WFA 2019 Directors Spotter Sheet

Emma Keehan has recently graduated the film program at UW-Milwaukee with multiple awards under her belt: Best Wisconsin Film, Best Narrative Director, Grand Prize, and 1st place at festivals around the country. Currently living in Asheville, branching out in her interests, Emma hopes to keep up filmmaking and take her passion far and wide.

Albert Fry Jr. was born in Denver, Colorado, and raised on a farm 50 miles north of there. At age 27, he left the farm, moving to Denver for a year, then on to Phoenix, AZ for less than a year, and finally making his way to Albuquerque, NM in 1986. He's done many different things since arriving in the 'Land of Enchantment' - including woodworking, building 'rustic furniture'. Albert got the 'acting bug' at age 35. He is now an award-winning actor, writer, director and independent film producer.

Anne-Flore Marxer is a professional snowboarder and strong advocate for gender equality in snowboarding; her input brought equal prize money in the World Snowboard Tour in Freestyle and put women back on the Freeride World Tour in freeride competitions. She is now back to films, to share the love of all her passions through inspiring film projects linking snowboarding, splitboarding, surfing, empowering and inspiring women to dare on and off the slopes. This film is her first creation as a director.

Nitzan Mager and Shachar Langlev are a filmmaking duo based in Brooklyn NY. Combined, their films have screened at Sundance, BAM, IFP and numerous film festivals, and have won awards from Sundance (Audience Award), The National Board of Review, and NY Women in Film and Television. They’ve directed/produced short documentary films featuring notable subjects such as Vice President Joe Biden and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg. A Scientist’s Guide to Living and Dying is their co-directorial feature debut.

Adriano Valentini is a Los Angeles based writer, director, producer and editor based in Los Angeles. His work has appeared on NBC's Sunset PPL and HBO's em>Project Greenlight. Writer Adam Toback is a New York City based writer, producer and actor whose work has been seen at Festivals around the country, as well at UCB and the IFC Center.

Andrea Guerrero was born in Guadalajara Mexico in 1992. She has written and directed several award-winning short films.

Nancy Dionne likes to take herself and others to a threshold by producing stories that create possibilities for envisioning better futures. The word “Future” is, so far, in all of her personal projects. An award-winning photojournalist and new documentary filmmaker from San Francisco, she is currently based in Manhattan working full time at Odyssey Impact and Transform Films.

Christopher Piazza is a writer/director living in New York. His last short film, Olfactory, played at over a dozen film festivals and was named Best Dramatic Short Film at the Berlin Sci-Fi Film Festival. He has also directed web series, music videos, live concerts and commercials. His comedy pilot, No Outlet, with stand-up favorites Nick Vatterott, Aparna Nancherla and Dan Soder was featured on the front page of Funny or Die. His commercial clients include the USDA, Volkswagen and Audi.

Catherine Lurie-Alt is a film producer and journalist based in London. She was the youngest investigative journalist ever appointed to the Business section of the Sunday Times in South Africa. Currently she is the European Correspondent for the New York-based TV Channel JBS and is a member of the Foreign Press Association.

Directors Brian Bonz and Mike Rizzo, aka Bobo Touch are lifelong friends creating comedy since they were kids. Brian is a filmmaker and musician who has published 3 studio records and tours with well-known artists across the world. Rizzo is an editor and filmmaker whose clients include Bud Light, Priceline, Little Caesars, Snickers, ESPN and who loves comedy and storytelling. Together the native New Yorkers write and produce strange films typically inspired by their City.

Anaïsa Visser grew up all over the world, namely in Mozambique, the United States, then France, before moving to Vancouver to pursue an undergraduate degree at Emily Carr University. Her short script Send Us Smokes won the Hot Shot Shorts contest in 2016, and she was a finalist in NYC Midnight's 2017 International Screenwriting Challenge. She was also privileged to receive the 2017 Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award for Emerging Artist in Film and Media.

