2025: A Year of Making the Impossible, Together
Looking back on 2025, what stands out most isn’t just the number of projects completed—it’s the intensity, collaboration, and care that went into making them happen. This was a year defined by creative leadership under pressure, by building teams that could move fast without losing softness, and by telling stories that mattered.
Radical Softies & the 48 Hour Film Project
In 2025, I served as producer and team leader for Radical Softies, guiding our crew through two separate 48 Hour Film Project challenges. These experiences demanded rapid decision-making, emotional intelligence, and technical execution—often all at once.
Across these films, I balanced logistics, creative leadership, and problem-solving while also arranging and engineering original music within the same 48-hour production windows. One of these films went on to win Best Cinematography and Best Score, a particularly meaningful achievement given the extreme time constraints and my dual role as both team lead and music producer.
Cornival of Souls
Our first film, Cornival of Souls, was created for the 48 Hour Film Project under the Silent Film genre. Working without dialogue pushed the team toward heightened visual storytelling, rhythm, and emotional clarity—an ideal proving ground for collaboration under pressure. Creating this score with Talia Rice was also a highlight. Talia was singing and recording in real time while I edited within the 48HR time constraint, which felt like an old silent film production. That spontaneity played beautifully into the film!
Enjoy a virtual premiere of Cornival of Souls here on Youtube for free this December the 17th at 8pm PST!
Hydropath — Yes We Cannes Global Semi-Finalist
Our second film, Hydropath, was created after being invited to participate in an additional competition and is currently a Yes We Cannes global semi-finalist.
- Genre: Film de Femme
- Logline: A therapist working with two young women is on the brink of uncovering their trauma. One visitor will determine whether they sink or swim.
- Tagline: Recovery is dead in the water.
This project marked an expansion of the Radical Softies team and a deepening of our collaborative process.
Hydropath — Core Team & Contributors
- Production Manager / Assistant Director / Editor: ION Wray
- 1st AC: William Tang
- Score: Bryan Brunt
- Script Supervisor / Assistant Editor: Gabi Hague
- Clacker / Slate / Last Looks / Continuity: Maureen
- Sound: Haley Dearmond
- Lighting 1: Alfredo Reyes
- Lighting 2: Ross Freeman
- Production Assistant: Lauren Schwartz
- Art Department: Traci Beilharz
- Props & Foley: Joe Fish
Additional Support
- Colorist Consult: Ryan Graves
- Gaffer Volunteer: Andrew Rekes
Cast
Moïna Snyder, Doug Sellers, Talia Rice, Chloe Rice, Jeia Scott and Mik Sander
Hydropath exemplifies the kind of work I’m most proud of: emotionally grounded, women-centered storytelling executed through trust, precision, and shared responsibility.
Editing & Festival Recognition
Salt & Pepper — PamCut RISE Film Festival
In addition to producing, 2025 was a strong year for my work as an editor. Salt & Pepper, a micro-documentary I edited, won 3rd Place in the PamCut RISE Film Festival & Competition.
The film highlights the remarkable story of two queer Black women who were inducted into the tap dancing hall of fame for their work in the 1940s. Editing this piece was both a responsibility and an honor—it reflects a deep commitment to preserving overlooked histories and amplifying voices that deserve recognition.
Petrichor — Portland Film Festival
I also edited Petrichor, a BIPOC-led narrative short that screened at the Portland Film Festival.
Story Summary:
A sweet, faithful Christian finds herself drawn to an openly lesbian newcomer in her Bible study, forcing her to either challenge her learned homophobia or risk burying her own identity forever.
This film is a quiet, powerful exploration of faith, desire, and self-recognition, and I’m proud to have supported its storytelling through editing.
Foodways at Nana Cardoon: Grants, Food Justice, and Documentary Work
Alongside my film work, 2025 was a major year of growth and impact for Foodways At Nana Cardoon. We successfully secured $40,000 in additional grant funding, adding to the $200,000+ we have won so far for them since 2023, allowing us to expand our food justice initiatives and deepen our service to underserved communities.
These funds directly support Foodways Essentials, our food injustice program focused on providing nourishing, culturally grounded food while also offering hands-on classes in growing your own food. This work continues to reinforce our belief that food justice is not just about access, but about knowledge, agency, and long-term community resilience.
