ABOUT
DIRECTOR EDITOR STORYTELLER
Filmmaking has taken me to places I never expected.
Standing behind a camera on a rocky desert ledge in Disappointment Valley, Colorado, I heard the helicopters before I saw the swirling dust cloud approaching. I pressed record, focused on the viewfinder, and pushed the long lens as tight as it would go.
Disappointment Valley, Colorado — filming wild horse roundup
A frantic herd of wild horses emerged on the opposite canyon peak, hesitating as they scanned the near-vertical slope between them and the valley floor below. Seconds later the two pursuing helicopters erupted into view.
The band’s lead stallion made his decision.
He leapt over the edge. The others followed, thundering down the sheer face of the slope. I was certain they would tumble down the cliff. Somehow they all made it to the bottom — only to find themselves ensnared in the maze of corrals waiting below. Helicopters roared overhead as cowboys shouted and slammed metal gates. The horses began screaming.
Moments like that push me outside my comfort zone and into worlds I never knew existed — and that’s exactly where the camera, and the audience, need to be.
Some moments stay with you long after the camera stops rolling. One morning in Hawaii while working for the National Park Service, I was dropped off alone with a camera and tripod before sunrise on the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor.
USS Arizona Memorial — Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
As the small motorboat pulled away, I stood there listening as the sound of the engine faded into the distance, replaced by something even louder: silence. Just the water lapping against the structure, above a place where more than a thousand sailors still rest below. Listen to the clip above to hear for yourself.
It struck me how few people will ever experience that moment the way I was. The access, the stillness, the weight of it. It was a moment most people will never get to feel.
I had less than an hour before the first visitor boats arrived. I focused on the work, moving quickly, setting shots, trying to make the most of the time I’d been given.
It felt like a responsibility as much as an opportunity, and one I’ll never forget.
To translate something most people will never see into something they can feel.
I’ve stood on the exact vocal spot in Nashville’s historic RCA Studio B where Elvis Presley recorded more than two hundred songs.
RCA Studio B — Nashville, Tennessee
When we arrived, it didn't feel like a museum. John Hiatt and Jerry Douglas had been granted rare permission to record there, something that had only happened a handful of times in the past two decades. The studio is mostly a museum now, but that day it was alive again.
On the 'X' — where Elvis recorded
A music historian guided us through the room and stopped on the marked “X” where Elvis stood everytime he recorded there. As he explained its significance, I immediately felt the weight of it, the history in the walls.
John stepped onto the spot, paused for a moment, then bent down and kissed the floor. It wasn't planned. No one asked for it. It just happened. We were already rolling, ready for whatever the moment became, not what anyone expected it to be.
I’ve shed tears behind the camera watching an undocumented father say goodbye to his wife and daughters, his young family split apart by intransigent immigration laws.
120 Days: Undocumented in America
I made a vow to myself in that moment — to not let that story pass by unnoticed. To make sure people didn’t just hear it, but felt it. To take that heartbreak and give it a voice.
What followed was years of work, editing, translating, shaping a film with no budget but a clear purpose. It eventually found its way into festivals, onto screens, and into homes across the country through PBS.
But what stayed with me most were the conversations after the screenings.
The people who came up and said they saw something differently now.
That their perspective had shifted.
That they understood.
Those moments meant more than any award or broadcast. They were a reminder of why I do this, and what film can do when it works. To make someone feel something they might not have otherwise understood.
To shift perspective, even slightly.
To me, the magic of filmmaking is the ability to help an audience walk a mile in someone else’s shoes — to step into another person’s world and see it from their perspective. When it works, those moments transcend time, culture, and language, allowing us to feel the weight of a decision, the stillness of a memorial, or the heartbreak of a family saying goodbye.