Ivan Velez was born in Brooklyn, NY in November of 1970 of Puerto Rican parents. Soon after graduating from high school at 17, he joined the Marines and completed a 4-year tour. Along with movies, the Marines were his surrogate parents. The movies gave him something to dream about and the military provided him with structure and discipline. Receiving his honorable discharge in 1992, he briefly attended John Jay College to study Deviant Behavior and Social Control. At around the same time he became interested in acting and enrolled in an acting program. Disheartened due to the absence of material available to Latino actors, he decided to focus instead on developing such material through writing and trying his hand at directing.

See Ivan's MySpace Page:  http://www.myspace.com/outtaleftfieldprod