Jason Benjamin was born in New York City and educated at The City University of New York. He received a BA in Sculpture and an MFA in Documentary film. He worked as a welder for 11 years and then became a boom operator. For the past 14 years, he has quietly observed a wide-ranging group of directors, actors and showrunners transform their stories from script to screen. SUITED is his directorial debut.

Mehrdad Oskouei is an Iranian filmmaker, producer, photographer and researcher born in Tehran in 1969 and later graduating in film direction from the University of Arts.  His films have been screened at numerous festivals both at home and abroad to great critical acclaim, making him one of the major Iranian documentary makers. In 2010 Oskouei received the Dutch Prince Claus Award for his achievements. He is a founding member of the Institute of Anthropology and Culture and has sat on several international film festival juries as well as being a cultural ambassador for the United Nation’s humanitarian committee UCHA. He also teaches at film schools around Iran and is active in the Tehran Arts and Culture Association.

Kristi Jacobson is an award-winning filmmaker whose films capture nuanced, intimate and provocative portrayals of individuals and communities. Her newest film, SOLITARY, an unprecedented look at life inside a supermax prison, will premiere at the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival. Jacobson’s film A Place at the Table, premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and was released theatrically by Magnolia Pictures in over 35 US cities. The film, which examines the shocking paradox of hunger in the wealthiest nation on earth through the very personal stories of three American families who face food insecurity daily, won the IDA’s prestigious Pare Lorentz Award and was nominated for Best Feature Documentary by the Producers Guild of America. Produced by Participant Media, the film is the cornerstone of a multi-year campaign to end hunger in the US.

Kate Trumbull-LaValle is an independent documentary filmmaker who first began in the field of social justice media as an educator and program coordinator for the Media Arts Center San Diego. She is associate producer for PBS's No Más Bebés (Los Angeles Film Festival, 2015) and is the director and producer of Ovarian Psycos (SXSW, 2016). In 2013 she co-founded Sylvia Frances Films with Joanna Sokolowski.

Joanna Sokolowski is an independent documentary filmmaker. She co-produced the film Very Semi Serious (Tribeca, 2015), and has worked as a producer at Walking Iris Media and Open Studio Productions. She formed Sylvia Frances Films with her filmmaking partner Kate Trumbull-LaValle in 2013 to producer their first feature: Ovarian Psycos (SXSW, 2016) .

After an award-winning career as a photojournalist, Maisie turned her attention to filmmaking. In 2014 her short film, T​he Last Clinic was nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy, and she was listed as one of PDN InMotion’s 20 Emerging Artists to Watch in Film and Video. In 2012, her multimedia project, Half-Lives: Chernobyl Workers Now won an Overseas Press Club award. In 2010, her short film A ​Life Alone was nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy. She has taught as an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. Most recently, she worked as a director of photography on MTV's documentary series, True Life.

Eric Juhola founded the film and television production company Still Point Pictures and produced the Gotham Award-nominated documentary Off the Grid: Life on the Mesa, winning 8 best documentary prizes at festivals around the world, followed by a theatrical release and US broadcast on the Sundance Channel. Eric is also the producer of the ITVS/PBS documentary Broken Heart Land which premiered at the Frameline Film Festival and aired on PBS WORLD Channel’s series America ReFramed in 2014. 

A multifaceted documentary filmmaker, Craig Atkinson is a notable producer, editor and cinematographer. Most recently, Craig was an additional cinematographer on the documentary Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You. Craig also produced and was the co-cinematographer on the feature-length documentary Detropia, a lyrical exploration of the city of Detroit trying to reinvent itself in a post-manufacturing United States. The film premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and won the Editing Award for U.S. Documentary. Detropia went on to win 10 additional awards worldwide and was short-listed for an Academy Award. While in Detroit, Craig was also a cinematographer on The Education of Muhammed Hussein, a 40-minute short documentary exploring the Muslim population in the Detroit area. The film, made for HBO, was short-listed for an Academy Award in 2012. Earlier in his career, Craig was Enat Sidi’s (The Wolfpack, Jesus Camp) assistant editor during 12th and Delaware, an HBO film that takes a compelling look at the ongoing abortion debate in America. The film was an official selection at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. Craig holds an MA in Visual Media Arts from Emerson College.

Michael Collins is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker and the founder of Thoughtful Robot, a production company specializing in documentary films. His​ film​ Give Up Tomorrow won the Audience Award and a Special Jury​ Mention for Best New Director at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival and was nominated for a 2013 News & Documentary Emmy Award for Outstanding Investigative Journalism.

Jamal Joseph is a full Professor of Professional Practice and former chair of Columbia University’s Graduate Film Program. He is the Executive Artistic Director of New Heritage Theater and Films and the Founder of the acclaimed Impact Repertory Youth Theater of Harlem. He is an alum of the Sundance Directing Lab and the Third World Newsreel Film and Video Workshop. He serves on the advisory boards of the Tribeca Film Institute, Imagenation, the Ghetto Film School and the Maysles Film Institute.