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Director & Producer
Self-shooting documentary director and producer, based in London and at work across Africa, the Middle East, South America and Asia, building films from observational footage and honest interviews, usually in places most crews don't reach.
I've spent the last fifteen years directing and producing films in places most crews don't go: the rocky deserts of eastern Sudan, the grasslands of north-west Cameroon, the side streets of Kinshasa. My background is in observational documentary: I work mostly as a self-shooting director, building a film from a run of honest interviews rather than a script written in advance.
Since 2011 I've worked for broadcasters, NGOs, agencies and corporates who need a crew that can travel light, earn trust quickly, and come home with something true, most of it through my own production company, Sketch Films. I manage the whole process, from client relationships, international shoots, permits and risk assessments, through filming and post-production to final delivery.
Recently at the BBC, I commissioned and produced Climate Guardians, a six-part series for BBC Studios / BBC Earth, made with local filmmaking teams, the majority of them women directors.
A six-part series for BBC Studios / BBC Earth following women protecting the natural world: the seaweed farmers of Zanzibar, the Black Mambas of Kruger, the women firefighters of West Borneo. Plus Open Cinema, Channel 4's 3 Minute Wonder strand.
Documentary films for Start Network, WaterAid, AMREF Africa, Muslim Aid, the British Council and the Cabinet Office, including a rice farmer in Le Point Chaud, Kinshasa, and the launch of a women-only taxi firm in the same city.
A series of entrepreneur profile films for Helios Towers across five countries, plus work for Helios Investment Partners, Africa's leading private equity fund focused on the continent.
An animation series translating policy research for a US foreign-policy think tank into short, shareable films, on deepfakes, the Russian Covid vaccine, and geopolitics in the Pacific.
I'm always glad to hear about new projects: documentary, NGO, corporate or animation, in the UK or on location.
jeremy@sketchfilms.co.uk