Timothy Wheeler recently received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Cinematography for Nonfiction Programming for his work on the Animal Planet/Discovery series Whale Wars. In addition to his cinematography work, Timothy is a freelance director/producer and still photographer for companies including Animal Planet, PBS, The New York Times Company, Nike, Red Bull, true.tv, and many more. Timothy is represented by Zuma Press as a still photographer and has a Master’s in Journalism from UC Berkeley.
Before getting involved in filmmaking and photography, Timothy worked for various human rights nonprofit organizations in the United States and Latin America, including Human Rights Watch and the Coalition Against the Use of Child Soldiers in Colombia. This work, as well as travel in fifty countries, inspired him to pick up a camera and document underserved communities with unique stories to be told.
While working for the non-profit sector for two years in Bogotá, Colombia, Timothy photographed, researched, and wrote his first book entitled The End of History, on the life and death of the infamous neighborhood of El Cartucho. The book launched a passionate career in journalism that brought him to his studies at Berkeley.
From 2004 to 2006, Timothy studied documentary filmmaking and photography at UC Berkeley and worked as an Associate Producer for PBS Frontline/World. His first film, Child Boxer, won the 2006 North Gate Prize for excellence in documentary film at UC Berkeley.
Other awards for his work include the Goldman International Reporting Scholarship, the 2006 Susie Tompkins Buell Award for excellence in the visual arts, and the 2006 Dorothea Lange Fellowship for outstanding work in documentary photography.
Timothy also has credits as a writer with various media including National Public Radio and as a staff writer for the Phnom Penh Post in Cambodia.
Timothy has reported in Antarctica, Bolivia, Cambodia, Colombia, throughout the Eastern Caribbean, The Gambia, Liberia, Mexico, Philippines, Peru, Tohono O’odham Nation, Indonesia, Thailand, and the United States.
