Fusion Film Festival

Celebrating women in TV, Film & New Media

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Iyabo Boyd: From Here To There

By Juliana Botelho, Fusion Alumni Relations.

Iyabo Boyd (TSOA ‘2006) is a trailblazer in every sense of the word. A founding member of Fusion Film Festival and Co-Director of the organization for two years, Boyd is an accomplished film producer, director, writer, and founder of the consulting company, Feedback Loop. On November 17th, 2016, Fusion welcomed the Tisch alumna to its “Coffee With Series” where she shared her path from here to there.

After graduating with a BA in Film and Television in 2006, Boyd held positions at distinguished institutions such as the Independent Feature Project (IFP), Tribeca Film Institute, and Chicken & Egg Pictures. Iyabo’s keen eye for talent qualified her to serve on juries for the SXSW’s Women Director Award, DOC NYC, Cinema Eye Honors, and Brooklyn Film Festival’s Pitching Exchange. When it comes to her creative endeavors, Iyabo Boyd possesses a prolific career. She produced the feature Sun Belt Express, which premiered in 2014 at the Champs-Elysée Film Festival, and the short film “Forever, Ally,” based on the poems by Ronaldo V, that she also wrote and directed. Boyd is currently producing the coming-of-age documentary For Ahkeem, set for a 2017 release, with Emmy-winning directors Jeremy Levine and Landon Van Soest.

In 2015, Boyd created Brown Girls Doc Mafia, a collective for women filmmakers of color in documentary, and in 2016, Boyd founded Feedback Loop. Feedback Loop is an organization that provides consulting services for independent documentary filmmakers in the areas of funding, editing, festivals, distribution, marketing, and impact. It was Boyd’s work as a Program Manager for Chicken & Egg Pictures, which supports and awards grants to non-fiction women filmmakers, that paved the way for her own firm Feedback Loop and her collective Brown Girls Doc Mafia. As a Program Manager, she held a leadership position in selecting projects for grants and mentorship opportunities. Despite her ample experience with grant applications, Boyd noted that selecting projects is always a difficult process for there are many talented filmmakers and not enough funds to bring all of their creations to life.

To add to her outstanding résumé, Iyabo Boyd received in 2016 the Impact Partners Creative Producers Fellowship, awarded to the most prominent independent documentary producers, and was selected for the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Creative Producing Lab, which provides emerging documentary-feature producers with mentorship from accomplished industry professionals.

During Fusion’s “Coffee With” event, Boyd expressed how much the experience at Sundance impacted her perception of the entertainment business and enabled her to grow as an artist. For the filmmaker, the key is to aim for longevity and to always think about future projects and creative endeavors. Also, know your audience and their demands. The Fusion alumna advised the emerging artists in the room to stay up-to-date with press releases about current projects being developed because funders are looking for new material and ideas. When asked what she would have done differently as a student at NYU, Boyd confessed that she wished she had established more connections with professors because they open doors into the entertainment industry. Nonetheless, since her days as an aspiring filmmaker at the Tisch School of The Arts, Iyabo Boyd has come a long way.

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Hannah Weddle: From Here To There

By Priya Khanolkar, Fusion Alumni Relations.

Hannah Weddle (TSOA, 2010) was part of a revolutionary time for Fusion. In 2009, when social media and cell phones were gaining traction, Hannah became the Director of Technology for the Fusion Film Festival. Since this was the first year the department was instilled, Weddle was Fusion’s first webmaster. Today, she is a Production Format Specialist and works with front end web development, formatting content for websites and E-readers. This past December, she spoke with Fusion about her journey from here to there.

When Hannah was a sophomore at Tisch, she thought she wanted to be a director. Once she began her Sight and Sound classes, that idea pivoted. She found that she really enjoyed the technical side of film: the lights, camera, and sound. Hannah was fascinated by the science behind it all and why everything worked the way it did. She remembered very clearly how, at this time, she was one of the only girls interested in the technical side of filmmaking. Because of this division, Hannah found that many people would try to pigeonhole her into other categories of the film department, but she stuck with what she loved. Because of her passion for technology, she became a Digital Teaching Assistant on the eighth floor of Tisch where the photography studios are housed. Her work there, along with work she had performed in Fusion, led her to her current career path.

Directly after graduating from NYU, Hannah did freelance film work, but she wasn’t extremely satisfied with the pace of the work. She went to grad school a year after graduation with a concentration in technology. Her first job after grad school was at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library where she was in charge of digitizing the collection and re-recording phone calls made by John F. Kennedy for a documentary.

Hannah was in college during the digital revolution where cell phones became a regular item to have, television shows began streaming on the internet, and social media began taking off. This was a very critical time for her because she was trying to understand how technology in film would change. How would the industry be impacted by the use of iPods and laptops? She knew from then on that she needed to go in the direction of technology and help answer these questions. She needed to be working directly with tech, and Fusion gave her that opportunity.

