Ariana Jimenez would typically mix and boom on a day on set, taking on a tedious and physically demanding job. She would have to raise her arms above her head, holding the one-pound boom pole above her head for hours on end by herself, and stay sore and exhausted on set for hours. Despite the muscle cramps and hair sticking to her face from the sweat, she enjoys every second of it.  

“I think I love sound so much because nobody wanted to do it,” she said. 

Jimenez graduated from San Francisco State University in 2023 and has made a name for herself in a variety of cinema-related roles. While she primarily pursues a career as an actor, she has also worked as a director, boom operator, script supervisor, sound and music producer, singer, songwriter, musical theater actress and stage crew. According to Jimenez, most people who work in the film industry stick with a speciality rather than being involved in various fields. Jimenez has a passion for acting, but she decided to work in multiple fields due to her desire to “be versatile for any camera-related role.” 

“The best and scariest butterflies all at the same time, embodying someone that someone wrote,” she said to describe acting. “The biggest thing as an actress is that I’m what the director is envisioning, you get to dive in and you get to live it. It opens your mind so much, and I love being open-minded.”

Jimenez’s work ethic is something that left a lasting impression on Scott Boswell, associate professor of the School of Cinema. He remembers her as a well-prepared, smart and naturally talented actor, as well as a director. Boswell has a distinct memory of Jimenez’s work shooting one of the shots for a behind-the-scenes video. 

“She’s multi-talented, one of those rare people who is good at everything she puts her mind to,” Boswell said. “She has naturally good instincts as an actor and is a strong writer.”

Boswell taught Jimenez in multiple classes, like the Fiction Filmmaking class. Jimenez described this class as the foundation for her career’s versatility.

“That class gives you the ability to do everything at once; from camera to sound, boom box to script supervisor, producer to production design to costume. You do absolutely everything, and you also do your own project,” she said. “It gave an overview of everything, what it’s like to be that person in the film industry. I appreciated that class because it solidified for me how versatile I wanted to be in the industry, knowing that anyone could ask me to do this, do that, they could trust me.”

 After Boswell recognized Jimenez’s reliability, he recruited her as a teaching assistant for his Fiction Workshop class. 

“She’s very responsible and I knew I could rely on her to be a good support for the class. She’s really reliable — when she commits to something, she does it. And she cares,” said Boswell. “I can’t say I’ve been inspired by every student, but I have been inspired by Ariana. I’m impressed with her talents, impressed by her tenacity and her seeing things through. She keeps going.”

After graduating from SFSU, she has also worked in sound production — sound mixing and boom operating and does freelance sound production jobs. After working as a professional in sound production, she took a step back to go back to her acting roots. She auditions for every role she comes across now while she currently works her day job as a secretary at her boyfriend’s father’s construction company. 

“I’ve made a name for myself as a sound mixer,” she said. “It’s not that I’m stepping back, but this is a point of redirection, to prove what else I can do. And I think I focus a lot of my time on acting now.” 

Hugo Amaya, an SFSU film studies graduate and Jimenez’s boyfriend, first met her in 2023 when working on a short film titled “Two Professionals” in Jimenez and Amaya’s last summer at SFSU, working sound and lighting, respectively. He described how their journey started as “colleagues on set” to “friends” to her being his “puzzle piece.”

“She pushes me to work on my script and my ideas in the same way I support her ideas, her music and her films,” Amaya said. “She’s very dead set on if she has a task or something in mind that she wants to complete, she’s very much on it.”

Amaya admires how Jimenez is dedicated to her passions, which includes her love for music. 

Jimenez’s love for singing began when she was 3 years old. She said that she is into different types of music and that she keeps her ears open because “music is just an incredible art that I admire.” She grew up listening to her parents sing, going to church and listening to the music involved in the worship team. 

Jimenez got her first taste of high school performing as part of her theatre class. She worked in both stage production and acting, particularly with musicals. 

“Aladdin was my most cherished role in terms of musicals. I played Jasmine,” Jimenez recalled. “It was one of the biggest turnouts for my high school. We had a huge casting crew and it’s one of those moments I think I’ll remember forever.”

She also played Scarlet in Clue, who Jimenez described as “more of the smartass, a little bit feisty.”

“I had never played a character like that,” Jimenez said. “It helped me step out of the shyness, the overthinking. If you’re playing a role, you gotta embody it.”  

Jimenez’s experience in high school theater paved the path for her to pursue film, where she majored in cinema at SFSU.

“I was doing YouTube videos, singing videos, just camera on me and singing the whole song and then I would also edit,” she recalled from her high school years. When it came to music production, Jimenez wanted to record music professionally. 

“I just thought about what it would be like to not just be in front of the camera but to be the editor, being the sound person for our own little video in an actual production,” Jimenez said.

Jimenez’s love for collaboration has been a key factor in how she has connected with her colleagues. Many spoke on her work ethic, versatility and talent in working different tasks on set, which ranged from directorial to editorial. 

Tyler Aguallo, a graduate from the SFSU theatre arts program, credited Jimenez as an important part of his development as an actor.

“Right off the bat, she’s not just the director, she’s a filmmaker,” Aguallo said. “She’s like a chameleon when it comes to working on set, she can quite literally do anything. It’s impressive being on set with someone who was so well prepared.”

Aguallo also described how her on-set demeanor contributed to a healthy working environment and inspired his growth as an actor.

“She carries herself with so much grace and humility, almost honor,” he said. “I never felt more safe on set than when being an actor for Ariana. She made me better and brought out the best in me. She didn’t have to do anything specifically, I just had to watch her work.”

Spencer Lee is another person who was inspired by Jimenez. When visiting SFSU during quarantine, Lee met Jimenez at a concert when he played in the band “Pool Boy Affair.” Jimenez had reached out to him as she had loved his music. After they connected, Jimenez and Lee collaborated on film projects. To Lee, Jimenez inspired him both as a professional and a person. 

A memorable experience that Jimenez recalls was driving up with 10 others to a cabin in Lake Tahoe to shoot a YouTube series titled “NERF” by Lee and his twin brother. 

“Seeing her on set and her demeanor and how present she is, how sweet she is but also professional at the same time,” Lee said. “She’s got that great combo of professionality and also being fun and social. She is a really good example for me going into acting. I thought to myself, ‘I wanna be like her.’”

Lee also recalled how Jimenez was toward other people on set. He described her as empathetic, caring and supportive and someone who is always thinking about the people around her. 

“She helped me, especially as a co-producer, but she also cooked and helped everyone with photography,” Lee said. “She helped me figure out how to use a new camera in five minutes, which really impressed me because it was my camera. I didn’t even know how to do half the settings and she was just messing with it.” 

Lee is one of the many people who have learned from Jimenez, whether it was work ethic to improving a skill. Jimenez’s main piece of advice for students in similar fields is to immediately note down any idea or inspiration.

“Once you have an idea, you have it for a reason, it doesn’t just leave your mind,” Jimenez said. “The opportunity is at your very feet and the universe knows in itself that if you don’t jump on that, the opportunity goes on to the next person.”

This story was originally written for JOUR 595: Magazine and Feature Writing, a journalism class at SFSU.