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Haley Geffen and Sam Stephens have launched their new, Brooklyn-based production company, Co_ed Studios.
The boutique will offer concept-through-completion capabilities, ranging from creative to live action, editorial, post, finishing, color grading and mixing. Prior to its official launch, Co_ed Studios has quietly produced work for a number of brands and media companies, including TED, NBCUniversal, MetLife, Charter Communications and more.
Stephens, a writer/director, was most recently co-founder and executive creative director at humble, the New York and Los Angeles-based company that closed last year. Geffen, a live-action director with extensive broadcast promotion experience, was most recently the executive creative director and roster director at Bodega Studios.
At Co_ed Studios, they’ll direct jobs individually and collaborate on projects that require live action, 2D and 3D animation, VFX and design.
Stephens says the launch of Co_ed Studios is a natural next step for Geffen and himself, adding that the boutique will be selective with projects, smarter with overheard and focused on “making quality creative with quality people.”
“Haley and I had spent a number of years building the creative abilities of our respective studios from scratch,” Stephens said in a statement. “We were both ready to go out on our own and craft something tailor-made for who we are as professionals and as people.”
Geffen and Stephens have also enlisted managing director and partner Damijan Saccio, who most recently was EP at Postal—the design, VFX and post-production division of humble. Prior to that, Saccio was a founder and EP at Uvphactory, the award-winning design and production studio based in New York.
EP Alexis Kaplan, whose vast experience includes live action, integrated VFX, animation and motion graphics, has also joined the team from companies like A Whitelabel Product and Supply + Demand and Imaginary Forces.
“What’s interesting here is that we’ve all been major contributors to very successful companies in our past, and are joining forces in our prime,” Kaplan said. “And even though we’ve spent years in the industry, we’re still excited by what lies ahead.”
“We want to succeed by being healthy,” Stephens says about Co_ed’s foundational beliefs. “Healthy in our relationship with advertising, our clients and our families, and healthy in relation to the bigger picture–the whole world around us. We all know the industry is in flux, and shops that can be smart, nimble, and evolve with the times are the shops that will flourish.”
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