Sheila Sofian

<p>Sheila M. Sofian creates films that investigate social issues utilizing a unique hybrid of animation and documentary. She has produced, directed, and animated six independent animated films. Sofian has received grants from the <em>Guggenheim Foundation, Rockefeller Media Arts Fellowship,</em> and the <em>Pew Fellowships in the Arts</em>, among others<em>.</em> Her award-winning films have been exhibited internationally.</p> <p>Her films have won numerous awards and have exhibited internationally, including at MoMA, Annecy Animation Festival, Hiroshima International Animation Festival, Zagreb Animation Festival, and CaixaForum in Barcelona, Spain. She received a Special Recognition Award for her body of work in 2011 at the CINETORO Film Festival in Colombia. Her films are distributed educationally and in home video markets.</p> <p>Ms. Sofian is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Southern California, where she teaches animation and a Documentary Animation Production course. She holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA in from the California Institute of the Arts.</p> <p>For the first time Sofian integrates live action footage with animation in <em>Truth Has Fallen</em>, a 60-minute documentary about three people who were convicted for murders they did not commit. The film examines their cases and weaknesses in our justice system. Painted animation expresses the fury and grief of their testimony, and represents their version of events. Surreal live action film portrays the experts&rsquo; testimony, providing a more detached perspective. &ldquo;Truth Has Fallen &ldquo; exposes causes of wrongful convictions, such as the inaccuracy of eyewitness identification, the unreliability of &ldquo;snitch&rdquo; testimony, and forced confessions. Experts advocate for relatively simple changes to our justice system in order to reduce the rate of wrongful convictions. </p> <p>After more than ten years of production, &ldquo;Truth Has Fallen&rdquo; is very near completion. This labor of love represents an enormous amount of frame-by-frame animation- over 30 minutes of footage (more than 22,000 individual paintings.). Sofian has succeeded in completing all of the animation and live action footage, despite maintaining a full-time job and traveling to work-related festivals and conferences.</p> <p>More information is available at www.truthhasfallenmovie.com.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><img style="vertical-align: middle;" title="Truth Has Fallen animation still" src="http://d2oadd98wnjs7n.cloudfront.net/medias/351650/pictures/full/20120724180849-IMG_1966.jpg?1343178533" alt="Woman behind bars." width="400" height="300" /></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><a href="http://www.sheilasofian.com/">www.sheilasofian.com</a><br /> <a href="http://www.truthhasfallenmovie.com/">www.truthhasfallenmovie.com</a></p> <p><a title="Sheila M. Sofian Vimeo Channel" href="https://vimeo.com/sofafilms">https://vimeo.com/sofafilms</a></p>

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