Faculty & Staff
Learn from the best! Our Academy staff consists of top-tier instructors with impressive backgrounds in filmmaking, movie production, photography, multimedia design and digital media. Get the chance to work side-by-side with industry professionals who have worked on blockbusters like Black Hawk Down, Planet of the Apes and Minority Report, university-level documentary film curriculum developers and staff members who have worked in conjunction with major production companies like Participant Media (An Inconvenient Truth, Waiting for Superman). Through their experiences, our staff has demonstrated technical and instructional excellence, and each member looks forward to mentoring a new group of iD Visual Arts Academy students this summer season. Check back regularly as we add content to these pages on an ongoing basis for the locations held at Stanford and Vassar College.
iD Visual Arts Academy, San Francisco Bay Area
Erin P.
Academy Director, iD Visual Arts Academy, San Francisco Bay Area
While working on her thesis documentary at San Francisco State University’s MFA program, Erin combines her passion for documentary film with her interest in teaching students the tenets of film production and cinema studies. Her previous films have screened in 17 festivals covering 11 countries and she has developed curriculum for several courses at the University. Erin has also worked with the U.S. Department of State and the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs to design and teach 10 workshops on scriptwriting, digital filmmaking and post-production in Kenya and Uganda. With her deep commitment to provocative documentary filmmaking and education, she intends to change how people interact with their community, other cultures and one another.
Zara A.
Instructor
Zara Ahmed earned her Bachelor’s Degree of Fine Arts from Chapman University in Film Production and French; she has worked on several productions that have played at festivals all over the world. In 2009, Zara traveled to Brazil where she was the Co-Director and Co-Editor for Ritmo do Morumbi, a short documentary filmed in Sao Paulo. The thesis documentary that she edited, entitled When I’m Not Alone has garnered awards from all over the nation, and was a recent winner of the Loreen Arbus Focus on Disability presented by the Emmy Foundation. During her undergraduate years, Zara spent a semester abroad in France where she interned at the Cannes Film Festival. After graduating, Zara went to Lyon, France to teach English, and to work as an Assistant Editor for a French production company named Lesfilmentropes, cutting experimental shorts and translating films into English. Zara most recently worked as a production assistant for an upcoming documentary entitled Last Call at the Oasis, which is being produced in conjunction with Participant Media (An Inconvenient Truth, Waiting for Superman) and the filmmakers who made Food, Inc.
Roberto F.
Instructor
Roberto began his visual arts education at an early age when he enrolled at Lucchetti Visual Arts High School in San Juan, Puerto Rico. While at school, he was formally trained in drawing, sculpting, painting and photography. It was during those six years of intensive art education that he fell in love with capturing images with a camera, and eventually graduated high school specializing in photography. From there, Roberto went on to further his education majoring in Film Production at Emerson College in Boston. After college Roberto moved to Los Angeles to work in Film (directing music videos) and TV production (E! TV and Univision). After winning 3 Emmy awards for graphic design in TV news, in 2005 Roberto decided to pursue a full-time career in photography. Today he enjoys mentoring new talent while combining his visual arts skills in his photography projects.
iD Visual Arts Academy, New York
Kristopher K.
Academy Director, iD Visual Arts Academy, New York
Kris is a Visual FX editor with 10 years of experience working in the film industry. He has worked on over 20 films with Directors such as Ridley Scott, Stephen Spielberg and Tim Burton to name a few. His film credits include Planet of the Apes, Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down. Kris also has extensive experience in commercials and music videos. Aside from his industry experience, Kris also volunteers as the head coach for the Thousand Oaks High School surf team and has spent several summers working with teens at residential summer camps hosted by the YMCA.
Check back soon for more faculty profiles.
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