2022 Participants

Anita Berkhane

After graduating with a degree in Art History, Anita worked across a variety of on- set and post-production roles. Throughout her career she has travelled extensively and worked behind the camera in many amazing places around the world.

Since moving to London in 2016, she has been involved primarily in the VFX industry, working on such award-winning films and TV shows as “Annihilation” (dir. Alex Garland), “Pinocchio” (dir. Matteo Garrone) and “Chernobyl” (dir. Johan Renck).

Alongside her production and VFX career, Anita has been collaborating with other filmmakers, writers and theatre practitioners as a producer, co-writer and co-director. Currently, she is developing a number of projects for film and TV.

Emily James, Mark Ashmore

Emily graduated from the Documentary Directing course at the National Film and Television School in 2000. She has made films and series for Channel 4, BBC, ITV, Vice, Discovery, and more. Her work pushes creative boundaries and is known for it’s inventive storytelling, a lightness of touch, and a gentle humour. The Guardian once wrote, “Emily James is a genius” - quite an honour.

As a producer at Future Artists, Mark created commercial VR project 'Lookout' for the BBC, and immersive video games event 'history of video games' which since its opening in July 2021 has seen over 30,000 attendees. His debut feature film 'the lost generation' was one of the UKs first transmedia cross platform projects to reach over 1 million views, whilst also being in the cinema and DVD, this was 2012. Mark is currently finishing his PhD at LJMU, on how generation z consume music via XR technology, and how the pandemic has accelerated this new market adoption."

Emma Morgan-Bennett, Valeria Salinas Toro, Fiona Quadri

We, Emma Morgan-Bennett, Valeria Salina Toros, and Fiona Quadri are a collective of three international Black identifying women/nonbinary creatives living in London. Together, as Afrofuturists (those who understand our diasporic past as a guide to humanity’s future), we draw from the mediums of moving image, visual art, and interactive video narratives. We are thrilled to create art that fosters curiosity and playfulness while centralizing Black voices in calling for life, joy, and liberation. As a collective, we have collaborated on projects commissioned by the Livesey Exchange, including the 2022 London Design Festival.

Baff Akoto

Baff Akoto is an artist and filmmaker who’s work has exhibited extensively including by the British Film Institute in their Experimenta strand for ""works by artists that revolutionise and reshape our vision of the cinematic moving image."

He has served on multiple cinema and television juries including for the BAFTA Awards and the BFI London Film Festival. As a director and producer Baff began in documentary before directing network TV drama at the UK's Channel 4 and BBC causing Screen International to tip Akoto as a “Star of Tomorrow”. The most recent feature film he has produced QUEEN OF GLORY (from actor and debut director Nana Mensah) premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and is released in cinemas in 2022.

Ben Mole

Ben Mole is director and writer. He has directed four feature films, Including Code Of Silence Starring Stephen Moyer released this year, and written four other optioned screenplays including Wolves Of War starring Rupert Graves and Ed Westwick, also out this year. He has show-run a $20million TV series, and has director credits on over thirty shows and feature-length productions across scripted drama, comedy, docudrama and documentary on the major UK, US and international television channels and streamers. He has also directed a 360-VR sci fi film, and several award-winning shorts, commercials and promos. He has been nominated for Grierson Awards and won Gold and Silver awards at the New York Film and TV festival. He has won dozens of Best Director and Best Production awards at festivals worldwide as well as winning the prestigious Promax Gold and D&AD awards for commercials directing. He grew up in the USA, Greece and London and began his career in Hollywood as a camera tech on major studio movies.

Claire Boissiere

As a games Producer/Writer Claire has been at the forefront of games development for 23 years, working at the intersection of art, tech and storytelling to deliver innovative and award-winning games on all formats including AR and VR. She has worked at AAA studios like PlayStation London and Media Molecule and is currently Studio Director at indie developer Jumpship working on their debut title Somerville, a narrative Sci-Fi adventure. She is also Chair of the BGI/National Videogame Museum, on the Advisory Board for Grads in Games, a member of BAFTA and was previously elected to the BAFTA Games Committee. Claire was also listed as GIBiz 100 Most Influential Women in Games and is a keen advocate of diversity and inclusion within the games industry.

Eleonora Mignoli

Eleonora Mignoli is an Italian-born UK-based bilingual screenwriter. She is interested in themes of identity, gender, family, and age-politics. Her drama feature Legacy has been awarded BFI Network Early Development funding, and she has been selected for the BFI Network x BAFTA Crew 2021 program and for the Series Mania Writers Campus 2022. She is a commissioned writer on The Hive, a film by Paguro Film, and is working with Manchester-based company Belly Feel as an Interactive Story Designer.

Most recently, she has won the Grand Prize at Fresh Voices Screenplay Competition. Her latest written-and-directed short film, The Bargain, has been acquired by the online platform DUST.

