Julian Shaw is a New Zealand-born, Australian-raised writer, director, actor and model who divides his time between Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon.

Julian Shaw’s filmmaking career began in his teens with the one-hour documentary Darling! The Pieter-Dirk Uys Story, which won the Inside Film Independent Spirit Award and placed Runner Up in the Berlin International Film Festival Panorama Audience Awards. A portrait of iconic South African entertainer Pieter-Dirk Uys, Darling! played at dozens of international festivals, picking up multiple audience and critic awards. Darling! was theatrically released in South Africa.

Julian’s next film Cup of Dreams documented New Zealand’s national Rugby Union team The All Blacks in the five years leading up to their 2011 World Cup win. Cup of Dreams aired on television in all continents, including NBC Sports in the US.

Use Me, Julian’s first narrative feature film as writer/director, won Best Editing at Brooklyn Film Festival as well as the Grand Jury Prize at Sydney Underground Film Festival. Use Me currently holds an 86% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes. The film was distributed globally by Gravitas Ventures, and became a trending title on Amazon Prime in 2020.

For his short drama Clearing the Air, Julian won Best Young Australian Filmmaker of the Year from the Byron Bay International Film Festival. His multiple fiction and non-fiction shorts have screened at Cannes Cinephiles in Cinema Des Antipodes, the St Tropez Film Festival, FLICKERFEST, and Melbourne International Film Festival.

Julian holds a Master of Film and Digital Image degree from Sydney University, a Graduate Diploma in Directing from AFTRS, and a Master of Screen Arts in Directing from AFTRS.

Credits as actor include San Andreas, First & Second and the title role in Looking for Dr. Love. Julian is well known for his appearance in the viral marriage equality short It’s Time, on which he also served as a producer. It’s Time has over 16 million views on YouTube, won the AdNews Viral Ad of the Year Award and was re-shared by Madonna and Stephen Fry.

Modeling credits include national campaigns for Google, Squarespace and Columbia Sportswear.