 | Carlos Franklin Visual artist, video and filmmaker XR artist mistercarrot.org Paris, France | Carlos Franklin is a visual artist who focuses on documentary and archive-based forms. He combines new media, video, installation, and drawing, as well as engaging in protean performative projects. Franklin is interested in how artistic practice reveals historical and political discourses. He explores semiotics to study aesthetics and representation paradigms and their role in the construction of meaning and the restitution of testimony. His work has been exhibited at numerous festivals, museums, and art centres, including the Centre Georges Pompidou and Grand Palais in Paris, the Saatchi Gallery in London, the Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Roma – MACRO, the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, among others. |
 | Deirdre Brenner Creative Producer/Writer/Line Producer South Pasadena, CA, USA | Deirdre Brenner grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, and headed straight for Los Angeles after graduating from Northwestern University. She’s worked in the animation industry for over twenty-five years, producing hundreds of hours of animated entertainment for studios such as The Walt Disney Company, Nickelodeon, and Six Point Harness. She was the Creative Producer on two CURIOUS GEORGE films for Universal Animation Studios and is currently a Producer on the popular adult animated series RICK AND MORTY. Deirdre resides in South Pasadena, California, with her cat, Benny. |
 | Jenna Levine Creative Development Assistant at Warner Bros. Animation & Cartoon Network Studios Animation | Live Action | Gaming, Los Angeles, CA, United States | Jenna Levine is a junior creative executive and lover of all things animation from Boca Raton, Florida. After graduating from Northwestern University, Jenna has worked at Cartoon Network Studios & Warner Bros. Animation as a creative assistant, supporting project development from pitch to greenlight across TV and feature for all age demos and genres. Jenna is passionate about championing new voices and bringing stories that are innovative, bold, and meaningful to life. |
 | Shoko Takegasa Festival Director Asian Shorts Film Festival | After working in finance, she joined the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia (SSFF & ASIA). In 2016 she became the programming manager and has participated in screenings and markets at international film festivals to promote the festival as well as the Japanese short films. She has also been involved in public relations for the SSFF & ASIA, including radio appearances and contributing articles about the festival to film magazines. From February 2021, she began working as Festival Director at SSFF & ASIA. She also worked for the Tribeca Film Festival as a short film screener, and participated in several festivals including Teheran International Short Film Festival, an Oscar qualified film festival as a member of the jury. |
 | Jen Rudin Writer. Casting Director Adjunct Professor. Author:CONFESSIONS OF A CASTING DIRECTOR published by HarperCollins NYC, NY, USA jenrudin.com Photo Credit: Douglas Gorenstein | JEN RUDIN is an award-winning casting director and author of Confessions of a Casting Director, published by HarperCollins. Jen began her career as a professional child actor in New York City. She spent seven years as casting director/executive at The Walt Disney Company, casting such beloved animated feature films as The Incredibles, Chicken Little, The Princess, and the Frog, and overseeing the Broadway casting and domestic tours for The Lion King, Mary Poppins, The Little Mermaid and High School Musical. Some recent casting credits include the Netflix animated series Arcane and Dead End: Paranormal Park. She also wrote and executive produced the short film Lucy in the Sky, starring Whoopi Goldberg, under her previous banner, Purple Glasses Productions, and cast the late Peter Bogdanovich’s final film, She’s Funny That Way. For more info, visit www.jenrudin.com and follow her on Instagram @rudinj. |
 | Yunah Chung Originals Development Content Acquisitions Astoria Film Festival Board Member NYC, NY, USA | Of Texas provenance and a bicoastal upbringing in California and New Jersey, Yunah Chung is a Korean American creative executive. After graduating from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts as a film & TV major, she cut her teeth at CAA followed by MTV where she witnessed words on a page turn into pixels on a screen as a scripted series development and current programming assistant. Her lifelong love of Korean cinema naturally led her to blogging about it online over at Dramabeans.com where a global community of K-drama fans continue to engage in thoughtful and enthusiastic discourse. In early 2017, Yunah was selected for an inaugural comedy screenwriting fellowship from Whoop Inc. (Whoopi Goldberg’s production company) and Mana Contemporary. Unable to shake her interest in global cinema, she also developed series and analyzed scripts at Infinite Studios (local producer of Crazy Rich Asians) while completing her dual international MBA degrees in Singapore (Nanyang Technological University) and Tokyo (Waseda University). She wrapped a 3-year stint as a Development Executive at 9 Story Media Group in New York where she developed kids & family animated and live action content. Currently, Yunah is the VP, Content and Executive Producer at SAMANSA, a Tokyo-based SVOD platform for high quality short films from all around the world; she oversees content acquisitions and originals. |
