Show Me Democracy

Dan Parris is an award-winning filmmaker and owner of Speak Up Productions, a St. Louis based film production company focused on documentaries and media content for non-profits. He’s the director of the feature length documentaries When the Saints, Show Me Democracy and the award-winning film What Matters? Dan was the closing speaker at the 2014 TEDxGatewayArch City 2.0 event. Most recently, Dan co-founded the non-profit, Continuity, whose mission is to expand diversity in media production.

So Hot Productions is the production company of Grammy award-winning artist/songwriter/producer J.R.. With credits including a Grammy Award for his work on Hip Hop artist Lecrae’s album Gravity, to his three Stellar Awards and two Dove Awards, J.R. has had an exciting and rewarding career thus far. His career highlights include working with some of the industry’s best musicians, songwriters and artists like St Louis natives, Nelly and The St Lunatics, Andy Mineo, Kenny Lattimore, Emilio Roas, Tye Tribbet, Da Truth, Thisl and Flame just to name a few. You can hear and see his work on media outlets such as BET, MTV, GMC, DayStar and more.

Kyle Montgomery has over a decade of leadership and management experience working for a Top Fortune 100 company. Since leaving the corporate world, he has been consulting startups and helping make their dreams a reality through his company KJ Media. He works full-time as business manager and producer for Speak Up Productions and is the co-founder of Continuity.

Botka Collective is a husband and wife led creative team based in Denver, CO. They specialize in purpose-driven short form animation and narrative content, working with a variety of non-profit organizations and small businesses.

Joey Jetton is a commercial cinematographer and professional sports shooter. He’s worked as a freelancer with Speak Up Productions for the last five years on numerous projects.

Quinsonta Boyd is an independent videographer. His passion for film led him to create a short documentary screened in the Saint Louis Filmmakers showcase in 2013. Since then, Quinsonta has done work with organizations such as STL Artworks, The Saint Louis Scholarship Foundation, and Speak Up Productions through his company, Boyd Media.

Sean Loftin is a filmmaker who began a career in photojournalism with several newspapers, as well as teaching kindergarten, first, and second grades. Most recently he has started his own film company in St. Louis called Ubertonic Films, and has focused on storytelling in the city.

Darnell Brown  is an independent photographer and filmmaker and the owner of Forgotten Image Media.

Sam Maul is an audio engineer at Shock City Studios, one of the St. Louis region’s premier audio facilities. His work ranges from recording rock bands to producing podcasts and everything in between - Show Me Democracy is the first documentary he’s had the pleasure of mixing.

Soon after graduating from Biola University’s film program, Chris worked as the sound editor and mixer on The Black Dawn which was picked up by Hulu. Since then he has worked on a number of other films, including the documentary What Matters? which has been shown all over the country. For his day job, Chris works as an audio supervisor overseeing and mixing for live events.

Evan Schneider is a freelance colorist based in Los Angeles, California. His interest in cameras and editing led him to attend Biola University in Southern California to study Cinema and Media Arts. Evan’s freelance career boosted off of an internship at one of LA’s top color facilities, and he now spends his time coloring feature films, commercial projects, music videos, and weddings.