New York City (EST) · ritaphilippova@gmail.com · LinkedIn
Photo editor with 15+ years running photo desks at independent news outlets in Russia and internationally, now based in New York.
I select and sequence images for daily news and long-form investigations, commission photography and illustration, license work directly from photographers and wire agencies, and handle post-production to a consistent documentary standard. I also produce and direct short documentary video, including field shoots.
Open to photo desk, photo research, visual editing and post-production roles — full-time or freelance.
Sourcing and rights-clearing images from wire services (AP, Reuters, AFP, TASS) and agencies (VII, Redux), negotiating usage directly with photographers, verifying captions and credits under deadline.
Briefing and directing photographers and illustrators, including original illustration for stories where no photography exists.
Selecting and sequencing images so a set reads as one story; building layouts that hold long, detail-heavy narratives together.
Producing and directing short documentary and news video, including field shoots in difficult conditions.
Mediazona, 2024 — coordination, selection, layout
Photo story on the politician's funeral, covered by several photographers across Moscow. Directed coverage on the day, edited the take down to a single narrative and built the layout.
Mediazona, 2023 — production, field direction, editing, layout
Produced the shoot end to end: planned and organized the photographer's trip, directed coverage and handled communication on location, then selected, processed and laid out the final photo story.
Mediazona, 2023 — photographer liaison, licensing, layout
Feature with the photojournalist (Harper's, The New York Times, The Washington Post). Handled the photography side end to end: liaised with her directly, selected and licensed the images, processed them and built the layout.
Mediazona, 2023 — photo research, rights clearance, layout
Feature with the conflict photographer and VII Photo Agency co-founder on his work in Bucha, Irpin and Izium. Sourced and licensed his photography through Redux Pictures, then processed the images and built the layout.
Mediazona, 2023 — photographer relations, image editing, layout
Series gathering the photographers who covered the first year of the war — Heidi Levine, Efrem Lukatsky, Yakov Lyashenko, Ed Ram, Stanislav Senyk, Andriy Dubchak — on the frames that mattered most to them. Handled photographer liaison, image selection, rights and layout across the set.
Mediazona, 2022 — wire research and verification
Photo-driven record of the first 150 days of the war in Ukraine. Sourced and rights-cleared wire imagery, cross-checking captions, credits and figures against multiple outlets on a story changing by the hour.
Mediazona, 2021 — illustration direction, layout
Multi-chapter investigation into a 47-year fight to overturn a wrongful double-murder conviction. With no photography of the original events, wrote the visual brief, art-directed commissioned illustration and built a layout that holds a long narrative together.
Mediazona, 2016 — commissioning, licensing, layout
First-person account by the head of a rehabilitation fund for former prisoners, carried by documentary photography shot inside a women's penal colony. Sourced and purchased the work from photographers Denis Tarasov and Fyodor Telkov.
Mediazona, 2016 — production
News video on the opening of proceedings against a defendant charged over the 2002 Dubrovka theatre siege, a case with more than a thousand recognized victims.
Mediazona, 2016 — producer, director, camera on location
Masked assailants stopped a minibus carrying staff of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture and journalists on a North Caucasus press tour, burned the vehicle and beat the passengers. Travelled to the region and shot, directed and produced the piece on the ground.
Mediazona, 2015 — full production: producer, writer, camera
Short film following the case brought by Yaroslavl prosecutors to have the rap group Krovostok's website declared banned content, and the band's appeal against it — cut against the story of a fan who took out a loan to hitchhike from a Kurgan village to the hearing with no return ticket.
Sep 2014 – Present · Vilnius / Hybrid
Curate and edit visual content for daily news and long-form documentary projects. Commission and direct photographers, illustrators and designers; oversee post-production; set visual strategy alongside the editorial desk. Currently building AI-assisted annotation and photo-enhancement into the production workflow.
Independent outlet covering criminal justice and political repression in Russia, founded 2014 by Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova; widely cited as Russia's most-referenced independent outlet.
Nov 2018 – Feb 2021 · New York / Remote
Led photo coverage and visual strategy for a regional and investigative news platform.
Independent Russian-language outlet covering regional news and corruption investigations largely absent from state media; blocked and shut down in Russia in 2021.
Sep 2014 – Nov 2018 · Moscow
Managed photo coverage and visual strategy for the media arm of a pro-democracy civic movement, held in parallel with the Mediazona role.
Pro-democracy movement founded by Mikhail Khodorkovsky; designated an "undesirable organization" in Russia in 2017.
Feb 2013 – Sep 2014 · Moscow
Ran the photography department of a national outlet. Built visual strategy for key news topics and photo stories; directed photographers and correspondents on special projects under daily deadlines.
May 2011 – Feb 2013 · Moscow
Led the photo desk of a national news outlet. Directed daily photo coverage and visual strategy for major news topics; managed a team of photographers and editors under continuous deadline pressure.
At the time one of Russia's most-read independent news sites. In March 2014 its entire newsroom, including the full photo desk, was dismissed after regulatory pressure; departing staff went on to found Meduza.
Jan 2009 – May 2011 · Tbilisi / Remote, part-time
Photo editing for a regional human-rights news outlet.
Human-rights reporting outlet on the Caucasus, founded 2001 by the Memorial human rights center; recipient of the Free Press of Eastern Europe award.
Photo research and sourcing, wire services, rights and licensing negotiation, commissioning photographers and illustrators, image selection and sequencing, layout, captions and caption translation (RU–EN), credit verification, team management.
Producing and directing short documentary and news video, field shooting, scripting, editing.
Adobe Lightroom, Photoshop, Premiere; Figma; CapCut; Notion, Google Sheets; Gamma, Framer, Webflow; AI-assisted restoration and annotation workflows.
Russian (native); English (professional, strong written).
New York City (EST)
Margarita Filippova