BIO
Kim first began taking 35mm stills during her freshman year at UC Berkeley and covered the Free Speech Movement during her freshman year. In her sophomore year, she transferred to UCLA where she majored in Motion Picture Production, graduated with honors and worked as a teaching assistant in the film department. During that time, she began covering interviews and concerts for local underground papers. She also had her first television job shooting the ShaNaNa Show.
She traveled extensively, lived in London for a year and then returned to Los Angeles to work for L.A. (a weekly underground paper) and Crawdaddy/Feature Magazine. She met her husband during the formation of Music World Magazine, where she served as photo editor.
She was hired to shoot a small independent motion picture that was never released, but the script supervisor was Debra Hill, who went on to produce John Carpenter’s “Halloween.” She remembered Kim’s work and hired her to be part of John’s team. Together they also shot “The Fog,” “Escape from New York” and “Christine,” as well as “Halloween II” (produced by John and Debra but directed by Rick Rosenthal). On “Escape from New York,” Kim was admitted to the Cinematographers Guild, IATSE Local 600 where she has served as an elected representative for still photographers on the Western Region Council and the National Executive Board for most of the past 25 years.
She also was the production photographer for “Cheers” (9 years) and “Family Ties” (5 years) as well as shooting for other Paramount television shows including “Star Trek — The Next Generation,” “StarTrek — Deep Space Nine,” “American Dreamer” (with Robert Urich) and the last incarnation of the Bob Newhart Show, “Bob,” produced by former “Cheers” writer/producers Cheri and Bill Steinkellner. She also shot the stills for Steven Spielberg’s TV series “Amazing Stories” where she got to work with a different major director every week, including Clint Eastwood and Spielberg.
Kim believes in volunteering her time not only to help her fellow still photographers with seminars in the new digital technologies, but in donating her skills and time to her favorite local public high school, Hamilton Music Academy Magnet, where she shoots the headshots and production stills for their Broadway quality shows. To see the photos she has taken for their various productions, go to the Hamilton Page.
She also edits a weekly progressive political email newsletter to keep her subscribers aware of what is going on in the country, everything you won’t find on the Faux News. To subscribe, send an email to KimsPoliticalNewsletter-subscribe@topica.com or sign up:
Kim lives in Los Angeles with her husband, genre and niche marketing genius, Jeff Walker, and has three grown children.
For more about her career, read the articles from International Photographer Magazine and Petersen’s PHOTOgraphic Magazine.