SPEAKERS

Christian is graduated from San Francisco’s Academy of Art University with a Masters of Fine Arts in 3D Animation and Visual Effects, and joined Framestore in 2007. Since then, he has worked on a huge range of titles, including Quantum of Solace, Where The Wild Things Are, Avatar and the Oscar-winning Gravity. Christian moved to Montreal in 2013 and supervised titles such as Paddington, Alien: Covenant, Mary Poppins Returns, Captain Marvel, The Aeronauts and the BAFTA-winning His Dark Materials. His  most recent project is 1899 where he led a team spanning concept art, visualisation, virtual production and VFX.

Dr. Vahe Vardanyan is the Scientific Director and an active member of the AI team at CDRIN, leading various projects related to computer vision, graphics and more. He has about 8 years of experience in the industry, worked in different companies in Montreal, creating VR applications, games and museum expositions.

As Epic Games’ Senior Director, Product and Engineering, Sébastien Miglio has over 25 years of experience in the computer graphics, real-time simulation, and digital video industries. He has a diverse background as Product Manager, UX designer & developer and entrepreneur.

Francois has worked in the visual effects industry for 25 years during which he worked as a generalist 3D artist, technical director, set supervisor and CG supervisor. He also participated in the development of the USD pipeline as pipeline architect and then head of pipeline at RodeoFX. He is now a professor at the NAD school of digital arts and a consultant in USD pipeline and color management.

Somewhat of a dinosaur in this industry, Fianna has had the fortunate opportunity to work at several notable software development companies, from Alias|wavefront, Autodesk and now SideFX. She enjoys seeing the landscape of the industry evolve and getting her mind blown by the many wonderfully talented artists that cross paths. At SideFX, she works closely with development, interns and external artists, and when she’s not doing that, she is probably complaining or sleeping.

Amanda got her start in entertainment in 2012 as an actor for independent film. Her exposure to the creativity on set led to curiosity around how films are made, which pivoted her passion towards Visual Effects.

In over a decade of combined film work, Amanda has earned credits on projects including The Mandalorian, Halo, What We Do In The Shadows and Midway. This work has led to a love of producing detailed creatures.

Amanda is currently the Lead Creature/Lookdev artist at WeFX

Studio. She teaches at Humber College helping students get their foot in the door in the industry.

In addition to a Ph.D. in Film Studies (Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris), JP Flayeux also holds a minor in Anthropology from Indiana University. He then worked for over twenty years in the video game industry and film visual effects industry before becoming a professor at UQAT in Montréal. In addition to his technical and artistic expertise, he wishes to engage in academic research and theory. Developing caring team and leadership during students’ project is also one of his goal.

Jeremy Robert has 15 years of experience in visual effects and recently oversaw the work on NOPE, delivering 675 VFX shots. This included the alien, cloudscapes, and a new approach to converting plates shot during the day into night. ​

Prior to this, Jeremy was MPC’s VFX Supervisor on Steven Spielberg’s re-imagination of West Side Story.

Before joining MPC in 2019, Jeremy spent 12 years at BUF, where he worked on Blade Runner 2049, Shane Black’s The Predator, X-Men Apocalypse and the acclaimed TV Series American Gods. ​

His career began in 2006, working as a CG Generalist, before becoming an On-Set Supervisor.

Étienne is a team manager and senior developer with established skills, rooted in a strong history of working in the VFX and animation industries. His particular focus is on innovation, providing quality code and development processes to strengthen the film, 3D and Animation pipelines.

Olivier studied at the ATM – École supérieure en Arts et technologies des médias in Jonquière, Québec from 2008 to 2011. After completing his internship at Hybride, Olivier officially joined the team as an assistant in 2011. In 2014, he joined the compositing team and was promoted to Compositing Supervisor in 2020. Since then, Olivier has contributed to the success of numerous blockbusters and series such as The Mandalorian, Invasion, Jurassic World: Dominion and Andor, the latest series from the Star Wars universe now streaming on Disney+.

Ex-generalist who became highly interested in shaders and optical physics. Coming from a game marketing background, Maxime joined Framestore as a modeler and had the opportunity to push and explore the boundaries of lookdev and all its related workflows.

