SJ Chiro graduated from Bennington College with a degree in theater and French literature. She spent much of her early career as an actor and director in Seattle’s theater scene. Her 2006 debut short film Little Red Riding Hood garnered awards for Best Live Action Short at Children’s Film Festival Seattle and Best Cinematography at the San Francisco Women’s Film Festival. Her next film, Third Day's Child, premiered at the Seattle International Film Festival 2008 and screened at the Science Fiction & Fantasy Short Film Festival, One Reel Festival of Shorts, and Palm Springs International Festival of Short Films, among others. Next, her short film Howard From Ohio was awarded a special jury prize at SIFF (Seattle International Film Festival) 2011, best short film at Seattle’s Local Sightings Film Festival 2011, as well as the Director's Award at the Boston Underground Film Festival. Her short film The Epiphany, based on a short story by Jonathan Lethem, was made for the Fly Film Challenge, SIFF 2011. This film marked the first collaboration with producer Mel Eslyn. In 2011 a tribute to Jørgen Leth’s The Perfect Human, was commissioned by Seattle's The Project Room. Most recently a collaboration with Charles Mudede, The Third Wheel, premiered at SIFF in 2013. LANE 1974, Chiro’s first feature film, draws on her own experience as a child of revolutionary thinkers who retreated to a communal life in Northern California in the 1970s.