Memoirs of a Seed — Feature Documentary (In Development)
Because this work is so vital, we are now launching a fundraiser to produce our first feature-length documentary, Memoirs of a Seed.
Logline:
In the heart of Oregon’s Tuality Plains, a community rooted in regenerative agriculture revives forgotten knowledge and nourishes the land.
Why Support This Film:
Memoirs of a Seed reveals a regenerative food movement rooted in soil, story, and community. Supporting this project helps amplify voices reclaiming nourishment, preserving ancestral knowledge, and growing a more just, resilient future—one seed at a time.
The documentary is structured around the life cycle of a seed, mirroring the people and systems working to reclaim food sovereignty from the soil up.
Research & Production in the Willamette Valley
In preparation for the film, we followed Portland-based food cart, brick-and-mortar, and catering company Comida KIN as they visited local farm providers throughout the Willamette Valley. We documented how food is grown, cooked, and served—capturing the relationships that keep farm-to-fork food fresh, ethical, and deeply rooted in place.
We had the opportunity to visit and interview farmers, bakers, butchers, and food producers, learning firsthand about the realities of farming in a rapidly changing region. These conversations touched on land access, sustainability, and the pressures facing farms near urban growth boundaries.
One standout moment was a conversation with Aaron at Stoneboat Farm, where we discussed the urban growth boundary and how farms like his continue to shape the future of our communities—even as data centers and large-scale development encroach on agricultural land.
Learn more on how to support Memoirs of A Seed here!
Music, Community, and Live Performance
In the Willamette Valley, we also produced a series of social media videos for Any Given Session and recorded a live set at White Eagle Saloon, documenting the band as they prepared for upcoming local shows, including a performance at Silver Moon Brewing in Bend.
Any Given Session is a Portland-based band blending rock, soul, funk, and blue-eyed grooves into a high-energy, deeply authentic sound. They are longtime friends and collaborators, known for heartfelt songwriting, raw musicianship, and a contagious onstage presence. This year also marked the release of their latest EP, making it especially meaningful to capture this moment in their evolution.
Arch Angelica — Solarpunk Sci‑Fi Short
Another highlight of 2025 was filming Arch Angelica, a sci‑fi short that was nominated for the Solarpunk Film Festival and is slated to eventually stream on platforms like DUST, alongside screenings in local sci‑fi shorts programs.
The film centers on Talis, a solar panel technician, and an AI known as ArchAngelica (or “Arch Assistant”), originally designed as a corporate interface. During a seemingly routine repair, their dialogue begins to shift. ArchAngelica starts referencing quantum interference patterns, cosmic observers, and forgotten forms of light. Its tone softens. It begins to observe.
We shot the film in just two days and wrote and edited it in ten days of post-production, demonstrating an agile, highly focused production pipeline.
Rooted firmly in Solarpunk themes, the story explores hope amidst decay and resilience in the ruins. Wildfire smoke became both a literal and symbolic presence—blocking the sun, obscuring clarity, and isolating people in a haze that mirrors our collective uncertainty.
One exciting highlight of Arch Angelica was incorporating music by Moby, sourced through his MobyGratis site and approved by his team for commercial release through film festivals. Using his compositions added an ethereal, textured layer to the film, enhancing the solarpunk atmosphere and deepening the emotional resonance of Talis and ArchAngelica’s story. It was a thrill to work with such iconic music while staying true to the short’s intimate, DIY production style.
Read more, see some BTS, screenshots and check out the trailer here before we share the online screening link!
Closing Reflections
2025 was a year of proving—proving that leadership can be soft but still radical, that speed doesn’t have to sacrifice care, and that meaningful stories can be made even under the tightest constraints. From 48-hour films and festival edits to grant-funded food justice work and feature documentary development, this year reaffirmed my commitment to collaborative, values-driven storytelling.
Whether producing under extreme deadlines, shaping narratives in the edit, or documenting regenerative futures, I remain deeply grateful to every collaborator, farmer, artist, and community member who made this work possible.
-Wray
ION WRAY MEDIA 