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Auburn alumnus crafts new role in world of film by combining business skill with love for the camera

Media studies alumnus Matt Sakatani Roe '06 utilized his innovative business networking skills to make a name for himself in the entertainment industry as a director of photography.

Roe helped create an Imagine Dragons music video and helped direct a new movie coming out next year called "My Dead Friend Zoe," starring Morgan Freeman, Natalie Morales and Ed Harris. Recently, Roe took part in a passion project called "This Body is a Shell." The film is based around a director who has a very rare bone disability and makes an autobiographical experimental short film confronting her childhood self-image.

Growing up in Alabama, Roe spent his childhood messing around with his mom's handheld camera to make home movies. Even as he grew older and began to film parties and document friendships, having a career in film was just a fantasy.

"When I came to Auburn, I bought a camera and took still photography for fun, but then working at Eagle Eye kind of helped me find the ability to tell a narrative," Roe said. "Holly Lavenstein's class was really eye opening for me. We learned how to take an image and make it evocative, make an image that inspires an idea, and how to create a dialectic or deeper meaning."

After graduating in 2006, Roe moved to California and sought out different internships, trying to get his foot in the door. Quickly, Roe realized that the entertainment industry is more about networking than he realized.

"Basically, my industry is, you go into a cafeteria and you're the new kid in school and you see some kids at the cool interesting art table, and you try to find ways to navigate yourself into that community," Roe said. "It's a lot of networking. If you are a good people person or a good salesman, you will be successful. That's essentially what I am. I'm a salesman, but the product is myself and my ideas."

The director of photography position involves a large amount of management. To create an image that tells a story, Roe works with groups of all shapes and sizes to create an image that tells a story. This includes working with the art department, deciding what kind of furniture goes into a set and even what time of day something is shot.

"Trying to create sunlight in the middle of the night requires a lot of team members and collaboration, working with different positions, shaping lights and painting with shadows in color," Roe said. "Being a little bit of a business major, you kind of learn that management aspect of having to work with people because you can't do the job just by yourself."

As the digital age grows, TikTok and Instagram have become the new frontier of our media landscape. As the desire for traditional media declines, Roe has had to embrace the idea that viewership is changing drastically and collaborate with creators to appeal to this new media audience.

"I think what's most important is finding a group of collaborators and being open to networking and putting yourself out there, because even to this day, I still work with some of my early collaborators that I met when I was just hanging out," Roe said. "We tell stories about our experiences and our communities, so if we don't have those experiences, then we don't have anything to create."

Learn more about film and media studies in the School of Communication and Journalism.

Tags: Alumni Communication and Journalism Arts and Culture