Iara Lee, a Brazilian of Korean descent, is an activist, filmmaker, and founder/director of the Cultures of Resistance Network, an organization that promotes global solidarity and connects and supports agitators, educators, farmers, and artists to build a more just and peaceful world through creative resistance and nonviolent action.

Kate Dolan graduated from the National Film School, IADT in 2012. Since then, she has made 3 short films, all of which have traveled to various international festivals. In 2016, she took part in the Guiding Lights mentoring scheme in the UK. She recently was selected to take part in the first round of Screen Ireland's POV scheme which allows young directors to make a fully-funded feature film in late 2019 - the feature is called You Are Not My Mother, to be produced by Dee Levins of Fantastic Films.

Humberto Vallejo (Mexico City, 1991) was awarded a scholarship to study at University of Navarra, in Pamplona, Spain, where he majored in Audiovisual Communications and directed his first short film Mi memoria está llena de gatos. In 2016, he gave Film Directing courses at Altos de Chavón School of Design, in the Dominican Republic. Chanel, finished in 2017, is his second short film. Currently, he works as a commercial director in Mexico, while developing new film projects.

Rosalie Tenseth directed the first season of After and is creating #ISITJUSTME for her new comedy channel Happy Martini TV. She produced the film Self Portrait with Lyricy Films, which just premiered at NY Intl Shorts Fest. Her short, Failure Groupies, won several Best Short and Jury Awards and is released on Amazon.

Lonnie Lynn Iske has been working in the film industry for 10+ years. She started her own production company straight out of film school and has continued to push herself and grow as much as she can. Lonnie fell into production starting with her love of music – creating music videos really inspired her to pursue this as a profession. Lonnie grew up traveling the states with her parents’ band which is where she credits the start of her passion.

Abdelhamid Bouchnak studied at the Ecole Supérieure de l’Audiovisuel et du Cinéma E.S.A.C. in Gammarth and graduated in 2008 with the short film Miroir. In the same year, he won the prize for Best Young Director at the International Film Festival in Carthage and moved to Montreal to complete a Master’s degree in film studies. Since 2012, he has produced and directed video clips, web series and short films. Dachra is his first feature film.

Andrew J. Hachem is a Lebanese-American director, producer and Emmy Award winning editor. He is a graduate from USC Film School.

Kotaro Saito was born on November 11, 1996 in Osaka Japan. Kotaro currently studies Information Design at Tama Art University. He is a cinematographer, editor and director for a great variety of films, such as motion graphics and 3DCG, and live-action films in music videos, etc.

Suraya Raja is an animator and director, and a graduate of the National Film and Television School, where she completed an MA in Animation Direction. Her films tell stories of the absurdity of human behaviour, the internal and the tragicomic, influenced by her previous work in psychology and social issues, and also by her day-to-day observations of human behaviour. Suraya has worked in film and television, most recently at Aardman Animations, and is currently developing her own work.

Guatemalan-born Vivian Rivas graduated as an Architect in 1990. In 1993 she worked as a prop-master for the award winning first Guatemalan feature film The Silence of Neto and moved to NYC to pursue her passion for filmmaking. At 52 years old, she decided to go back to school to get a Masters degree in documentary filmmaking. Ebb Tide is her thesis project. Her goal is to shoot and direct documentaries about regular people who go through unexpected journeys.

Bismark Fernandes is a stop-motion filmmaker and designer from Goa, India. He has over three years of experience in designing and creating animated content for Television. He is well versed with various styles of animation with stop-motion being closest to his heart. What draws him towards this handmade art form is that it is tangible with subtle imperfections that makes it unique.

Irina Arms, born in Moscow, lives in Berlin as a filmmaker, journalist and producer. In 2012 she founded her company Armsfilm. The main focus is on art house movies and trends of modern social life.

Omar Rammal is a 21-year old filmmaker studying at SAE institute Amman in Jordan. He started out in photography and then got into cinema and cinematography in particular as well as few directing experiences.

Toshiko Hata was born in 1985. She graduated with a master’s degree in animation from Tokyo Arts University, and is currently working on making animations and illustrating. She has worked on films such as Rootless Heart, Melody of Funhouse and PacAlien.

