Julia Doran
"But the summer after high school I interned at Vanity Fair and I reconsidered. I was in awe of the talent there and decided to pursue work in publishing. Being only 17 years old it opened my eyes to a whole industry."
"As an intern [at the magazine], I expected to be fetching coffee and doing the photocopying…But it's funny, coffee is serious business not necessarily entrusted to the interns! And I was surprised to actually do some work. I worked mostly in the editorial department doing some background research. It was a great learning experience in the breadth of detail that goes into putting a long narrative together."
"I ended up doing internships throughout my undergraduate studies with a whole slew of publications. I worked as an editorial clerk with Ottawa Life and then Maclean’s magazine in Toronto. And after graduating from university, I was the copy editor for a small, grassroots publication, Updown Magazine. But despite all that, my next step was actually in online advertising at 24/7 in Toronto."
"After working in media for the year, I decided to go travelling, which is when I started to get more heavily into photography. And when I got back to Canada I sent out applications to journalism schools. It was during the application process I realized I wanted to use all mediums to tell stories, and that's how I came to the News and Documentary program at NYU."
"Our first class we watched Lixin Fan's 'Last Train Home,' and I remember thinking, 'I want to make long-form films like this.'"
"My short, 'The Gangs of Brooklyn’, was one of the first videos I created at NYU. It's about this revival breed of biker gangs that are, part hipster, but mostly just about riding around on mopeds. I was pleased with how this piece came out aesthetically. More importantly, I really enjoyed doing it - though I was still learning how to shoot and produce."
"Because the college program I was in is so focused on how to be a one-man-show, you don't really get an insight into all of the different roles in production and post-production. So during the summer, while working on my thesis project, I reached out to the filmmaker Margaret Brown who was doing a feature documentary on the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico."
"Working with Margaret, I actually got to see how the different roles in a production come together, the different boundaries. Like, what role a director plays exactly, and how the editor helps to shape the story. It gave me insight into the structure of a large production."
"Then during my final term, I interned with CBS' '48 Hours' unit. That gave me a different view of production on a large scale. Again I worked mostly as a researcher but was exposed to the role of a producer or story editor within a larger media organization."
"I don't think it's too surprising that I want to tell stories…I come from a large boisterous family full of charismatic people! No journalists specifically, but certainly storytellers."
"For the past two years I have also been a contributing editor for Discosalt Magazine. I produced 'Inside the Bicycle Film Festival' with fellow editor Joseph Vele for Discosalt.6”
“And the short 'Sound of Vision' was a product of the International Doc Challenge. A former classmate and I had wanted to participate in a timed, documentary competition. So in 2012, a group of us from NYU, as well as Joseph Vele, competed and won with a short that explores the experiences of a blind man living in New York City."
"Our team was made up of five filmmakers who were used to working on their own, so we all jumped in, getting involved in every aspect of the production. We developed two script drafts, but since the visuals were so important to the narrative, the edit ultimately evolved organically. With something like the Doc Challenge you know you can’t go back and get more shots - there isn't the time - so you tend to shoot as much as you can and then hunker down to get through the edit. I know it’s a pretty inefficient way to do it, but that’s what the Challenge is all about."
"To our surprise, 'Sound of Vision' won Best Film, Best use of Genre, Best Cinematography, Best Editing and the POV Audience Award…Doing this type of challenge is so rewarding when it comes together."
Julia is as a freelance producer and filmmaker. She currently works at Thomson Reuters. 'Sound of Vision' will air on the PBS Online Film Festival on March 17th, as well as the Atlanta Film Festival at the end of March.