EDUCATION:

• Youth Program

• Screenwriting

• Film / DV / Audio

• Photography

• Web Design

• Instructor Profiles

• Conferences

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Discarded But Not Lost: Photos by Ann Marsden and Ann Prim May 21-July 17 Click Here

Darin Back has been a professional working photographer for over 15 years. He worked as first assistant to Annie Leibovitz at Vanity Fair for one year early in his career. Darin’s work in the industry has taken him around the country. He has shot and been published in New York, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis. Some of his most recent local editorial/advertising photography has appeared in Mpls.St.Paul magazine, Minnesota Monthly, and Twin Cities Metro magazine. He has also instructed at the Mpls Photo Center.

Paul Bernhardt is an award-winning director of educational videos in the Digital Learning Group at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. As an independent producer/director, his films have screened at festivals and on public television. He has been teaching editing with Final Cut Pro at IFP Minnesota since 2002.

Nicholas Bochek has worked as a freelance editor, graphic animator and digital special effects designer. He has worked on a wide variety of successful independent features: Snuff, A Documentary About Killing on Camera, and Preston Burring. He has also worked on various multimedia pieces for the Walker Art Center, Mixed Blood Theater and the American History Theater, as well as working with corporate clients.

Joel Dickinson is recognized for his efforts in the advancement of multimedia design and development for educational programming. His design work with the University of Minnesota Extension Service has won several awards and received national attention in US News & World Report. Joel has a BS in Graphic Design and an M.Ed in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in multimedia design and development, both from the University of Minnesota. His work includes educational video production; curriculum design and development; and program identity, packaging, and graphic design. He is also an accomplished music producer with numerous productions that have been featured on the Billboard dance charts.

Osama Esid was born in Damascus, Syria and currently lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. “As a child I was frightened by the images from my family photo album. I was unable to understand the images of people with piercing eyes and of blurred children. Most frightening of all was the thought those people lived in a world that had lost its colors. In 1977, a new form of photograph appeared, square and colorful, to the family photo album. For my father, it was the instant gratification of the Polaroid camera that made him so happy. For me, the Polaroid brought the answer of knowing where the colors came from. But it also raised another question. ‘How did the colors get inside?’ This became my interest in technical photography. Still feeling that colored pictures embodied happiness, I began to hand color my black and white images. I guess it was my way of giving happiness to those people who lived in that world that lost its colors.”

Terry Faust has been a photographer for 27 years, working as a staff photographer and freelancer for newspapers, magazines, and in-house publications in the Twin Cities and New York. He has taught photography and multi-image production at the School of Communication Arts, Articulture, Minneapolis Park and Recreation, and South High School’s Adult Community Education Program. He has received grants and awards from the Minnesota State Arts Board, Intermedia Arts, MNTV, The Loft, and the Neighborhood and Community Press Association. He belongs to the National Press Photographers Association and the Minnesota News Photographers Association.

David Grant is a Twin Cities-based screenwriter and playwright. As a playwright, he has been commissioned to write new work for the Minnesota Science Museum, the Minnesota Historical Society, Mixed Blood Theater, VocalEssence, The Playwrights’ Center, and Great American History Theatre. As a screenwriter, he has written drama for Twin Cities Public Television, Russell Simmons’ Def Pictures, HBO New York, Davis Entertainment, and the Showtime Network. Grant has been a recipient of screenwriting fellowships from the Minnesota State Arts Board and the McKnight Foundation, and was a finalist for the 1999 Gordon Parks Award and the Heathcote Arts Foundation Fellowship at the Independent Feature Film Market in New York for his screenplay Trouble. His travel story, I Hold High My Beautiful, Luminous Q’uran, appears in the book, Best Travel Writing, 2009, published by Travelers’ Tales, Palo Alto. He has taught screenwriting at The Loft, Playwrights’ Center, and S.A.S.E., as well as basic writing skills for The Center for Non-Profit Management at the University of St. Thomas. Grant is a graduate of Antioch College and president emeritus of Screenwriters’ Workshop, member of The Loft board of directors, a core alumnus member of The Playwrights’ Center, and a member of the Writers’ Guild of America, West.

Sarah Jones-Larson is a 27-year voiceover professional. For four years a voiceover instructor at The Academy of Film and Television, she was also a faculty member of the University of Minnesota. Sarah was rated above the 99th percentile as an instructor by the University of Minnesota Office of Measurement Services in 2008. Her voice has been heard on thousands of radio and television commercials as well as hundreds of training, medical, and technical DVDs, IVR, and on the Web. Her students have been successful getting local, regional, and national voiceover work.

Patrick Kelley received his BFA in photography at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and produced a wide variety of publications as their staff photographer. He has worked as a teaching assistant as well as the assistant gallery manager at the Minnesota Center for Photography. Patrick is currently working with the photography department at General Mills and also operates a full-time freelance photography business.

