Rough Cut
Conversations with documentary filmmakers and video journalists about their creative process—successes, failures, and what they’ve learned along the way. Created by the global filmmaking collective The Video Consortium, Rough Cut is a guide to navigating today’s ever-changing media landscape.
- Update frequency
- every 27 days
- Average duration
- 35 minutes
- Episodes
- 71
- Years Active
- 2019 - 2025
When Subjects Change their Relationship with your Film
Indian filmmakers Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh were pleasantly surprised when their independent feature doc Writing with Fire swept up awards, including at Sundance, and became the first Indian fe…
What Do Filmmakers Owe Their Subjects?
What Do Filmmakers Owe Their Subjects?
Souki Mehdaoui is a documentary filmmaker, DP, and subject coordinator. Her cinematography can be seen on Netflix, HBO, New York Times, and the Sundance-premier…
Two Documentaries on the Same Subject?
It's a scenario most documentary filmmakers dread: someone else is covering the same story. Dueling documentaries are becoming more common, but is competition always bad for filmmakers?
Director Jenne…
The Relationship between Filmmaker and Subject
A documentary filmmaker's relationship with their film's participants, or "subjects", is one of the most important but challenging parts of making a film. The director might have to consider: What ar…
Licensing Music For Your Film
This episode is all about music in film—choosing the right tracks, licensing music, music supervision, and more.
We sat down with all star Music Supervisor Justin Feldman, whose credits include The L…
How to Create a Film Festival Strategy
You've finished a film. Now how do you get it programmed at your preferred festival?
Samah Ali is a film festival strategist, meaning she works with documentary directors and producers to achieve the…
Jon Gerberg on Covering the War in Ukraine
Jon Gerberg is an award-winning video journalist on the national and investigative beats. He joined The Washington Post in 2017 and was previously a foreign affairs producer at the “PBS NewsHour.” He…
Chloe Gbai on What Makes a Great Documentary Short
*Republishing an old favorite*
Chloe Gbai is the director of If/Then, a Tribeca Film Institute initiative that gives grants and provides mentorship to filmmakers creating short documentaries. She was …
Poh Si Teng on What Makes a Strong Grant Application
Poh Si Teng is a documentary filmmaker and the Funds and Enterprise Program Director at IDA, one of the largest documentary grant funders. Before IDA, Poh worked as an independent filmmaker in India,…
Joe Posner on Building Vox Video
Since it launched in 2014, Vox Video has amassed nearly 10 million subscribers on YouTube, and has expanded to platforms like Netflix, HBO, and Quibi. Its new docu-series Level Playing Field, about t…
The Power of VR Documentaries
What kinds of stories are best told in virtual reality? Why is VR so effective, and how can emerging filmmakers get started with VR?
Gary Yost and Adam Loften lead The WisdomVR Project, a library of …
How to Negotiate a Fair Rate
As a freelancer, how do you negotiate a rate? What should you consider when setting a price? Doc filmmakers from both sides of the negotiation share their expertise in this special episode.
Guests:
Re…
Hao Wu on Directing a Film Remotely
Hao Wu is an award-winning documentary filmmaker born and raised in China. His most recent film, 76 Days, documents Wuhan’s COVID-19 outbreak. The film is shot completely vérité with no interviews, …
Geeta Gandbhir on Authorship and Working with Editors
Geeta Gandbhir is a documentary director, producer, and editor who has been nominated for three Emmy Awards and has won two. As editor, she won a Primetime Emmy for Best Editing for Spike Lee's HBO …
Jeremy Workman: The Art of Trailer Editing
Jeremy Workman is a documentary filmmaker and founder of Wheelhouse Creative, a company that makes trailers for narrative films and documentaries. In this interview, Jennie and Jeremy discuss the thr…
Emily Strong: Sound in Documentary
Emily Strong is an NYC-based documentary filmmaker and freelance location sound mixer. She's contributed to Taylor Swift: Miss Americana and New York Times the Weekly, and was just listed in Doc NYC'…
Uptin Saiidi: What Works on Social Media
Uptin Saiidi was a multimedia journalist for CNBC for 7 years based in Singapore and Hong Kong. His videos about business and tech like this one about Singapore's Airport and this one about 'digital …
Julie Cohen on Making a Commercially Successful Documentary
Julie Cohen is a documentary filmmaker and television news producer. Most recently, she directed and produced RBG about Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, along with Columbia J school profess…
When the Personal is Political in Documentary Film
Director Nick Bruckman and Producer Amanda Roddy talk about their upcoming film, Not Going Quietly. The film follows activist Ady Barkan as he travels the country fighting for healthcare reform. Over…
Funding Your Film: How to Get Started
How do you get funding for your film before you have anything to show? In this episode, Jennie sits down with Co-founders Lisa Kleiner Chanoff and Bonni Cohen, and Senior Program Director Megan Gelst…