FUTURE OF THE INDUSTRY

Morgana McKenzie is an award winning cinematographer and director based in Toronto. Most recently, Morgana received two nominations from the Canadian Society of Cinematographers for her work on “Wild” (Dramatic Short Cinematography), and “Lost Time” (Robert Brooks Award for Documentary Cinematography). Her short films have garnered over 40 awards from international festivals, including Best Director and the Canada 150 award for Best Film from TIFF Jump Cuts Next Wave. As a cinematographer and colorist, Morgana is currently working on a number of narrative and documentary projects in Toronto, Tokyo, Kentucky, and Seattle.

Atlas Acopian is an award-winning video director, creative director, and conceptual artist. As a pioneering short form director, Atlas brings a visionary approach to projects he spearheads. His clients, including Airbnb, Coachella, Instagram, Red Bull and Will Smith, choose to work with him because of his ability to concept and direct projects that balance experimental and genre-defying choices, with mainstream viral appeal. As a conceptual artist, Atlas has created projects including viral satire Amazon Dating, and an electronics charging board which “Sparks Joy,” according to Marie Kondo. Atlas is a master of incorporating cutting edge technology into his work to maximize its impact, having used everything from drones to 360 cameras. He was a finalist in the Shorty Awards, winner of the GIPHY Film Festival and New York City Drone Film Festival, and his work has been selected to Tribeca Film Festival and NFFTY. He currently splits his time between Los Angeles and Twitter.

Carol Nguyen is a Vietnamese Canadian filmmaker based in Toronto and Montreal. Her films often explore the subjects of cultural identity, family and memory. Her most recent film “No Crying at the Dinner Table” premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and had its international premiere at IDFA 2019, where she was also invited as the Opening Night speaker. It also received the Jury Prize for Short Documentary at SXSW. Carol is a 2018 Sundance Ignite fellow, Adobe Creativity Scholar and a TIFF Share Her Journey ambassador, where she strives to empower diverse voices and women through her own stories and personal experiences in the film industry. Today, Carol is working towards developing her first documentary feature as well as an animated short.

Anissa Amalia is a multidisciplinary artist, born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia. At the age of 17, they moved to Seattle to pursue their education, and unbeknownst to them, their decision to move to the US has opened many doors for their creative endeavors. They spent roughly over 5 years in Seattle, and in late 2017, they moved to Los Angeles to pursue their career further.

Anissa also identify as a queer non-binary muslim. Even though they have to hide their queerness from their family due to religious factors, they still chose to have their muslim identity as a part of them because they still want to preserve their familial connection, and also because it is the strongest ties they have to their family culturally.

The dynamic of Anissa’s identity often becomes the basis of their practice. At times the questions of "who am I?" or "where do I belong?" are the forefront of their work, other times they show it more subtly in the way they build their world through film, photography, or installation. They also used to DJ and VJ, but haven’t done it in a while because they like to sleep.