After completing his training at La Cité in 2008, David began his career as a 3D artist at the Coopérative de travail 1-20MÉDIA in 2009. He started teaching 3D Master Classes at La Cité in 2011 where he stayed for three and a half years, sharing knowledge on different techniques, methods and practical skills and fostering students’ ability to evolve in their artistic aesthetics. David joined the Hybride team as Senior Modeler in 2015, became Lead Modeler in 2020 and in 2022, he was promoted to Asset & Environnent Supervisor. He has contributed to the success of several film productions and series such as Jurassic World : Dominion, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Andor and Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan.

David has over 25 years of experience in the media and entertainment industry. He contributed to the Visual Effects Society community as an active board member for the past 10 years.

He started as a technical help and support at a software reseller and has since co-founded three companies related to the industry. During this period, he worked on a few movie productions .He also taught Maya in few schools and university in Montreal.

David helped found and grow the biggest Autodesk M&E partner in Canada, 3vis, and played a pivotal role in growing their M&E portfolio offering at Scalar after the 3vis acquisition. He is currently building a worldwide M&E strategic business for Hypertec.

Mathieu Mazerolle has over 25 years of engineering and product experience in the VFX, cloud and gaming industries. His projects include founding a games start-up, helping to launch the blockbuster Assassin’s Creed franchise, pioneering game and film technology convergence at Digital Domain, and a platform for building VFX studios in the cloud. As Director of Product for Innovation, Mathieu connects Foundry’s Research projects in the areas of machine learning, virtual production, and cloud with the VFX artists who use our tools to create the impossible.

Martine Bertrand obtained her Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Ottawa in 2012. As an industrial research scientist, she then went on to tackle challenges in a number of areas including computational chemistry, natural language processing, medical imaging, and computer vision. In the last six years, she has developed an expertise in computational approaches falling under the large umbrella of Artificial Intelligence (AI). She also has a passion for science popularization which led her to teach the fundamentals of physics to future visual effects (VFX) artists and life scientists on multiple occasions. She joined DNEG as Senior AI Researcher in 2022 where she’s now exploring novel approaches to keep dazzling audiences around the world.

Philipp Wolf is the Executive-In-Charge, Corporate Strategy at DNEG based in Montreal. He has worked on projects such as Dune and Glass Onion: A Knife’s Out Mystery. As a VFX Producer, Philipp has collaborated with directors such as Guy Ritchie, David Yates, and Shane Black. He is a Member of the VES Board of Directors, Co-Chair of the VES Health & Wellbeing committee, and Co-Chair of the Animation and VFX committee at the Producers Guild of America. Philipp started his career producing shorts, gained recognition with a VES Award nomination, and worked on notable projects such as Game of Thrones, The Mummy, and Godzilla.

Marc-André is a veteran in the animation industry with over 35 years of experience. He has worked with TONIC for more than two decades on a variety of projects spanning from TV commercials, series, and feature films. His credits include Space Jam: A New Legacy, Apple TV+’s Central Park et Disney+ Disenchanted. Marc-André is proficient in many aspects of the animation industry, from stop motion, motion graphics, 2D, and 3D animation.

Lisa Purisima is an American/French Canadian award-nominated VFX producer. Known for The Morning Show (2019), Big Little Lies (2019), Disenchanted (2022). Lisa has over a decade of experience producing for major studios including Lionsgate, HBO, Netflix, Disney, WB.

From her first moments in entertainment, when actor Steve Martin described her work as “flawless” in 2010, Lisa knew she had found her life’s calling. That is until she took a far more challenging and fulfilling role as a mother. Unwilling to choose between these two vocations, she approaches her demanding work and home environments with enthusiasm.

Following an international journey in visual effects from Spain to Australia and back again, Javier Roca joined Rodeo’s Montreal team as VFX Supervisor in 2021 where he tackled the challenging project of bringing the Stranger Things digital upside-down world to live audiences in Stranger Things The Experience. He has worked with some of the biggest directors in the industry such as Steven Spielberg and Luc Besson and has contributed to many award-winning projects like X-Men Jours d’un avenir passé (2014), L’impossible (2012), Seul sur Mars (2015), and Monde jurassique (2015).

Graduated from UQAT with a Major in Visual Effects and a personalized Minor, as well as from the NAD Centre, Pierre has been working in the field of visual effects since 2009 and is also a lecturer at UQAT. As a passionate speaker about his profession, he knows how to captivate and convey his knowledge to his audience and students. Pierre has worked on several major productions in recent years and was nominated for a VES award in 2017 for Black Sails 3.