Frederic van Strydonck

Frederic is a filmmaker from Belgium, currently living in London. For the last five years, he has worked with some of the world’s biggest tech brands, including Xiaomi and Apple, to make visually cinematic films shot with mobile phones. These projects have taught him to always embrace new opportunities for storytelling with emerging technologies. Recently, he has been collaborating with NFT and web3 projects, such as PleasrDAO and the official Ghostbusters NFT project. He has also worked in production on films and TV shows such as Jason Bourne, Assassin's Creed, and Black Mirror.

Ida Thomasdotter

Ida Thomasdotter is a Swedish writer, filmmaker, interdisciplinary artist and creative director based in London. She has studied at Vancouver Film School, Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts and Broby Grafiska and since graduating she has freelanced in the independent film industry in both Sweden and the UK as well as written and directed several of her own short films. Besides “Save The World” she is currently working on a feature film screenplay and a book project. In her job as creative director for transmedia start-up company Cypherpunk Studio, she is developing an interactive anthology series called “Decipher” which is now in production. Ida is a member of the Writers Guild of Great Britain and Women in Film and Television.

Martin Bell

Originally from a Yorkshire mining community, Martin moved to London and became an animator over 15 years ago. Now a film visualisation supervisor, he has helped create huge action sequences for blockbuster franchises such as Jurassic World, Marvel, Fast & Furious, James Bond, and the DC Universe. His credits also include THE LITTLE MERMAID, ALADDIN, 1917, and THE WHEEL OF TIME. He has been writing screenplays for years, and in 2021 his true-crime drama DEAD MAN’S HILL was optioned by production company Buffalo Dragon. He is currently deep in production on his fifth - and most ambitious - solo CGI animated film, PRAZINBURK RIDGE, an 8-minute long sports-slash-war drama created in Unreal Engine using cutting-edge virtual production techniques.

Emma Nuttall, Thea Burrows

Cannes Lions award-winning producer Thea Burrows has teamed up with award-winning writer and creator of immersive and interactive stories and experiences Emma Nuttall to push the boundaries of transmedial content. Behind our female-led team, there are many years worth of film and game industry experience, which we are keen to use as a platform for our development into the virtual production space. On this project, we are united by a curiosity to develop a fully realised story world capable of being experienced by audiences across game, film and XR while exploring themes of journey and transformation.

Max Mackay, Samuel Rebelo

Max Mackay is a Writer / Director / Producer working across theatre, film and emerging media. Her formally inventive work explores the links between memory and imagination. Samuel Rebelo is a Game Designer and Environment Artist working in Game Development and Virtual Production for film and television. Max and Sam created a short version of In Perpetuum in 2020 under commission from BBC Arts. The film was broadcast on BBC4 in 2021 and selected for LSFF 2022, and they are excited be developing it further through FoF Inc.

Rachel Gold, Finola Waller

Kent based producer Rachel Gold is a former recipient of the John Brabourne Award and alumnus of the Edinburgh International Film Festival’s Talent Lab. Rachel was selected to participate in Film London’s PFM 2021 and most recently the Creative England Market Trader as well as the 2022 JETS initiative, that saw her feature film pitch chosen as a UK winner by the jury.

Finola Waller is a BAFTA Rocliffe winning screenwriter and WeScreenplay Pilot Finalist. In 2021 Fluidity Films commissioned Finola to write ‘Burned’ – an adaptation based on true events, most recently she has reached the 2nd round of a well-known Writer’s Academy and has a TV pilot under agreement. Finola is also a member of the Independent Film Trust cohort and ITV’s Comedy 50/50.

Tony Hipwell, Amy Banks

Tony is a writer/director whose work has screened at leading festivals such as Fantasia, FrightFest, Raindance and in competition at LIFF.

Tony's most recent project, an adaptation of 'Standing Woman' by internationally acclaimed author Yasutaka Tsutsui has been acquired by ALTER and is touring festivals now, including the academy award qualifying Deadcenter and HollyShorts.

Amy is a producer whose work includes; Unleaded (2014), Audience Award Watersprite, “Best of the Fest” Seattle Film Festival and Staff Pick/Vimeo Short of the Week; Jaime (2016), Alt Spirit Award at Rhode Island and one of the #fiveFilmsforFreedom at BFI Flare.

Amy is currently developing a slate of projects including US and South Korean film Lost Seoul based on the true story of Jin Stearns.

Maria Caruana Galizia, Caitlin Bramwell, Atticus Carter

Candle & Bell is a production company from Gateshead. In 2017, it was named one of the Top 50 Emerging Creative Companies in England by Creative England. The company is currently developing projects supported by BFI, Tornio Script Lab and EIFF Talent Lab connects. Candle & Bell works across content creation, scripted and immersive media. Lead producer Maria Caruana Galizia is a BAFTA Mentee and has produced 15 short films and two feature films. Caitlin Bramwell graduated from Northumbria University with a 2.1 in Film and TV production and is assistant producer and lead researcher. Atticus Carter is a graduate of the University of Derby, and is the writer and marketing lead at Candle & Bell.