Everyone has access to a pen and paper, but to be a great writer is difficult.

Witnessing is the essence of being a documentary filmmaker. Capturing moments in time; never knowing how history will judge them.

My advice to emerging documentary filmmakers would be: try to find other people, a group, a cooperative that you can work with. Filmmaking is hard and lonely and decidedly unglamorous. Find like-minded souls and share the joy and the misery.

If you make a great film full of emotion, of pathos, people want to continue to know more, to work harder.

I believe that those who believe in the power of human rights must find new ways to address economic injustice - and on a scale commensurate with the millions of people around the world that are mired in poverty.

I'm both an artist / filmmaker and a human rights defender.

Celebrate your victories and mark your defeats. Ultimately documentary filmmaking is not a job, it's a calling.