Animation filmmaker Pranay Patwardhan's recent work includes art direction and animation for film, advertising and branding - for Google, Adidas, UNICEF, Amnesty International, Budweiser and Netflix. His short films have been featured by the Vice Creators Project, Vimeo, Fubiz, Design Taxi and screened at the Seattle International Film Festival, Clermont Ferrand (France), TBS Digicon (Tokyo), Mumbai International Film Festival (India), VH1 Sound Nation (India) and ITFS (Stuttgart), winning a bunch of accolades along the way. A self proclaimed food enthusiast, he's passionate about art, music and sport. Enjoys taking short naps, cycling, reading and collecting records, often all at the same time.

Dee Austin Robertson is an Emmy award winning writer, director, producer and content creator for both the traditional and new the media industry. He has been recognized by the creative industry with awards from NATAS, Digiday and Adweek. In addition, his directing and creative producing work on BuzzFeed and Purina’s DEAR KITTEN has amassed over 120 million views and was turned into a Super Bowl commercial in 2015.
In 2102, Robertson was the second video hire under visionary Ze Frank at BuzzFeed Motion Pictures, where he was the founding member and lead of the company’s branded video department. Since then, under Robertson’s leadership, the division has seen massive growth. BuzzFeed’s branded content has been recognized by the YouTube Ad Leaderboard for over 15+ separate branded campaigns, with Webby, Digiday, and many other honors.
Robertson has overseen the creative and physical production of more than 500 pieces of original content ranging from award winning TASTY sponsored short form recipe videos to Executive Producing long form scripted content like PUPPYHOOD which was listed as one of the 20 Most Viral Ads of 2015.
Robertson co-wrote (story) and Executive Produced the divisive feature length film 'The Happytime Murders' starring Melissa McCarthy, Maya Rudolph, Elizabeth Banks and Joel McHale. The Hollywood Reporter calls it "uproariously funny," The Boston Globe calls it "undeniably hilarious," and Vanity Fair calls it "maybe the worst movie of the year”.
For 16 years, Robertson has written, produced, and directed narrative short films for companies such as Killer Films (Boys Don’t Cry, Far From Heaven) and Darko Entertainment/QC Entertainment (Donnie Darko, Get Out, BlacKkKlansman). He also co-wrote and directed the short film ERIC GOES WEST, which was screened as part of the feature length anthology HOLIDAY ROAD at the Slamdance Film Festival and was recognized on screenwriter John August’s popular blog.
Dee is currently the Executive Creative Director at ATTN:, a digital publisher focused on purpose driven content for brands.

Filmmaker/Artist Amos Sussigan started his professional career working as the youngest official correspondent for Warner Brothers and Fox in his native Switzerland. At the young age of 22, his first and widely praised book The Chocolate Oscar - which sold out three times -- was published by the prestigious Swiss publishing house Armando Dadò Editore. Amos has been repeatedly recognized and awarded for his creative works, such as writing and directing the animated shorts Broken Wing (2012) and Swan Cake (2013). His films have been screened at more than 40 International Film Festivals all around the globe, including 6 major Academy Award Qualifiers. In 2015, Amos was hired by Walt Disney Animation Studios veteran executive Dan Lund (Aladdin, The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules and Mulan, Frozen) to art direct and co-produce Aria For A Cow (2015)- one of the last songs of Howard Ashman and Alan Menken (Beauty and the Beast & The Little Mermaid). The animated short film was produced by Connie Nartonis Thompson, an Associate Producer for Tim Burton's Frankenweenie. After working at Paramount Pictures in the Animation Department, Amos is now a Visual Development Artist for Ryan Coogler's Space Jam 2 at Warner Brothers. His other notable accomplishments are working for several major studios and media conglomerates including The Walt Disney Company (Ducktales), Fox, DreamWorks Animation (Where’s Waldo) and Netflix (Green Eggs and Ham). Further, he continues to work as a freelance director for artists such as Joe Brooks, Tammin Sursok (Pretty Little Liars), Caleb Hyles, Sinplus, and Luca Hänni.

Ken Tsui is a curator and the producer at The Vancouver International Film Festival's Films+ department, providing strategic, creative and production oversight for 16 days of conferences, talks, keynotes, concerts, exhibitions and special events. The prerogative of Films+ is public and industry initiatives that expand discourse and challenge expectations of screen-based media in a film festival environment. Subject matter initiatives in my purview include traditional cinema, television, VR/AR, live performance and music in film.