Live the Dream

 Live the Dream

Live the Dream

The Documentary Laboratory for Creative Non-Fiction Film (The Doc Lab) is the creation of an eclectic group of filmmakers and scholars who together have garnered three George Foster Peabody Awards, two National Emmy nominations, and whose works have been broadcast nationally on HBO, POV, Independent Lens, CNN, the BBC, and at film festivals around the globe.

We, the Doc Lab faculty and students, are a collection of outlaws, intellectuals, renegades, geeks, and artists who believe in innovation and transformative beauty and in the power of true stories told through moving images and carved from the real events around us.

Documentary filmmakers have been called “The Justice League of filmmaking.” Unconventional and rogue, we are committed to social justice and to creating a better world through our art; we challenge authority. We work together as a community and in common cause for the greater good. We believe the documentary form can and must explore the drama, darkness, madness, hope, and love inherent in the human condition.

The Doc Lab is looking for students with grit and determination. With imagination and heart.  And with the commitment to transform lives through their work.

Jumpstart your career as a documentary filmmaker by learning how to tell impactful stories through the medium of film. You will learn how to approach every stage of the creative process. Our short application is designed to get you thinking what the program can offer you.

As you chart your path through the possibilities open to you as a documentary filmmaker, discover more about our program’s philosophy and what we offer to our students as they learn the craft of making films and sharing their work with the world.  

As you chart your path through the possibilities open to you as a documentary filmmaker, discover more about our program’s philosophy and what we offer to our students as they learn the craft of making films and sharing their work with the world.  

Our faculty are diverse award-winning filmmakers whose work and experience cover a wide range of approaches to telling non-fiction stories through moving images and finding ways to distribute their work.