About/Contact Me | Kim Paul Nguyen

Thanks for taking the time to check out my portfolio!

Education:

Bachelor of Social Work, Australian Catholic University, 2003
Master of Journalism, Monash University, 2013
Master of International Development and Environmental Analysis, Monash University, 2013

Awards:

Nominee for Young Australian of the Year ACT, 2010
Dean's Award, Monash University, 2011, 2012
Fellow, Filmmakers Without Borders, 2017
Grant Recipient, Walkley Foundation, 2020

About:

My name's Kim Paul Nguyen and I'm a freelance journalist and documentary filmmaker.

My work has been published by VICE, the Guardian, Al Jazeera, the Big Issue, Monocle, the Bhutan Broadcasting Service and others.

I've also made video content for the Sydney Opera House, the World Health Organisation, ARD (Germany), Greenpeace, GetUp (Australia) and many others.

My work has taken me across Australia, Europe, the US, Central America, India, Bhutan and the Pacific Islands. I've also made short documentaries in Nigeria and Ghana.

I'm always looking for new stories, ideas, projects and people to collaborate with. So please get in touch if you'd like to share ideas, discuss work opportunities or simply have a chat. You can reach me via the social media links above, or the contact form below.

Background:

When I was in high school in Canberra in the 90s I loved making films on my parents' camcorder, imagining ending up in Hollywood, writing and directing my own blockbuster hits.

But instead, in 2003 I graduated from the Australian Catholic University with a Bachelor of Social Work. In 2004 I moved to the UK and worked in child protection investigations for 2 years, first in London and then the remote Highlands of Scotland.

After that I spent 6 months travelling and volunteering in South America, discovering a love for Spanish and the natural environment.

I returned to Australia in 2007 and went back to child protection investigation work, first in Melbourne, then Sydney.

But in August 2008 I started a 16 month bicycle trip, all the way from Brisbane to Copenhagen, to attend the COP15 climate summit in December 2009. I cycled across Australia, Asia and Europe, writing and recording what I experienced, with a focus on climate impacts.

By the start of 2010 I was in Europe and broke, picking up a job in an Irish bar in Amsterdam. It was there I decided to start on a path towards journalism, studying an international course at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam.

I returned to Melbourne in 2011 and began a double Masters at Monash University, one in Journalism, the other in International Development and Environmental Analysis, whilst working in disability services part-time.

I finished my Masters on exchange in Sweden in 2013, spending 2 weeks in the Arctic Circle researching the impacts of industrialisation on the indigenous Sami people. From that I made a very crappy student film, but also published my first feature article, Reindeer herds in danger as Australia's mining boom comes to Sweden, in the Guardian.

I returned to Australia via the Philippines, just after the devastating Typhoon Haiyan had ripped through the country. There I published two stories for Al Jazeera, 100 days in the Philippines since Typhoon Haiyan and A Filipino’s fight against climate change, at the start of 2014.

When I got back I applied for journalism jobs, but with no luck, returned to social work part time, whilst making videos for different small NGOs, and writing the occasional article, like The Buddha of Dandenong, which was published in the Big Issue in 2015.

In 2016 I headed to the States to try my hand at freelancing again. I couldn't pick up any journalism work, but instead made videos for small businesses and NGOs in exchange for room and board as I travelled from California to Louisiana and then south through Central America.

At the start of 2017 I headed to Bhutan to take up a voluntary Filmmakers Without Borders Fellowship, teaching and making films in the remote Himalayan kingdom. My last major piece of work there, a 30 minute documentary about the recent emergence of civil society in the remote kingdom, was broadcast nationally.

I was pretty ready to give up on journalism and filmmaking by the start of 2018, it didn't seem possible to make a living doing it. I was looking at starting a paramedics course having met doctors in Bhutan who'd set up the first helicopter rescue service there.

But instead I ended up getting a Multimedia Producer's role at Greenpeace where I stayed til mid 2019. And I spent the following year working for the World Health Organisation, making a series of videos about the impacts of climate change on health in the Pacific.

The pandemic years are a bit of a blur like I suppose they are for many of us, but at the end I'd somehow been able to make Conversations with Coal Miners about Climate Change, with a 2020 grant from the Walkley Foundation.

In 2022-23 most of my time was focused on researching the international oil industry and it's relationship to the war in Ukraine, including filming trips in India, Ukraine, Europe and the Middle East. That project is currently in the works.

Thanks for reading! And if you'd like to get in touch and work with me on something, in any capacity, please send me a message, I'd love to hear from you.

All the best,

Kim

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