Photo by Hayden Antal/University of Tennessee

Hi, I’m Nick Geidner. I’m currently an associate professor in the School of Journalism and Electronic Media at the University of Tennessee, where I run Land Grant Films, an Emmy-nominated documentary production program. Most recently, we produced The Library That Dolly Built, a feature-length documentary about Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library.

I also serve as the director of graduate studies for the School of Journalism and Electronic Media, where I oversee the journalism concentrations within the college-level masters and doctoral programs. Most recently, I led the redesign of our masters concentration to make it more project-based and professionally-oriented. The program, launching in fall 2022, will focus on community-engaged, solutions-based reporting.

Current Projects

Howard Baker’s America [Tentative Title] – Land Grant Films is partnering with with the Howard H. Baker Center for Public Policy at the University of Tennessee to produce a documentary about the late Senator Howard Baker. I’ll be directing and producing the film and will be working with a UT student crew. This project is currently in preproduction with the film expected to premiere in spring of 2023.

TVA Connected Communities Project – Land Grant Films is partnering with East Tennessee PBS and the Tennessee Valley Authority to produce a series of short videos aimed at 7 to 12-year-old children. The videos will introduce students to available jobs and careers in our community and relate those careers to concepts the are learning in school. This project is funded via a grant from TVA for the next two years and is still in development.

Latest Posts

  • Using JobPop! Graphics Packages
    This guide is for UT students editing JobPop videos for Land Grant Films. It covers the three basic graphic packages: 1) Machinist Style, 2) Environmental Scientist Style and 3) Ripped Paper. To use the graphic packages, you will need to…
  • Using MOGRT in Premiere
    A MOGRT is a motion graphics template, which allows you to make complex animated graphics in After Effects that can be easily edited in Premiere. In this example, I made a text slide for our oral history-style interviews we did…
  • Let’s Make This, Y’all!
    This walkthrough will show you how make this simple diameter slide in After Effects. You can see the full segment at about 30 seconds into this video. Step 1 – Before making anything in After Effects, you want to storyboard…
  • Geidner wins two national Tellys 
    Knoxville, Tenn. — University of Tennessee associate professor of journalism and director of Land Grant Films Nick Geidner won two national Telly Awards for social videos he produced during the pandemic.  “I’m really excited about these awards, because we were really limited…
  • Making and using proxies with Adobe
    Proxies are small versions of your media that you can use to reduce the workload on your computer. Proxies can also make it easier to work as group when editing. This quick guide will show you how to make proxies…