Yasmin Mistry is an Emmy-nominated animator and filmmaker. Her work has been displayed worldwide including recent showings at the White House and United Nations. She is the recipient of grants from the Brooklyn Arts Council, Puffin Foundation, Riverside Sharing Fund, and Harnisch Foundation. She is also the recipient of the Jessie Streich-Kest Memorial Grant. Her documentary short films about foster care have been selected for over 100 film festivals and won more than 25 awards.

Fred Soligan is an award-winning writer, director and editor who has produced work for IFC, The New Yorker and UCB Comedy. He co-owns and operates a Brooklyn based production company called Gray Hour Media along with Zak Ray and Giovanni Colantonio. Fred likes making funny movies with his friends and hopes to continue doing so for a long time.

J.R. De Ford is an award winning director and cinematographer hailing from New York, currently operating out of Chiang Mai Thailand with his wife and two children. He's shot numerous films in 20 languages for NGOs advocating for social justice for a number of issues around the world. He as also produced several award-winning indie films with critical acclaim for their potent sweeping visuals and imaginative storytelling on a limited budget.

Cherie Julander has worked as an actor, writer, director and producer in the film and theatrical industries for over ten years. Cherie has a deep passion for film and has enjoyed creating with this medium since she was a child. She has worked in the production department on Independence Day:Resurgence, Six Below, and The Jade Pendant. Honey Do has been one of Cherie's favorite productions to date.

Yen Juen Lee is a New York based 3D artist. He has been working on refining his computer animation skills and sense of aesthetics to produce well ­crafted CG projects.

Lovisa Lara is an award-winning director based in Iceland. She graduated from the Icelandic film school in 2014 and won best picture from her department at graduation. Her short films have been screened at festivals all around the world and won several awards. Lovisa is also a director and founder of Frostbiter: Icelandic Horror Film Festival. She is currently working on a feature length documentary, Extras, supported by a grant from the Icelandic Film Fund.

Singer/producer Bettina d'Mello and drummer/producer/physician Krishan Khan's music-clips are developed by collaborating with sound, dance and vision artists of the most diverse cultural environments, with the intention to take a trip through the overlaps of hip-hop, rock, jazz, classical & traditional music and dance.

Hava Kohav Beller was born in Germany, raised in Israel and currently lives in NYC. She studied at Julliard and the New School. Her first film, The Restless Conscience was nominated for the Academy Award as Best Documentary Feature. It had its World premiere at the Sundance Film Festival and was televised nationally on PBS, and broadcast internationally. Her second film, The Burning Wall, opened at the Film Forum in NY, and at the Berlin Int. Film Festival and was broadcast by the BBC.

Caylee So was born in a refugee camp in Thailand on September 17th 1981, just after her parent’s escape from the reign of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia. When she was just three years old, her family immigrated to the United States. In 2011, Caylee was awarded the Zonta’s Women in Film grant for Most Promising Young Filmmaker. She is also the winner of the Director’s Guild of America’s 18th annual Best Female Student Director award.

Stefano Cassini is a film director and animator. He forged his skills animating on high profile Oscar/Award winning features such as Chicken Run, Wallace & Gromit and Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride before moving on to his own shorts.  Stefano grew up in Kenya and lives in Nairobi where he developed a strong interest in cultural diversity & ecology. Many of his films tackle social and environmental issues or investigate stories involving identity and change. For more info: www.stefanocassini.com

Pepper Binkley is a performer, writer and director who has worked extensively in film, television, theater, and commercials. As a storyteller she loves working collaboratively and experimenting with styles and genres. It’s Freezing Out There is her first venture as a creator of online content. Upcoming projects include two feature films, a children’s book, and parenting her two small children. A graduate of Princeton University and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Qi Lin graduated from the Communication University of China in 2006 and worked in CCTV from 2007 to 2014. In 2016, her short film The Hole was shortlisted for Cannes International Film Festival.