Hannah knows the importance of technology as a force that’s driving the industry and she acknowledges how it is changing all the time. This is why she loves working in the fast-paced world of technology. From pioneering as one of the only women to attend a camera class to working solely in tech, Hannah has certainly come a long way from her time at Tisch.

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George Itzhak: From Here To There

By Priya Khanolkar, Fusion Alumni Relations.

After graduating early in December of 2013, George Itzhak (UGFTV/TSOA, 2013) went straight to Sochi, Russia for the 2014 Sochi Olympic Games as a Production Assistant for NBC News. Today, George is the Associate Producer at NBC Nightly News. He was able to sit down with us and explain how he got from here to there.

Itzhak recalls first being inspired to become a TV news producer after a speaker from CBS came to talk to his Producing For TV class. While working as the Design Director in Fusion for many supportive years and an important E-Board member, he was also interning at The Today Show. After shooting and editing his thesis film during his senior year, he began interviewing for many different TV networks.

George was already interning at NBC News when he heard that NBC was hiring people to help cover the Olympics in Russia. Since George speaks Russian fluently, he interviewed for the position and was then sent to Russia for five weeks. George thought this was a wonderful first job because he could work in the field and be extremely active. He was able to not only work with producers but also set up and be a part of many interviews.

George’s first position at NBC News was as a desk assistant. Because of his shooting and editing skills, which he learned specifically in Sight & Sound: Documentary, Sight & Sound: Filmmaking, and Camera 1 at Tisch, he was able to quickly move up in his career. George’s work is not limited to TV though. When he has free time, he works on film projects as well. One project he is currently working on is a feature length documentary about Joanna Stingray, the American godmother of Russian rock music.

George has traveled all over the United States as well as the world for his job and has had a great time doing it. When asked what he would tell himself if he could go back in time and speak to his college self, he replied, “I would tell myself to really focus more on your technical skills and your craft. That’s your work and that’s your value at your job. You have to have both ambition as well as the technical skills you can learn. There will always be creative people out there. You have to be able to back it up though.” George loved his years at Tisch and loved his time at Fusion. He is thankful for everything he learned during his years at NYU.

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Erika Houle: From Here To There

(Header Image a Still of Gloria Steinem in “Equal Means Equal”)

By Priya Khanolkar, Fusion Alumni Relations.

Erika Houle (Grad Film/TSOA, 2011) works not only in the field but also in the classroom. In college, Erika had many different internships with world-renowned directors such as Terrence Malick, and after graduating she was able to work on many projects. She recently completed her master’s degree in Art, Education, & Community Practice while teaching Camera I at Tisch. Erika knew she always had a passion for teaching as well as an interest in film, so being a part of the 2016 Fusion Film Festival as a faculty judge was perfect. Erika recently answered a few questions, highlighting how she got from here to there.

When Erika first began her undergraduate years at the Tisch School of the Arts, she believed that she wanted to be a music video director. However, her passion quickly pivoted to documentary filmmaking. Documentaries allow Erika to grow close to people all over the world and learn from them. During her time at Tisch, Erika interned on Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life, where she had the opportunity to work on  a professional set for the first time. She noted how everyone on set treated each other with respect but also prepared her for enduring the emotional turmoil and logistical chaos of many low budget shoots. Erika also interned at Partizan, a world renowned production company, which was perfect for her due to her interest in Michel Gondry. She learned most of her skills from working on many student film sets. By the time she graduated, she had made contacts with many people because she had worked on their student sets when she was an underclassman. This is how she found many of her jobs post graduation.

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Still from Erika Houle’s Undergraduate Thesis Film “Last Texas Cowboy”

One of those jobs was as a DP for a documentary starring social political activist and feminist organizer Gloria Steinem. The documentary’s director, Kamala Lopez, was looking for a NYC-based DP to shoot the interview. Erika was put in contact with Kamala through a mutual friend whom Erika had met while working on student film sets at NYU. Erika commented that Gloria Steinem is a wealth of wisdom and experience, and one comment from Gloria that stuck with her was that, “Upon reflection it was naive of her [Gloria Steinem] to believe that simply presenting facts to people would change minds. As a budding activist, that bit of wisdom saved me years of learning the hard way.”

Erika did make a note that as a freelance filmmaker, you face many hard decisions. To do the interview with Gloria Steinem, she had to turn down a well paying commercial, but she is glad that she did. Erika said that, “Sometimes the projects we work on affect more than our IMDb page. They touch our souls.”

Erika is now a member of Local 600 and is currently working on segments for Saturday Night Live and a documentary titled “Equal Means Equal”, all while teaching Camera I: Practices & Principles of Cinematography. When she is not working on her multiple projects, Erika is watching Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes in between the new season of BBC’s Sherlock. When asked, “If you could go back in time and give your college self any advice, what would it be?”, she replied, “I would ask myself the question I now ask my students: ‘What is your burning question?’” Erika wants students to not be caught up in worrying about a career before they have graduated and take the time in college to experiment and find their voices. “Figuring out your essential question, which can change over time, and answering it helps you find your purpose in your work.”

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