 | Judy Kriger Program Director + Professor WOODBURY UNIVERSITY School of Media : Culture : Design Animation + VFX Burbank, CA | Judy Kriger is an independent filmmaker and animator and has been a professional CG artist for two decades. Her credits include: Cats and Dogs, Antz, South Park, Ren and Stimpy, and Doughboy, Kraft and Keebler commercials. She teaches senior thesis, introductory through advanced 3D animation and visual effects production courses. Her book, “Animated Realism: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Animated Documentary Genre,” was published by Focal Press, and she is currently working on a CG animated PSA and her second book focusing on lighting for CG animation. She is Program Director and Professor of Animation + VFX at the University of Redlands Los Angeles | Woodbury campus. |
 | Carlos Smith Animator Chair of Animation School Veritas University San José, Costa Rica | Carlos Smith is an audiovisual director and producer, founder of SMITH & SMITH and HIERRO ANIMACIÓN. He has been professionally dedicated to animation since 1993. In this field he has alternated the development of content for television, film and other platforms with the making of short films and experimental pieces. He has extensive experience in teaching. He has been a professor at the National University of Colombia, the Javeriana University, the University of the Andes and for eight years he was professor and academic coordinator of the Master in Animation at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. Now is the academic director of the DIgital Animation School of Veritas University in Costa Rica. |
 | Kaylin Bondoni Assistant to SVP Warner Bros. Discovery Los Angeles, CA, United States | Kaylin Bondoni is a member of the jury for the Tampa Animation Festival 2025. She works as assistant to SVP in the Adult Animation division. |
 | James Leming Filmmaker Assistant Teaching Professor University of Tampa Tampa, FL, USA | James Leming is an established independent filmmaker and educator who focuses largely on the world of underground and cult films. In his personal work, he has addressed hefty topics such as mental health, the human condition and existential crises through the lens of absurdist satire. Leming’s expertise ranges from writing, directing, editing and film criticism with a premium placed on teaching young filmmakers how to express their unique individuality through the art of filmmaking. Leming’s most recent film, #toxic_positivity, was shot in the virtual production studio on campus with an almost exclusively all-student crew. The film is currently on its festival run, already winning Leming a best director award and a best cast award from the Couch Film Festival. The film will also have its international premiere in the UK with the Lytham International Film Festival. Leming is currently at work drafting another film, which he aims to shoot with FMX students as an extra-curricular activity. |
 | Max Catu Digital Producer Paris, France | |
 | Megan O’Neill Senior Associate Shorts Programmer Tribeca Film Festival, NYC, NY, USA | Megan is currently a consultant to film festivals, including the Tribeca Film Festival, where she is the Associate Shorts Programmer/Animation. She originated and curates an animated program with Whoopi Goldberg that has premiered two Academy Award-winning shorts – Kobe Bryant’s DEAR BASKETBALL and Pixar’s BAO. Megan has 25 years experience acquiring, developing, producing and distributing short-form content. As the head of AtomFilms Studio, she worked with emerging artists and animators on original web productions. She has acquired and/or developed content with Academy Award nominees PES, Jason Reitman, Adam Elliot, Lisa Cholodenko and Bill Plympton, as well as commissioning animation series from Aardman Animation and the JibJab Brothers. She co-founded one of the first US short film distribution companies, Forefront Films, and negotiated the sale of the company to AtomFilms. |
 | Patti White Founder/Director Annapolis Film Festival | Patti White is the Co-Founder and Principal at FILMSTERS, a production and development company, operating in Annapolis, Maryland and Los Angeles. White’s credits have appeared on CBS, ABC, Lifetime, Discovery, Turner, and others, and is known for producing and directing feature-length documentaries and producing a docu-reality series -ABC’s Extreme Makeover as a Producer & Senior Producer. She is also the Co-Founder and Festival Director of the Annapolis Film Festival, |
 | Karma Masselli Director at Shorts Movie Theater, Brooklyn, NY, USA https://www.karmamasselli.com/ | Karma Masselli is a Brooklyn-based producer, director, and theater creator known for her work in independent media, specifically short films and experimental theater. She is actively involved in the New York City arts scene, producing independent theater and, as of 2023, developing “Shorts Movie Theater” to showcase short films. |
 | Sheila Sofian Director Expanded Animation Research + Practice, School of Cinematic Arts, USC, Los Angeles, CA, USA | Sheila M. Sofian has produced, directed, and animated seven independent animated films. Sofian has received grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, Rockefeller Media Arts Fellowship, and the Pew Fellowships in the Arts, among others. Her award-winning films have been exhibited internationally. Awards include a Lifetime Achievement Award from the CineToro Film Festival in Colombia, Best Animated Film and Grand Jury Prize, New Orleans Film Festival, Best Animated Film, Humboldt International Short Film Festival, Best Animated Film, Ojai Film Festival, First Prize, World Animation Celebration, First prize, Animation, Central Florida Film & Video Festival, a CINE Golden Eagle Award, Grand Prize, International Festival of Non-Professional Cinema, France, a Student Academy Award, and Best of Show Award, New England Film Festival. In addition, Sofian’s films have exhibited internationally, including MoMA, Annecy Animation Festival, the Ottawa International Animation Festival, Hiroshima International Animation Festival, Zagreb Animation Festival, and CaixaForum in Barcelona, Spain. Her films are distributed educationally and in streaming markets. Collections include Harvard University, the California Institute of the Arts, and the Walker Arts Center, among others. |