Stacey Larkins is a narrative filmmaker and musician residing in the NYC metropolitan area. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Spelman College, and a Masters in Music from New York University. She has written, directed, composed music and edited films that have played in numerous film festivals throughout the country.

Ria Tobaccowala is an award winning Indian-American filmmaker from Chicago. Ria is a thesis film student at NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Her newest short film, Freedom Shadow is in post-production. She is also developing an original TV show about women in tech.

Arian Vazirdaftari has master’s degree in cinema from Tehran University of Dramatic Arts. So far he has made 5 short films. Not Yet is his previous film, which won the Grand Prix for best fiction and the NETPAC Award at the 34th Busan International Short Film Festival and the Best Asian Short Film Award at 35th Fajr International film festival. Like A Good Kid is his new short film, which was premiered at 71st Cannes Film Festival in the CineFondation Competition.

Born in St. Petersburg Russia, Irina Patkanian is an award winning filmmaker, a Fulbright and MacDowell Fellow, and the president and filmmaker of In Parenthesis - a nonprofit film, theater and media arts company. Irina’s films have screened and won awards at more than a 100 film festivals, including. DOC NYC, Ann Arbor, STARZ Denver, Palm Springs, Hot Springs and many others. Irina teaches filmmaking at Brooklyn College/ CUNY.

Aitan Spring was raised by Israelis. His journey to this point in time is riddled with statements like, "emotions have no use" and "always assume you're the alpha then let nature decide." Love Tough is the culmination of his childhood, embodied ironically by a character that is an Israeli therapist. Aitan is a New York writer, producer and director living in LA with his family.

Chelsea Lupkin is a storyteller and an active member of the online film community. She has a passion for short films and is a senior programmer and writer for Short of the Week. She is also the Lead Creative Video Producer and an original member of Delish, an award winning Hearst food site. She has Directed short films, comedy sketches, filmed live productions, commercials, and documentaries for major media outlets including MTV, Delish, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle Decor, House Beautiful, VH1, GQ.

Silvia Schmidt started making films in secondary school where she also received an award for one of her screenplays. She gained further experience at an internationally successful TV show and decided to enter the world of filmmaking. She gained experience as a videographer in London, where she completed numerous short films for a number of organisations. She then began to focus on documentaries, with some of her shorts winning numerous awards.

Aksel Rifman is a director from Morocco who won the Best Screenplay Award in the Meknes TV Festival for his first TV movie The Killing Silence, which he wrote and directed. Last year, Aksel directed his debut film Monsters. He has acted as a screenwriter, cinematographer, and a director in various projects in Spain, USA and Morocco over the last ten years.

Shaan Couture is a French-American film director and producer based in New York. Her awarded documentaries and short films often address themes such as music, sports, diversity and the disabled. Shaan is a globetrotter who speaks 5 languages, including ASL, which she learned for her first short film Thin Lines featuring deaf actors. Coming from a family of artists, her deep concern for the sustainability of diversity in the Arts inspired her latest doc New York Scherzo.

Lorena Colmenares is an Audio-Visual and Film director who has made numerous short films awarded at various festivals. In 2015, her short film Death Forest won the first prize in the first edition of the international festival Premio Giulio Questi. In 2017, her short film Nine Knots premiered in the 41st edition of Montréal World Film Festival.

Matias Vellutini is an American-Brazilian director and composer who after 30 years living in the United States, moved to Brazil in 2012. He has written and directed shorts such as Chaplin SP, Alki & Me, the official music videos for the American rock band The Yawpers and for the electronic artist Altermauz. He studied cinema and received a master’s degree in experimental electronic music at the University of California, Irvine in 2011.

Anne Breymann is an independent animation filmmaker and puppet artist based in Berlin. Since graduating from the Kassel School of Art and Design she has been working as a freelancer for international animated film and TV productions. She was Artist in Residence at the Netherlands Institute for Animation film, the Abbey of Fontevraud in France and the Finnish Saari Residence.

Guy Hayout is a Tel Aviv based animator, media artist and curator of exhibitions in the realms of animation, illustration and technology. He is a graduate of the Minshar School Of Art.

