Washington, DC – The District of Columbia Office of Cable Television, Film, Music and Entertainment is pleased to honor award-winning producer and director Brandon Russell as the October Filmmaker of the Month.
Brandon Russell is an award-winning independent filmmaker and director of the web series The Beat & Path: Walk of Shame. A recent graduate of American University’s School of Communication, Russell received his MA in Producing Film and Electronic Media in 2014. Russell’s first interest in film and technology started as an adolescent growing up in Dover, Delaware. He paired that talent for technology with art at Wesley College, where he studied Media Arts for his undergraduate degree. Thereafter, Russell worked as a DJ for art events and worked as a freelance graphic designer.
The Beat & Path: Walk of Shame was funded via a successful crowdsourcing campaign featured on Kickstarter in 2013. The series has since circled film festivals including the Toronto Web Fest 2015, Miami Web Fest, Rome Web Fest, DC Web Fest and the upcoming Rio Web Fest. At the DC Web Fest it won awards for Local Hero and Audience Choice, and in Miami it won Best Music/Score and Best Supporting Actress (Stephanie Ray Glass). Walk of Shame also won an American University Visions award for editing and the series is nominated for best Cinematography at the Rio Web Fest. Most recently it is set to compete at the Brooklyn Web Fest where it is nominated for an Emerging Voice Award.
The six-episode online-only series depicts a modern coming of age tale told through the lens of DJ culture. The cast includes characters ranging from youthful bloggers to budding disc jockeys, and it covers topics of online dating and hipster fashion trends. Episodes are currently being released online with other transmedia content including mixtapes, original music and short web clips.
Brandon is currently working on building a “digital media collective” also named “The Beat & Path.” The project focuses on creating digital content across multiple platforms that caters to the increasing amount of “cord-cutter” viewers with an emphasis on emerging trends in film, music, and art. The collective has various projects in the works including several new web-series, mixtapes, and even a podcast. The collective is now partnering up with various DC organizations to bring awareness to burgeoning local art scene through the usage of new media platforms and events.
OCTFME launched the Filmmaker of the Month initiative to feature a District-based filmmaker who exemplifies the vast amount of talent and creativity based here in the nation’s capital. The Filmmaker of the Month initiative is part of OCTFME’s mission to elevate the national and international profile of the city’s most talented filmmakers. Previous filmmakers honored include ThinkFilm producer Jonathan Zurer; Fatback Films Founder Be Steadwell; and veteran award-winning husband and wife filmmakers Marilyn and Hal Weiner.
You can visit the Filmmakers of the Month section to learn more about Brandon and previous Filmmaker of the Month recipients.