Documentary studio
Currently accepting commissions
for 2026.

Portrait Productions

Cinematic films about lives, legacies, and the stories worth preserving.

See the Work → Begin a Film →
On the Work

Portrait Productions is a documentary studio devoted to long-form, deeply researched, cinematic films that capture the stories that make up our lives.

— Portrait Productions

Films

Each film is the result of months of conversation, archival research, and patient editing.

Gaga
41 min

One of the highlights of my life

Marcia Grey Subject of Gaga

Films We Make

01

Family Histories

Multi-generational documentary portraits commissioned to preserve a family's story. We interview parents, grandparents, siblings, and children — weaving voices, archival photographs, home movies, and place into a single inheritance.

02

Legacy Portraits

A film about one person, made while there is still time. Often commissioned by adult children, spouses, or close friends — sometimes by the subject themselves. Equal parts oral history and cinematic portrait.

03

Community Profiles

Documentary work for congregations, neighborhoods, schools, and small organizations whose stories deserve to be told from the inside.

How a Film is Made
i.

Listening

We learn the people, the rooms, the language, the essence.

ii.

Gathering

Archival research, photographs, letters, home recordings — the material that gives a film its memory.

iii.

Filming

Small crews. Interviews, b-roll, place. We shoot on schedules built around the subject.

iv.

Editing

A final film delivered in archival masters and shareable formats.

Nathan Read, filmmaker and founder of Portrait Productions
The Filmmaker

Nathan Read

Nathan Read is a documentary filmmaker based in Los Angeles and the founder of Portrait Productions.

His path to filmmaking began at McGill University, where he studied history. The discipline left its mark: a patience for research, an eye for the texture of a particular time and place, and the conviction that the most interesting stories are usually the ones hiding inside a single life. That sensibility shapes how he works today. Portrait Productions takes its name seriously — the company is built around character-driven documentaries that sit close to their subjects and let small details carry the weight of larger meaning.

Nathan is drawn to stories about people whose lives illuminate something beyond themselves: the inherited histories they carry, the worlds they've built or been shaped by, the quiet decisions that add up to a life.

Common Questions

Before you ask

Every film includes three rounds of editing reviews. This ensures the final cut feels exactly right before delivery.
Films are priced at $10,000 per shoot day, with each day producing a finished piece of roughly 10 to 15 minutes.
Yes. While the studio is based in Los Angeles, we regularly travel to film wherever your family is. Some of the best portrait films are made in the places that shaped the subject — a hometown, a family home, or a landscape that holds meaning. Travel logistics are handled on our end.
All archival material — photographs, letters, home recordings — is carefully scanned at high resolution and incorporated into the film digitally. Originals are returned to you promptly, and you receive a full set of digital scans for your own archive as part of the project.

If there is someone whose story you want kept —

Begin a film.

Every commission begins with a long conversation, no obligation. Tell us a little about the person, the family, or the community you have in mind, and we'll write back within the week.