Raya Leary is a proud generalist who’s lived and worked in Seattle for 8+ years. She currently serves as project manager for local design firm Civilization, and was an owner of risograph publisher Cold Cube Press before leaving the company in 2016.

During her time at King County funder 4Culture, she focused on community outreach as a tool for advancing equity and inclusion. She served on a grant panel for the Washington State Arts Commission and consulted on community-driven efforts to place public art at the 23rd & Union Corridor which acknowledges African American history in the Central District.

Her interest in film has landed her in screening roles for both Tacoma Film Festival and Seattle Shorts, led to various positions on local productions, and ended in an annual FilmStruck subscription she can’t seem to give up.

Megan Griffiths is an independent filmmaker who received her MFA in Film Production from Ohio University School of Film before relocating to Seattle in 2000 and becoming part of the city’s burgeoning film community.  In 2010, Megan directed The Off Hours (starring Amy Seimetz, Scoot McNairy and Ross Partridge), which premiered at Sundance and went on to receive an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Cinematography as well as the Best Director Award from the Ourense Film Festival in Spain. In 2012, Megan directed Eden (starring Jamie Chung, Matt O’Leary and Beau Bridges), which premiered at South by Southwest Film Festival and won both the Audience Award and the Emergent Female Director award. Megan was the recipient of the 2012 Stranger Genius Award for Film.

Kiran Dhillon is a scientist, film enthusiast and community organizer. Since 2009, she has been a volunteer film festival organizer with Tasveer, which produces the 10-day Tasveer South Asian Film Festival, the largest South Asian film festival in the world. She has served in numerous capacities for Tasveer, including Festival Director, with experience in aspects of festival organization such as programming, community partnerships, volunteer management, logistics, sponsorship and marketing.

Kiran has a PhD in Genetics from the University of Washington and worked as a cancer researcher at the Fred Hutch for 8 years where she studied chemotherapy resistance in breast and ovarian cancers. At Fred Hutch, Kiran served in several leadership roles including Chair of the Student-Postdoc Advisory Committee, member of the Fred Hutch Diversity Council and co-Founder and Board Member of Hutch United, an organization that promotes under-represented and other minorities in the sciences. She played a key role in developing mentorship programs, a fellowship and, seminar series within Hutch United. Currently, she is the Director of Scientific Programs for the Rivkin Center for Ovarian Cancer where she oversees all things scientific including an international scientific grants program, international and regional scientific symposia, scientific communications and scientific content for community education program.

Matthew Dresden focuses on international and China law, with a focus on technology and entertainment law and Chinese transactional and IP work. He represents a wide range of companies, from start-ups to NYSE-traded companies. His work has included matters for film studios, cable channels, film and television production companies, video game developers, magazines, restaurants, wineries, international design firms, product manufacturers, outsourcing companies, and computer hardware and software companies.

Before attending law school, Matthew worked in Hollywood for eight years as an independent filmmaker and as a production executive for Roger Corman’s Concorde-New Horizons Pictures. Before that, he spent three years as a graduate student in computer science at Stanford University. He has also worked as a journalist, a transportation planner, a food critic, and a website designer.

Matthew was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. He spends his free time watching movies, hiking, cooking spicy food, and relaxing with his wife and daughter.

Sandy Cioffi is the founder and executive director of fearless360º, a new media and virtual reality production company in Seattle. Sandy recently founded and directed SIFFX 2016, a showcase of the most current and creative thinking in virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and 360° immersion. As a 2016 Stranger Genius Award nominee, Sandy has been recognized as a cultural innovator.

Sandy has produced and/or directed several films as a film and video artist, including the critically acclaimed Sweet Crude, Crocodile Tears, Terminal 187, and Just Us. She has worked with human rights organizations in using video as a documentation and verification tool – specifically providing video evidence during the 1998 Marching Season in Northern Ireland. She documented the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride in 2003. Sandy was also a frequent guest on the NPR show Rewind which ended production when host Bill Radke left Seattle for Los Angeles. Sandy has also created media design for live performance at the Annex Theater, Hugo House, The Seattle Repertory Theater and On the Boards.

Sandy has worked with young people extensively as an artist in residence and through the mentor/apprentice film program at the Langston Hughes Cultural Arts Center. As a long-time educator, she has also taught film at Seattle Central Community College, Seattle University, and Cornish College of the Arts.

John DeShazo is an actor, theatre and film technician, and woodworker.  He has collaborated creatively on projects with Northwest Film Forum, Annex Theatre, Typing Explosion, The Film Company, Megan Murphy, Matt Wilkins, Web Crowell, Herbert Bergel, Firehouse Theatre Project, Ampersand, Implied Violence, Empty Space Theatre, and Saint Genet.

AJ Epstein produces theatre, music and independent film through his company, The Ethereal Mutt, often exploring Science through Art. His credits include the off-Broadway shows An Oak Tree, with Tim Crouch, Mike Daisey’s How Theatre Failed America and his film and TV credits include Lynn Shelton’s We Go Way Back; Guy Maddin’s Brand Upon the Brain!; Tim Crouch’s England at The Henry; and Survival Skills. Seattle Weekly has named him Seattle’s Best Lighting Designer (2004), and his work as a designer and light artist have been seen in theatres and galleries worldwide. He sits on the boards of The Lark Center for Play Development in New York and Humanities Washington. He studied with Mabou Mines and toured with AC/DC, Rod Stewart and the Eagles. In 2010 he opened West of Lenin, an 88-seat black box theater in Seattle.

