director of Raíces del Barrio, a documentary project focused on Puerto Rico's food sovereignty, and "The Last Wave," a documentary project on the 80's Puerto Rican new wave movement. Both documentaries are co-produced with fellow filmmaker Angel Janer. Martínez is also an active board member of the Seattle Documentary Association and the Olympia Film Collective.
Documentary: Más Raíces
Food Sovereignty, Social Synergy, Agroecology and the fight for Food Justice in Puerto Rico.
Jessica Plumb
Producer and writer Jessica Plumb is known for award-winning films that explore the relationship between people and place. Her feature documentary, Return of the River, chronicled the largest dam removal in history and the restoration of the Elwha River. Recognized with a dozen festival awards, including “Best Storytelling” by the International Wildlife Film Festival, the film was reviewed as "hell-raising documentary filmmaking at its best". Her short films and video installations have screened in galleries and theaters throughout the United States and internationally. Plumb directs a video production company with a focus on storytelling for environmental and arts organizations. Plumb worked in Boston and Beijing before being called to mountains and waters of the Olympic Peninsula. Plumb holds a B.A. from Yale University and an interdisciplinary MFA from Goddard College.
Documentary: The Path of the Moon
A lyrical celebration of the human spirit, this short film profiles a Chilean artist approaching mortality with an unconventional mix of creativity, humor and curiosity about our most universal journey. This short film is intended to accompany a completed multi media installation project, which can be seen here: plumbproductions.com/inner-space.
David Quantic
David Quantic, Writer/Director/Editor/Producer. Originally from Kansas, Dave lived in Dallas and New York City before moving to LA in 1999 to attend UCLA’s MFA Film Directing program. After graduating in 2004, he worked as an editor and other post production gigs in LA while making more than 15 personal short films that have screened in festivals worldwide including LA’s Outfest and SF’s Frameline. In 2016 he moved to Seattle to work for the Queer Film Festival. He currently works as a full time editor for Cascade Public Media which owns local news site crosscut.com and KCTS, the Seattle PBS affiliate.
Documentary: Fruitbowl
FRUITBOWL is a hybrid documentary film / podcast that explores the unique ways that queer people discover their sexual identities and preferences. Interviewees are all asked the same 15 questions about their coming of age years: all the ups and downs and ins and outs of sexual discovery. Podcast episodes feature just one interview per episode while the documentary film will weave similar narratives together and show the extremely different ways that queer people discover their sexual preferences.
Baylee Sinner
Producer and director in Seattle with over 11 years of experience professional. By day, I produce and direct branded content for clients like Amazon, Microsoft, the Seattle Seahawks, and others. At night, my enthusiasm for film drives me to create music videos, extreme sports documentaries (that is, if LARPing counts as an extreme sport), and award-winning narrative shorts.
Documentary: Untitled
A long fall that sparked profound deep thoughts.
Sharon Nyree Williams
Sharon Nyree Williams is a storyteller in various genres and arts administrator. She believes in experiencing life through the artistry of storytelling and leadership.
Documentary: I Miss Going to the House
I Miss Going to the House is a poetic exploration of what happens when a family know longer has access to their gathering place. Does this loss effect the family’s relationship with each other? How has family dynamics shifted? This poem is the motivation behind me wanting to do a documentary, youtu.be/5MlrOzkth2w.
Inye Wokoma
Inye Wokoma is a filmmaker who integrates his background in journalism and visual arts into his filmmaking. His work explores themes of identity, community, history, land, politics and power through the lens of personal and visual narratives and is informed by a deep social practice. Inye completed a degree in journalism and filmmaking from Clark Atlanta University and has won number awards for photojournalism, visual arts and filmmaking.
Documentary: An Elegant Utility Suite
‘An Elegant Utility Suite’ is an evolving constellation of films that explore the meaning of connection, place and identity in a community beset by displacement. A as series documentary shorts, they range from experimental to conventional formats with each designed to be presented in contexts as diverse as live storytelling, site specific museum and gallery installations and traditional screenings. ‘An Elegant Utility Suite’ is a kind of filmmaker’s journal of ideas, experimenting with various storytelling approaches as Inye Wokoma maps out the dimensions of a complex inter-generational story.