In a release sent out today, the Sundance Institute announced that Patricia Finneran, festival director at Silverdocs: AFI/Discovery Channel Documentary Festival, will be coming on as a Senior Consultant of the their Documentary Film Program.

According to the release, in addition to representing the Sundance Documentary Program internationally, Finneran will be responsible for recommending film projects, maintaining the Documentary Program’s New York base and working on the Program’s initiatives such as the Sundance Doc Fund and the Skoll Foundation’s Stories of Change: Social Entrepreneurship in Focus Through Documentary.

The Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program provides year-round support to nonfiction contemporary-issue filmmakers internationally.

The Institute also announced the Documentary Film Program grantees nominated for the 2008 News and Documentary Emmy Award:

Iraq in Fragments
James Longley
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft, Cinematography News Coverage/Documentaries

Made in L.A.
Almudena Carracedo, Robert Bahar
Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story, Long Form

Rain in a Dry Land
Anne Makepeace
Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story, Long Form

Sentenced Home
David Grabias, Nicole Newnham
Outstanding Informational Programming, Long Form

The Trials of Darryl Hunt
Ricki Stern, Annie Sundberg
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft, Research
Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft, Music and Sound