Jonathan Olshefski (Director)

Jonathan Olshefski is an artist and documentary filmmaker.

His debut feature documentary, QUEST was nominated for two News and Documentary Emmys in 2019. The film premiered in competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival and went on to screen at over 75 festivals nationally and internationally.

In 2017 he was named as one of 25 New Faces in Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine and mentioned in the New York Times as one of “The 9 New Directors You Need to Watch.” In 2018 he received the “Truer Than Fiction Award” at the Independent Spirit Awards and was selected for a Pew Artist Fellowship.

Olshefski strives to tell intimate and nuanced stories that honor his subjects’ complexity by employing a production process that emphasizes collaboration, dialogue, and relationship in order to amplify their voices and reflect their points of view in an artful way.

He has an MFA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University and is an Associate Professor at Rowan University where he teaches in the department of Radio, TV, and Film. He lives in Philadelphia with his two sons.

You can view his portfolio here: olshefski.org

Sabrina Schmidt Gordon (Producer)

Sabrina Schmidt Gordon is an award-winning documentary filmmaker. Her editing debut won an Emmy for WGBH’s “Greater Boston Arts” series and she has continued to distinguish herself as a producer, editor, and now, director. She is the Co-Director/Producer and Editor of BaddDDD Sonia Sanchez, winner of Best Film Directed by a Woman of Color at the 2015 African Diaspora International Film Festival. Sabrina is also the Co-Producer and Editor of DOCUMENTED, the story of Pulitzer Prize-winning undocumented journalist, Jose Antonio Vargas. The film had record viewership for its CNN broadcast, received Oscar buzz, and was nominated for the NAACP Image Award for Best Documentary Film. Other credits include Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was named in the Chicago Tribune’s “Best Documentaries of 2007, The New Black, and The New Mad Men, which won the 2015 Imagen Award for Best National Informational Program. Sabrina is on the board of the Yale Visual Law Project with Fred Wiseman and Alex Gibney, and teaches documentary filmmaking at the Columbia University School of Journalism and the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

Lindsay Utz (Editor)

Lindsay Utz is an award-winning documentary film editor. Her film, American Factory (dir. Steven Bognar & Julia Reichert) premiered at Sundance in 2019 and won the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2020. Prior to this film, she edited QUEST (dir. Jonathan Olshefski), a longitudinal portrait of a family from North Philadelphia, ten years in the making. QUEST premiered at Sundance in 2017 to wide critical acclaim and the film went on to win top prizes at multiple prestigious festivals. In 2018 Lindsay won the Cinema Eye Honors award for Outstanding Achievement in Editing for her work on the film. QUEST had its television broadcast as the opening film for POV's 2018 summer season. Her other credits include the Oscar-shortlisted Bully (Tribeca FF 2011), First Position (TIFF 2011), Buoy (Ashland FF 2013), In Country (Full Frame 2014), two Emmy-nominated FRONTLINE episodes (PBS 2015/2016) and multiple shorts for the New York Times. In 2012 Utz was awarded the Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship, named in honor of Errol Morris's late editor. She teaches Advanced Documentary Editing as a part of Northwestern University's MFA in Documentary Media program and is currently serving as an advisor to the selection committee for the Sundance Institute Documentary Fund. 

Christopher "Quest" Rainey
(Original Music)

I've been into music since the 80's from breakdancing to beatboxing. Over the years I watched hip hop change  in to many different avenues hard core, new jack. chanting, and many others. But all still to be under one main title: RAP!

I created Everquest Recordings as a way to help the teens in my area. But it grew into something more, a family. My name is Chris but friends over the years gave me different titles according to how we met. I guess they all settled on "Quest" (named after the studio). Through music I met David Barnes. A staple on 96.1 & 900am WURD’s "The New World View" radio program. Every Sunday evening 6pm - 8pm. also became a cohost on that program. I directed a video shoot starring Pep Shooter co-starring Meek Mill called Daily on the Block. I’ve been doing studio recordings for people for almost 20 years with local celebrities like Ron Geez, D Mack Kings, and our very own 23P. I'm probably the oldest studio fixture in my area with tons of music just waiting to be heard from past and present artists!

Everquest Recordings:
Freestyle Friday venues weekly since 2012!
https://soundcloud.com/queue-c-rainey
https://soundcloud.com/2300pj-698904395
http://facebook.com/everquestrecordings

T. Griffin (Original Score)

T. Griffin has composed scores for over 40 feature length films, and dozens of live and multimedia projects. Notable titles include the Academy-Award nominated LIFE, ANIMATED and multiple festival award winners QUEST, THE OVERNIGHTERS, and WELCOME TO LEITH as well as the recently Oscar Shortlisted ONE OF US. He has composed and performed live film/music events with filmmakers including Sam Green, Jem Cohen, Brent Green and Esther Robinson. These shows have toured internationally and been presented by The Barbican, BAM Next Wave, The Walker Art Center, The Melt Down Festival, Big Ears Festival, and dozens of other festivals and museums. Besides his work as a film composer and solo artist he has worked as a player and/or producer with luminaries of the independent music world including Patti Smith, Vic Chesnutt, Mary Margaret O'Hara and members of The Ex, Dirty Three, Fugazi and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. He was a fellow at the Sundance Composers' Lab in 2008, and has twice been nominated for Cinema Eye Honors for Original Music Score. He is based in Brooklyn, New York.

Ellen Knechel (Assistant Editor)

Ellen is an independent filmmaker and editor based in NYC. She is currently editing the feature documentary, Border South (Dir. Raúl Paz Pastrana). Ellen was recently selected as a mentee in the 2018 class of the Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship’s Diversity in the Edit Room Program. She participated at the 2017 Camden/TFI Filmmaker Retreat, the 2017 DocsMX Docs Labs in Mexico City, and she is a Flaherty Film Seminar alumnus. She holds an MFA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University.