Still We Survive is an anonymous animated interview series that centers survivorship and resilience through long-form conversations with people in recovery, building a collective portrait of how individuals continue to live, adapt, and persist beyond addiction.
Jesse Dana is a cinematographer and documentary filmmaker whose work explores the space between observation and empathy, where documentary objectivity meets narrative truth. Projects he has lensed have received national News and Documentary Emmy
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Jesse Dana is a cinematographer and documentary filmmaker whose work explores the space between observation and empathy, where documentary objectivity meets narrative truth. Projects he has lensed have received national News and Documentary Emmy nominations, a Peabody Award, and premiered at Sundance, Tribeca, and Cannes.
Drawing and painting long before he ever held a camera, Jesse first turned to image-making as a refuge from chaos outside his control. Over time, storytelling became both a way to be seen and a way to bear witness for others. Now two decades into his career, his practice has evolved into a quiet act of restoration, shaped by long-standing proximity to addiction, recovery, and the people who live within those realities.
Jesse has spent years working in spaces shaped by addiction, including recovery communities and prisons, where trust, patience, and ethical care are not abstract values but daily requirements. He has lived alongside addiction and addicts for much of his life, an experience that informs how he listens, how he asks questions, and how he builds environments where people can speak without fear of exposure or judgment.
As the creator and host of Still We Survive, Jesse brings this lived familiarity into a long-form interview practice grounded in presence rather than performance. He approaches the series as a collaborative process, using documentary craft to create space for reflection, resilience, and the ongoing work of surviving with honesty and dignity.
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