Alumni Documentarians

While students, Landon Van Soest '04 and Jeremy Levine '06 teamed up to shoot Walking the Line, a film about vigilantes on the U.S./Mexico border. The documentary became an official selection of more than 25 film festivals. After graduation, the pair formed their own production company, Transient Pictures, and began Good Fortune, a documentary shot entirely in Africa, supported by a Fulbright Fellowship and a major grant from the Sundance Institute and was aired on the PBS show, POV.

For their Documentary Research Class, Jacqueline Willemsen '06, Chris Lavigne '06 and Colleen Evanson '06 joined Emmy-winning producer and professor, Ben Crane, to form Big Deal Productions. The result: Strongest Ever, a feature-length profile of the world’s strongest woman. The documentary was shot on location across the United States and in Europe, and after playing in film festivals, is now in world-wide distribution.

Eric Maierson '90, is a writer, editor, and producer at MediaStorm. Maierson has worked on projects for National Geographic, Open Society Institute, and Council on Foreign Relations. He has received two Emmy Awards in addition to numerous other awards, including NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism, and Picture of the Year International.

ICView, Ithaca College's magazine, featured a group of alumni and faculty who work in documentary. Features include: Rich Newberg '69, Nisma Zaman '92, Susannah Ludwig '93, Tate MacDowell '93, Jon Nealon '93, Jesse Zook Mann '02, Professor Mara Alper, Professor Ben Crane, and Professor Gossa Tsegaye '76. To read the article, click here.