Jaime javier (Ja´ja) Peña was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico in 1991. As a newborn, he moved to Mazatlán Sinaloa where he spent his childhood years watching movies and playing video games. At the age of 19, he moved to Mexico City to study Communications at the Universidad Iberoamericana. In 2017 he finished his first professional short film called “Pacgirl”, in this project he combines his taste for directing and his passion for video games.

Filmmaker Derek Frey has helmed Tim Burton Productions since 2001. Frey is currently producing Disney’s Dumbo, a live-action reimagining of the animation classic set for release in Spring 2019. Prior to Dumbo, Frey executive produced Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children and Big Eyes. In 2012 he co-produced Frankenweenie, which received an Academy Award® nomination for Best Animated Picture. That same year he produced the music video Here with Me for The Killers.

Christine Shaw is a Brooklyn-born Documentary Filmmaker and Producer. She’s passionate about creating socially relevant documentaries that shine a positive light on the issues facing the African-American and Caribbean community. Panorama: Jamming to the Top is her first feature-length documentary.

Catherine Dee Holly and Fray Forde are the filmmaking team and real-life couple behind the production company Coki Productions. The duo first teamed up to create Good Hair, an award-winning short film selected by Kevin Hart to screen at the world’s largest comedy festival, Just for Laughs 2017. Pop-Pop Is Dead is their debut feature film. The two are currently developing their series based off both films, Split Ends.

Hanna Bergholm is a Finnish film director and screenwriter. She graduated in 2009 from University of Art and Design Helsinki with an MA in Film Directing. Hanna has directed several internationally awarded short films and children's drama TV series. Currently, she is working on her first feature film Birds of a Feather which has been selected in Nordic Genre Boost 2016, European Genre Forum 2018 and Frontières co-production market 2018.

Lynda Reiss has worked as a Property Master and Production Designer since 1986. Working with such directors as Sam Mendes, Gus Van Sant, Norman Jewison, gave her an amazing directorial education. Her credits include American Beauty, American History X, True Detective and Stranger Things. Her debut short film has screened worldwide in 25 festivals, and received 25 awards. Lynda is a fellow in the Sony Pictures Television Diverse Directors Program.

Flo Convey started stage acting at a young age. After graduation, he took acting classes at Film School Vienna. As a result he played various roles at different theatres all over Austria. As a film fan, his interest in directing grew over the years. In 2012, he earned his bachelor's degree in media-technology. After internships in Los Angeles and Munich he started working for a TV production company. After a couple of short films, Return of the Thumb is his first feature film.

Greg Chwerchak has directed three award-wining shorts and a feature that has played at hundreds of film fests. The feature got distribution in US theaters and 75 countries worldwide. He has also written over 2,000 music videos and commercials, for everyone from Britney and Beyonce to Toyota and McDonald's.

Claire Fowler is a Welsh writer and director based in Brooklyn. After studying at Oxford University, she made a number of short documentaries including two about human rights issues in Palestine. She then attended Columbia University’s M.F.A. program in film on a Fulbright scholarship and, later, the AmericanFilm Institute's Directing Workshop for Women. Her short film Noodles was a Vimeo Staff Pick and can currently be seen on Nowness. She recently participated in the Sony directors program.

Denise Reed is a first time Director. She's an actor who grew up in the arts, beginning with dance and then stumbling her way into theater but found that TV and Film is where she thrived. Now based in New York City, no role or opportunity is too big or too small for her to execute her vision to the best of her ability.

Jiage Tong is a director and scriptwriter from China. She finished a literature degree in Shanghai Theater Academy, and her work includes film, TV Shows and theater. Since moving to New York, she concentrates on filmmaking and stories about Asians, in hopes of bringing great films that expose human nature.

Genevieve Clay-Smith is Australia’s foremost globally inclusive filmmaker. She is a writer, director and actress, who has won over fifty international awards for her films including the audience award at Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia 2013 with The Interviewer. She is the CEO of Bus Stop Films, a pioneering not-for-profit, which has conducted over 280 accessible film studies workshops for people with disability. In 2015, she was named Young Australian of the Year in her state of NSW.