Nicholas Hanauer earned his degree in Philosophy from the University of Washington and has worked at the family-owned Pacific Coast Feather Company, where he continues to serve as Co-chair and CEO. In the 1980s he co-founded Museum Quality Framing Company, and in the 1990s he was one of the first investors in Amazon.com, where he served as adviser to the board until 2000. He founded gear.co, which merged with Overstock.com in 2003, and Avenue A Media, which was acquired by Microsoft in 2007. In 2000, Hanauer co-formed the Seattle-based venture capital company, Second Avenue Partners, which advises and funds early stage companies. He is the co-author, with Eric Liu, of The True Patriot, and co-founder of the League of Education Voters, a non-partisan political organization dedicated to improving the quality of public education in Washington. He serves on the boards of Cascade Land Conservancy, the University of Washington Foundation and the Biosphere2 climate research project.

Miriam Marcus produces independently financed feature film productions through her company, Moody Independent. Moody Independent develops original content and offers production management services to the film community. Miriam has produced 19 pictures since 2002 with budgets between $1M and $7M. Recent films include Altar Rock (2016), Grey Lady (2014), and Crooked Arrows (2012), including a slate of direct to TV movies for cable channels such as Lifetime and Ion Network. Miriam relocated to Seattle from the east coast 5 years ago and is thrilled to bring her experience as a producer to the NWFF community.

Filiz Efe McKinney is a woman filmmaker, a Turkish-born immigrant, and a Seattleite since 2008. She runs Brave Sprout, a partner organization to the Forum, producing educational and documentary films. When she’s not behind the camera or in front of her edit suite, you can find her teaching the next wave of budding documentarians. She also serves on the KUOW Puget Sound Public Radio Board of Directors to support the mission of creating a more informed public.

A multidisciplinary artist, Filiz holds a BFA in Cinematography, an MA in Communication Strategies and Public Relations, a Master of Communication in Digital Media, and is an Adobe Certified Expert in Premiere Pro CC.

Filiz is currently working on a documentary film and a series of community discussions that aim to spark a conversation on accent bias and how it affects individuals, and society more broadly, in our rapidly growing city.

Alan Pruzan is a founding partner of Forrest-Pruzan Creative, product invention studio specializing in games and toys. He was one of the original game-makers at ENTROS in Seattle, creating a wide variety of physical and social entertainment experiences. His background is in film and video arts, and he worked for many years in the media arts scene, both as a facilitator and as a multi-media artist.

Sudeshna Sen is a Seattle based filmmaker. Her films have screened at Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF), Outfest, Boston LGBT Film Festival (Wicked Queer), New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) and many others. Besides her own films, she has worked on several productions- SADIE (dir. Megan Griffiths SXSW 2018) MOPZ  (dir. Todd Rohal SIFF 2017) and AUTO (dir. Steven Schardt TriBeCa 2017) in recent years. She has a Ph.D in Classical Japanese literature. Previously she was Professor of Japanese literature and Visual Culture at University of Washington and University of Utah.

After a lengthy sojourn around the country, working on sets and collecting experiences, Nesib CB Shamah settled in the Pacific NW attending the Seattle Film Institute with a focus on cinematography. Highlights include: the music series Destination Unknown, feature music documentary Lemolo: A Beautiful Night, dark comedy Worst Laid Plans and producer of the sci-fi short Haskell. Most notably CB is the co-director and producer of the Emmy-nominated live music documentary Welcome to Doe Bay.

Peter J. Vogt is an award-winning filmmaker with over 30 years experience in the film industry. His work has premiered at festivals such as Sundance, New York Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival, and Bumbershoot, as well as art centers such as the Center On Contemporary Art. His work regularly runs on regional and local PBS, and his 2004 Up Thornton Creek aired nationally. Highlights include: Hype! which premiered at Sundance and achieved worldwide theatrical release; Nuts&Bolts, winner of a special jury prize at the 2000 Seattle Film Festival and shortlisted for the prestigious AFI’s digital film award. Peter is part owner of Optimistic Camera.

Jennessa started her production career working in episodic television for Warner Brothers Television, the FX Channel and CBS Television while living in Los Angeles. Jennessa later moved to Seattle, Washington and partnered to form Pressing Pictures, LLC – a production company dedicated to creating compelling commercial and narrative works. Jennessa’s producing credits include Lane 1974 which premiered at SXSW in 2017 and received distribution through The Orchard along with two grand jury prizes, My Last Year with the Nuns, which premiered at the 2014 Seattle International Film Festival with distribution through Fandor, Spin, a short film premiering at the Julien Dubuque International Film Festival and she co-produced the comedic web series Rocketmen. She is the Executive Producer for Stefanie Sparks’ comedy In Case of Emergency which won an audience award for best feature at the Bushwick Film Festival. Jennessa is currently developing Ahamefule Oluo’s highly anticipated film Thin Skin based on a true story which was featured on This American Life.