NikosKatsaounis
Here is some of the work I have directed, produced, shot or edited — thirty-five projects in the order I made them, each one its own film, and a hundred and eighty-nine photographs. Press play, or tap a frame, where it sits.
Nikos Katsaounis · documentary · based in New York, on the road
Before Greece · 2008 to 2010
01 · Co-produced, 2008
2012 Timefor Change
A film I co-produced in 2008. Two friends, a writer and an animator, go looking for a paradigm that puts the archaic wisdom of tribal cultures and the scientific method in the same room.
Co-produced by Nikos Katsaounis · interviews with Dean Radin, Paul Stamets, Sting, Ellen Page
02 · Animation sequence
AnimationSequence
The animation sequence from 2012 Time for Change, cut loose and kept as a film of its own.
From 2012 Time for Change, a film Nikos Katsaounis co-produced
03 · Short · MIT
TransmediaStorytelling
Henry Jenkins directs the Comparative Media Studies Program at MIT. He talks about the power of media in a trans-mediated century, where converging technologies and cultures make a new landscape.
Henry Jenkins on converging technologies and cultures
04 · Pilot · never commissioned
MoreThan Zero
A cross-media pilot I produced and co-wrote with Jonathan Stack, about what media does to the stereotype of a Muslim. Sadly it never grew up to be a real show or film.
Produced and co-written with Jonathan Stack
05 · Short film · India
RustCrust Dust
A short film about truck drivers in India. Seventy thousand kilometres of national highway, six hundred thousand long-distance drivers, and that is sort of what it is about.
“I mean, it's sort of about endurance, and back sweat. 39 hours in a cramped smelly box that vibrates nonstop.”
A short film about truck drivers in India
06 · Conference · Athens
TheΣymposium
Formed as a response to the challenges Greece has been facing. Bright fresh minds in one room, exchanging ideas and cross-pollinating them across disciplines.
That year's question: has technology empowered us from controlling our own narrative about life?
07 · Forty-three photographs · India
The Truckdriversof India
Some photographs from my travels with the truck drivers of India. Behind the risks and the poverty and the endurance there are these men, who stand on the edge with no support, and stare at you until you look away.
“70,000km of National Highway. 600,000 Long Distance Truck Drivers. that is sort of what this is about. Simply put, but that understates it.”
Forty-three photographs · India
08 · Online collective documentary · Greece
The PrismGR2011
In the summer of 2010, after years away from Greece, I went back, and with my good friend Nina produced and directed an online multimedia documentary. We put together a team of fourteen photojournalists and held a workshop introducing them to video. Together we made twenty-seven shorts and a feature.
A collective documentation of Greece, and the question I put on it: “what do you see through the The Prism?”
Produced and directed with Nina · theprism.tv
The Prism · the contact sheet · 105 photographs
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Twenty-seven shorts came out of one workshop. These ten kept their own page.
09–18 · The Prism GR2011 · shot 2010–11
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Insomnia
Athens at night lost its gloss, and a darker city grew in the narrow streets.
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Westbound
Greece is called the gate of illegal immigration to Europe. In 2010, 128,000 crossed.
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100+
He came home to Ikaria to die thirty years ago. The island had other plans.
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Once Upon a Time
On the mountain where Zeus was born, a lute player shows another way to live.
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Maria
Twenty, cerebral palsy, law student, swims for Greece, in a city with no ramps.
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The Writing on the Wall
More graffiti than any capital in Europe, and its pioneers argue it is not pollution.
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From a Distance
They left Athens for Kythira at different times. The island kept them both.
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Local
Bicycle riders reclaim the cement crust of Athens with guerilla films.
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Radical Youth
Twelve-year-olds throw stones at the Parliament. The film asks where the anger came from.
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MC Yinka
Born in Athens to Nigerian parents, he uses his lyrics as weapons.
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The other seventeen were woven into one feature, which is the next poster.
Twenty-seven shorts · one film
19 · Feature documentary · shot 2010–11
Krisis
Once the twenty-seven shorts were done, we wove them into a feature. It explores how Greece and the Greeks are handling the crisis, and it has been broadcast in eight countries.