Adam Williams is the Creative Director of ADCY Media and a VFX Coordinator for the hit television show Supernatural. Through ADCY Media, Adam has enjoyed exploring the art of photography and film making, having written, directed, and edited a music video for a local Vancouver band. The success of the music video project has launched Adam and ADCY Media into directing an experimental web series that is currently in production.

Kabir Chopra is an actor and filmmaker based in New York. He graduated from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in dramatic writing and has appeared in several short films, off-Broadway shows and TV series, including Madam Secretary. Recently, Kabir was a co-writer and acted in the horror feature Horror Time produced by James Franco and Rabbit Bandini productions.

Sebastian Stojetz was born in Munich and studied at the University of Television and Film (HFF Munich). He worked as assistant for Franz Xaver Bogner (TV series München 7), as a Creative Film Writer for ServicePlan and as writer-in-residence for Bavaria Fiction. He has written award winning short films and directed several commercials. His award winning social spot Ice is Melting was screened on over 30 festivals worldwide.

Valerii Gaken was born in Rome in 1997 and is now studying in VGIK in Moscow.

Niki Lindroth von Bahr is an artist and animation director based in Stockholm, Sweden. She received her master's degree in fine art at the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm in Spring 2016 and is represented by the Swedish gallery Stene Projects. Along with making her own films and sculpture, she is also a freelance costume designer co-working with Nicklas Nilsson. Together they have designed and made costumes for the artist Fever Ray and David Bowie's music video Blackstar.

Meritxell A. Valls was trained as director and scriptwriter at the ESCAC film school. She has worked in the production company Filmax, working with great professionals of the cinema industry. She began to participate in the development of scripts such as The Muse, the latest film by Jaume Balaguero and 100 meters by Marcel Barrena. At the same time, she collaborated in the development of the TV series Se quien eres by Pau Freixas. The Flapping of the Hummingbird is her first professional short film.

Alain Bidard is an award-winning animation film director from Martinique. whose first animation feature film won 20 awards and more than 70 nominations worldwide.

Gyu-min Gim defected from North Korea and settled in South Korea. After graduating from film school at Han-yang University, he started his career as a film maker.

George Vatistas is a Greek-American filmmaker who graduated from the New York College Film School in Athens, Greece. His first short movie The Weapon was appraised by international self-taught director Pantelis Voulgaris. His passion for directing and cinema led him to New York City. where George completed his Masters in Directing at the School of Visual Arts, under Bob Giraldi’s Directing Program. The Hobbyist is George's graduate thesis film at the School of Visual Arts’ Live Action Short Film Masters program.

Ramón Rodríguez is an actor, writer, director and activist who is known for his roles in such films as Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, The Taking of Pelham 123, Battle: Los Angeles, Megan Leavey and Need For Speed. In television, he worked on HBO’s The Wire, Marvel’s Netflix series Iron Fist and The Defenders, Fox’s one hour drama Gang Related and will be seen this Summer on Showtime's The Affair. He is currently filming Disney’s The One And Only Ivan.

At age 19, Machu Latorre moved to the US to fulfill her dream of becoming a filmmaker and obtained a BFA in Film at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. In 2000, she met Academy Award winners Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman and joined their production company Telling Pictures. Over the years, Machu has collaborated with them on multiple projects for PBS, HBO and Showtime as an editor and associate producer.

Asghar Safar is a founder of Hooran Studio. He graduated from the faculty of Cinema & Theatre at the University of Honar in Tehran with a Master's degree in animation. He is the writer and director of over 50 animated films and TV series. Abbas Jalali Yekta graduated with a degree in Cinema. He directs short animated films and is cooperating in the production of feature films, including Jamshid and Khorshid and TV series including History This Way .

