2018

Throughout his life, JJ Strother has fought through emotional and physical adversity. Raised in Rochester by a single mother, he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. Despite JJ’s challenges, his driven attitude and independence allow him to use basketball as a motivating outlet towards several goals in his life.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Chinatown in Washington, D.C. has been a product of gentrification over the last several decades. The Chinese community that once thrived in the neighborhood has become lost and priced out from within its roots. A majority of the Chinese that once lived there have moved to the suburbs in Maryland and Virginia. Many of the roughly 300 Chinese inhabitants and 20 Chinese shops that still stand in Chinatown feel out of place in an area that is now filled with bars, American chain restaurants and high-end clothing stores.

Roles: Photographer, Editor

Parker Booth is one of 2,000 Iroquois people living just south of Syracuse in the Onondaga Nation, and remains dedicated to traditional indigenous ways of life.  In an effort to aid his community in preserving their native culture, Parker has dedicated his time to learn and pass the traditions on to others. As a planter, an apprentice, and a father, Parker does all he can to learn as much as he can before the elders with the traditional knowledge are no longer there.  

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Liz Randolph faces a unique set of challenges as she navigates classes in her first semester of college. Liz has a mitochondrial disease that inhibits her cells to produce enough energy for her entire body. Despite her lack of energy and a feeding tube that sets off the library metal detector at school, Liz has enjoyed college because it’s given her independence and “a very much needed sense of normalcy.”

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Lulu and Oscar Brewer struggle with poverty and addiction and are placing all their hopes for recovery on their newborn baby, Peggy Marie. Through the help of local shelters and advocacy groups, they've begun the uphill battle of bettering their lives and attempting to disrupt the cycle of poverty in their family.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

After becoming the first Cuban circus clown to perform with the Ringling Brothers Circus, Joan Fernandez Cabrera, 30, saw that dream disappear this past May when he learned that the 146-year-old circus closed its curtains for good. He and 500 clowns, acrobats, and stage crew members were left scrambling for new jobs at the end of an era. Motivated by the American value system, he looks for new success back in his home country by joining the Cuban National Circus.

Roles: Videographer, Photographer, Editor

Valentina and Valeria Rosero are two eleven-year-old girls whose lives are affected by Colombia’s fifty-year civil war with guerrillas and paramilitaries. The girls’ mother, Olga, raised her daughters in the depth of poverty after Olga’s family was killed. But, Valentina and Valeria live a unique life, where they spend much of the week at The Cultivando Sonrisas Foundation, which provides the girls with care and education while their mother works long days and nights.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Blake Ressler, my twin brother, struggles to find his identity as he faces the implications of serious mental illness, as I document the journey of his cycle in and out of treatment. Finally, Blake’s drug addiction and gender transition reach a chaotic climax.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Andrea’s own journey with an eating disorder serves as a professional motivation to give back to others who are struggling with the disease. Her desire to give back to those who helped her is driven not only by her own recovery but the recovery of others as well. Andrea wishes to not use her last name in this story.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Jim Swan is a homeless man living on the far end of a homeless tent encampment next to a highway in Rochester. Struggling with the effects of his wife’s disease and his own mental health, Jim is beginning the transition back into permanent housing.

Roles: Videographer, Editor

Three Kosovar women struggle to raise their families in a former prison that has been converted into a shelter for those in need. Each of the women and their families has come to live in the prison for unique reasons, but also share many of the same challenges as they represent the downward current that pulls disadvantaged and neglected Kosovars to live in such conditions.

Roles: Photographer, Editor