Deborah Meyer has been an active participant in IFP MN since the 1980s, first as a student/member/volunteer, and as an instructor for the past ten years. Professionally, she works in advertising as both a photo stylist and co-designer. Her fine art photography has been exhibited locally and purchased for publication.

Dawn Mikkelson is an award-winning media producer and documentary filmmaker who was named to AV Multimedia Producer’s 2004 National Top Producers Showcase. From National PBS broadcasts to Featured Video Podcast by iTunes, Mikkelson’s work in film and video has received international acclaim across broad delivery platforms. She has completed four award-winning feature documentaries. Her most recent film, The Red Tail, directed with Melissa Koch, had its world premiere at the 2009 Galway International Film Fleadh. A former television news reporter at an ABC affiliate, Mikkelson has spoken about documentary filmmaking on numerous festival panels, and also about LGBT and environmental issues at colleges and universities around the world. She teaches documentary film as adjunct faculty at Ottawa University, Kansas and IFP Minnesota.

Rhea Pappas (rheapappas.com) has worked as a freelance photographer in Minnesota for eight years shooting album covers and promos for record labels and photographs weddings, portraits, fine art projects, and editorial work. She has worked at West Photo and National Camera Exchange and was the 2005 recipient of the Scholastic Photographic Portfolio Award Scholarship at Minneapolis College of Art and Design, where she graduated. She spent the summer of 2008 teaching photography for the Duluth Public Schools’ Community Education Program. Rhea’s photography has been exhibited at the Perpich Center for Arts Education, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Fallout Urban Art Center Gallery, and Icebox Gallery. Rhea won the Best of Student category in the 2008 Advertising Photographers of America national photo competition, resulting in an exhibition at the Calumet Gallery in New York City.

John Pennoyer is a freelance nature photographer whose love of the outdoors shines through the images he captures. Wildflowers, environmental scenes, birds, and other wildlife are of special interest to him, especially that which is native to Minnesota. Over the last ten years he has been conducting photography workshops at the American Bear Association (americanbear.org) in Orr, MN. He also teaches photography classes at various locations in the Twin Cities area. For the last five years he has been shooting totally digital using Nikon equipment. His photo credits include Minnesota Conservation Volunteer, Lake Country Journal, Bowhunter, Outdoor Life, and many other national and regional publications. John has been a member of the Minnesota Nature Photography Club (minnesotanature.org) for 27 years and was recently awarded honorary status. Since retiring from General Motors, John has been working full-time in his own photography business, Impressions of Nature (impressionsofnature.net).

Emmy award-winning filmmaker Jesse Roesler has a storytelling addiction. From comedies, to documentaries, to robotic love stories – you’ll find him ever exploring the humor, lightness and depth of the human experience through the use of cinematic expression. His mini-movies have found homes in international film festivals, on national television, and in your Web browser.

Dawn Schot Klotzbach has worked both as a sound mixer and post-production sound designer/editor for many independent films and projects. She has recorded audio with Flash, DAT, Minidisk and Nagra recorders, and has mixed/designed with Pro Tools and Digital Performer software. “What's amazing about good sound is that you don't notice it; it's when you DO notice the sound that you have a problem.”

Jon Springer is an award-winning indie film producer, director, and cinematographer with regional and national acclaim. His films have garnered rave reviews from some of the top film sites in the world, including Ain’t it Cool News, Film Threat, and Fangoria. Springer’s cinematography credits include a long list of feature films, narrative shorts, documentaries, and over 700 commercials. His latest feature film, The Hagstone Demon, starring indie film icon Mark Borchardt, premiered at the 2009 Tromadance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Along with numerous awards for his direction and cinematography, Springer won the IFP/McKnight Artist Fellowship for Filmmaking in 2007.

Justin Staggs is an independent, Minneapolis-based music video director with over three dozen music videos to his credit, most of which have received national and international broadcast promotion. Justin was the winner of the 2004 Kangaroo Project and was also chosen as one of the elite recipients of Twin Cities Metro magazine’s 2009 Keep Awards for excellence in filmmaking. Justin is a self-taught filmmaker and has an extensive creative background in advertising design, illustration, and screenwriting. In addition to being passionate about film directing, he enjoys teaching and sharing his unique insights into his craft and creative process with his students.

Deacon Warner is the Youth Program Coordinator for IFP MN. During the school year he teaches documentary video production through residencies at high schools in Saint Paul. He is also the founder and director of the Polar Producers Documentary Team, an after school program for students in the Minneapolis Public Schools. His students’ work has been accepted into many festivals and screenings and won numerous awards, including a 2008 Award of Excellence from the Minneapolis School Board.

Eric Weidmann attended the Los Angeles Film Studies Center before receiving a BA in Philosophy of Creative Media from Greenville College in Illinois. He has spent the last seven years working in professional DVD production and freelance video editing. He currently is a freelance graphic designer and technical consultant.