Joanna Michna started her journey in 1999 with a trip to Cuba, a travel experience period during her ethnology studies at the University of Munich. In Cuba she discovered her insatiable wanderlust. Since then she has been capturing on film, unique individuals' stories from almost every continent and developed her unique style of attention for these people. She holds a key that unlocks the protagonist’s heart. Antarctica is the last outpost awaiting conquest.

Sara Martins

Marek Klosowicz graduated from Łódź Film. He participated in many expeditions to Asia and Africa and has created several films for Discovery History, Canal + Discovery and TVN. He has directed several documentary films for the Discovery Channel, including In the Shade of the Reactor, Wloszczowa-Faithful to the Cross as well as the Himalayist series, which have been shown in numerous film festivals both in Poland and abroad.

Paul Schwartz is a writer, director and composer. His work is in the field of dramatic story-telling in all its forms, and encompasses projects in film, theatre, opera and dance. He is a member of ASCAP, the Dramatists Guild, and the Playwrights and Directors Unit of the Actors Studio.

British-born Caspar Seale-Jones is a writer, director and illustrator who studied Animation in London and Live Action in LA and NY. Caspar wrote, directed, storyboarded and animated multiple short live-actions and animations. One animation was used as an MTV ident and another was shown at Cannes. He has since written three feature film scripts.

British director in Hollywood, Paul Duddridge, has created, written and directed innovative, multi media, UK shows for both the BBC and ITV. In the US, he is in demand as a producer/writer and consultant, and has worked for major networks and production companies. As a comedy manager in the UK, he discovered and developed the careers of Rob Brydon and Michael McIntyre, among others. His first narrative feature Mothers and Daughters illustrated his skill in creating ground-breaking story platforms.

Mayumi Yoshida is from Tokyo, Japan. Her role as Crown Princess in The Man in The High Castle received a 2016 UBCP/ACTRA’s Emerging Actor nomination. She made her debut as a filmmaker with Akashi-あかし- (2017) which she wrote, produced, directed, and starred in and which won Outstanding Writer at NBC Universal Short Film Festival, Best Female Director at Vancouver Short Film Festival, and many more.

Iris Moore is an artist and animator based in Victoria B.C, Canada. Her films are made entirely by hand, with watercolour and paper cut-outs. She aims to tell stories with poignant messages that will inspire viewers within their own lives. Her films have been screened in over 80 festivals worldwide and she has received 9 film awards.

Dom Lenoir’s passion for storytelling and powerful narratives is best suited for the big screen. This includes international shooting in Sicily, Scotland, Austria, Spain and Germany, showing an ability to create high production values and focus on acting- led drama. His latest feature Winter Ridge has already won 13 awards at festivals across the world and has been going out to a 25+ screen theatrical release in the UK. It is currently being distributed in the USA and Worldwide with Gravitas Ventures.

Johan Cronje is a part-time musician and a full-time filmmaker. He writes, directs, edits, and does a little bit of almost everything else. He graduated from AFDA Johannesburg and the University of Cape Town, and has won a SAFTA for Best Editing on a drama series and Best Script at the Silwerskerm Film Festival in Cape Town for Wonderlus.

Born in Kenosha, Wisconsin to British parents, multi award-winning actor, writer, director Sarah Deakins is a graduate of the University of Victoria theater program, and has extensive stage and screen credits. The first short film she penned and starred in, Late, went to Cannes as part of Telefilm Canada's 'Not Short On Talent' Program, and more recently, she has collected over 25 awards on the festival circuit as the writer and director of Greece, produced by Brightlight Pictures.

After studying art in Paris VIe, Stiv Spasojevic became an animated character and motion designer in advertising for brands like Greenpeace, The Economist, World’s Fair French pavilion. He has participated in many award-winning projects in international festivals.

Justin Andrew Davis is an actor, writer, and filmmaker based in New York City. Recent work includes the lead role of Alex in Brian DiLorenzo's feature film Myth, as well as a major role in in Emmy-winner Erik Bloomquist's award-winning horror short She Came From the Woods. In addition to film work, Justin holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the New School and served as an Apprentice at the Barrow Group Theater Company. You Look Great is his first short, both as a director and filmmaker.