Shot with DSLR cameras during 2010–11, and selected by more than thirty festivals.
Directed with Nina Maria Paschalidou · broadcast in eight countries · trailer
The road years · city guides and timelapses
20 · Video city guide · Daily Secret
AthensDaily Secret
The second of the video city guides, shot for Athens Daily Secret.
The second of the video city guides for Athens Daily Secret.
Custom directed and produced for Daily Secret · three digests
21 · Video city guide · Daily Secret
LimaDaily Secret
Part three of the series, custom directed and produced for Daily Secret.
Part 3 of the video city guide series DSV.
Custom directed and produced for Daily Secret · two digests
22 · Video city guide · Daily Secret
Buenos AiresDaily Secret
Part four, and the last of them, custom directed and produced for Daily Secret.
Part 4 of the video city guide series DSV.
Custom directed and produced for Daily Secret · three digests
23 · Timelapse · eight sequences
Timelapses
Timelapse sequences I filmed in the various places I have visited. Athens, Lima, Istanbul, Buenos Aires.
Six of them were never titled, so they are labelled here by what is in the frame and nothing more.
Eight sequences · Istanbul has its own page, and its own poster beside this one
24 · Timelapse · September 2012
Istanbul
One sequence kept its own page, and the old site wrote nothing under it.
So nothing is said for it here either: the film is the whole of what is known.
Istanbul, September 2012
25 · Photographs · 2007
Cuba2007
Photographs from my trip to Cuba in 2007. Ten of them.
No film to make, and no one had hired the camera.
Ten photographs · Cuba, 2007
26 · Photographs · 2008
Morocco2008
Photographs from my trip to Morocco in 2008. Seventeen of them.
The following year, the same camera and no brief.
Seventeen photographs · Morocco, 2008
27 · Webdoc series · Oregon, September 2018
Oregon GlobalEclipse
In September 2018 I had the privilege to witness my third total eclipse, in Oregon. I helped my dear friend Kevin produce the video capture of it.
Four of its six films have since gone from Vimeo.
Produced with Kevin · globaleclipse.tv
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28 · Feature documentary
The SecondWave
As head of video production at the festival, our documentation included this feature by Ryan Frame.
Directed by Ryan Frame · trailer
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29 · Australia · 2012
AustralianEclipse 2012
A short film I produced for a solar eclipse music festival in the Australian outback, November 2012.
Australian Eclipse 2012
After · 2017 onward
The light comes back, and the work carries on in other countries.
30 · Two short films
IRC
Two short films I produced for the IRC.
Syrian Voices from Greece · Lights Out in Syria
31 · Florida · art director
Okeechobee
I am the Art Director for Okeechobee Music x Arts Festival, in Florida.
Four teasers · three on Vimeo, one on YouTube · two festival frames below
32 · Feature · Northern Greece
Digger
A contemporary Western about a farmer who lives and works alone in a farmhouse in a mountain forest in Northern Greece. He fights an expanding industrial monster digging up the forest, and then the son he has not seen for twenty years arrives.
Directed by Georgis Grigorakis · Nikos Katsaounis, co-producer · Haos Film
33 · Cape Town · March 2023
Cloudline
In March 2023 I went to Cape Town to help produce a video for one of Timon Capital's portfolio companies. A story about autonomous airships bringing emergency services to places that are hard to reach.
Produced for a Timon Capital portfolio company
34 · TEDx · spring 2012
In the spring of 2012 I was invited to talk about the Prism: how you coordinate large groups of photographers to co-create one online documentary, for very little money.
TEDx · on YouTube
35 · Where it began
Here is some of the work I have directed, produced, shot or edited. For twenty years I have been fascinated with what new formats of storytelling could do. An Emmy, an honoree selection at the Webby Awards, a finalist place at the Pictures of the Year awards.
I am also a fund manager at Timon Capital, an early stage VC fund for early stage tech companies in Africa · based out of NYC, but on the road quite a bit