about
photo by Camille Farrah Lenain
Hi — I’m Zaferhan Yumru, though most people call me Zaf.
I’m a filmmaker, photographer, and cultural worker based in Los Angeles. My work moves between documentary, portraiture, live events, and communications — often centering LGBTQ+ lives, migration, memory, intimacy, and the ways people build community in difficult times.
Across both artistic and institutional work, I’m interested in storytelling as a form of connection: something that can hold complexity, create belonging, and imagine more humane futures.
My films and creative work have screened at festivals including Sundance Film Festival, SXSW, Hot Docs, OutFest (RIP), and have been supported or licensed by organizations including PBS and TIME.
Alongside my artistic practice, I’ve spent the past decade leading marketing, communications, design, and events for film festivals, nonprofits, and media organizations, most recently at International Documentary Association (IDA) and previously with New Orleans Film Society, and !f Istanbul Independent International Film Festival.
These days, I move between filmmaking, photography, creative direction, communications, and live events — working out of my studio in Los Angeles and collaborating on projects that need both emotional clarity and strategic thinking.
If you’d like to work together — whether that’s making images, shaping a story, building a campaign, producing an event, or something harder to categorize — say hello anyway.
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