Speaker Biographies

TALES FROM THE DIGITAL FRONTIER 23 JUNE 2009

Liz Rosenthal, Director, Power to the Pixel

An early advocate and pioneer of digital distribution and filmmaking, Liz is a digital film and media expert.

She is the Founder and Director of Power to the Pixel an organisation that provides the film and media community with the latest knowledge about the digital changes that are transforming the independent film business. PTTP organises The Cross-Media Film Forum during the London Film Festival. This event connects the film industry with key innovators of the digital revolution, pioneering new distribution and finance models, in a conference, a think tank and a cross-media project forum. Power to the Pixel Consulting advises international media companies, film financing organisations, filmmakers and film festivals about using cutting-edge distribution and production strategies and new film business models. Liz has recently been appointed as the Digital Distribution Strategy Advisor to the UK Film Council.

She is invited regularly to speak at international conferences, film festivals and leading film schools including Berlin, Cannes, Rotterdam, London and Edinburgh Film Festivals, Screen International Conferences and lectured at EAVE, The Media Business School in Ronda, BAFTA, The National Film and Television School, for Skillset, The ICA and The National Film Theatre in London.

She is also the founder of Earthly Delights Films, a production company that develops independent media projects. She is one of the producers of feature film The Trouble With Men and Women which was released in the US through The Independent Film Channel and has just launched online animation project and series, Marsipan.

Liz set up and ran the UK office for Next Wave Films (a Santa Monica based company of the Independent Film Channel US) from 1998 to 2002. Next Wave Films was a pioneer in the production, finance and sales of ultra low budget features and digital filmmaking. The company helped exceptionally talented filmmakers, from the US and abroad, launch their careers.

Peter Buckingham, Head of Distribution & Exhibition, UK Film Council

Peter Buckingham is Head of Distribution & Exhibition at the UK Film Council and as such is tasked with increasing the breadth and diversity of film audiences across the UK, as well as assisting audience appreciation of UK films.

He heads up a range of schemes to support this strategy, which aim to broaden the choice of films available to UK audiences and to increase admissions for a wider range of film; these include the P&A (prints & advertising) Fund and the world’s first 2k Digital Screen Network in over 200 cinemas.
Buckingham is leading on digital strategy for the UK Film Council and has given many lectures on this subject. He is currently also on a number of boards and advisory boards including Cass Business School in London and AIM (The All Industry Marketing agency for the UK film industry). He was previously Deputy Chief Executive of FilmFour Limited and was named Video Distributor of the Year in 2000.

Prior to FilmFour, he was MD of Chris Blackwell’s Oasis Cinemas building up a specialised cinema chain. He has also worked as Director of Film Distribution for Virgin Vision.

Brian Newman, President & CEO, Tribeca Film Institute

Brian Newman was recently named the President & CEO of the Tribeca Film Institute (TFI) as the result of a combination between Renew Media and TFI. As a combined organisation, the primary objective is to create one institution dedicated to innovation in film and media, the enrichment of audiences and the promotion of education, understanding and creativity through the media arts. TFI now gives approximately $1 .25 million annually to filmmakers and media artists through grants and fellowships in the United States and Mexico, in addition to other programs for media artists, youth and the general public.

Newman was Executive Director of IMAGE Film & Video Center in Atlanta for five years, overseeing the Atlanta Film Festival amongst other programs. Previously he held positions at the IFP and the South Carolina Arts Commission. Brian also serves on the editorial advisory board for Art Papers magazine and the steering committee of Grantmakers in Film & Electronic Media (GFEM). Newman has a MA in Film Studies from Emory University.

Jamie King, Award-winning Filmmaker and Digital Pioneer

Jamie King is founder of the VODO project for distributing and sustaining cultural production via P2P and Director/Producer of the STEAL THIS FILM series which has been downloaded more than 6m times, broadcast internationally and screened at festivals worldwide. Jamie’s work focuses on the radical creative possibilities offered by new media. He is currently in post-production with a five part net-show and feature, Dark Fibre commissioned by FACT and Arts Council England.

When not working on projects, Jamie lectures worldwide on the changes digital networks are bringing to creativity and cultural production. In 2008 he keynoted the Creative Commons Conference in Sapporo and spoke at Power To The Pixel held at the London Film Festival. He continues to consult for a number of high-profile firms and organisations including the UK’s Royal Society of Arts, Channel 4 Television and RTL. His essays, articles and ideas are published internationally including in The Times, Guardian and Telegraph newspapers.

He lives at jamie.com and in Kreuzberg, Berlin.

Lizzie Gillett, Producer

Producer Lizzie Gillett came to London from New Zealand in 2001, where she had been working as a TV news reporter and programme maker. Lizzie planned to live the dream, directing Panorama for the BBC or similar, but somehow wound up working part-time for Franny Armstrong at Spanner Films instead, and by the end of 2004 Lizzie was on board the Stupid beast as Co-Producer of the feature film Age of Stupid.

Over the past four and a half years her roles as manager of the entire 100-strong production crew and constant companion to Franny throughout the filming trip to the four corners of the earth have given Lizzie a unique and intimate inside perspective on the Stupid story as it unfolded.

M dot Strange, Award-winning Filmmaker

When M dot Strange touched down in Park City, Utah for the Sundance Film Festival in January 2007 for the world premiere of his first animated feature We Are The Strange, thousands of Internet-obsessed teens and twenty-somethings already knew more about the film than any buyer at the festival. For months M dot had been leaking footage and behind-the-scenes featurettes of the film to YouTube, and once he was accepted to Sundance he put up the trailer. It got 500,000 views in four days. Not bad for a guy who made a movie in his bedroom. With a love for 8-bit video games and stop-motion animation, the San Jose-based M dot has been honing his bizarre brand of stories since the late ‘90s. “I’ve never taken a film class or an art class ever,” he says. “I learned everything through the Internet and reading books – the Internet was my film school.”

M dot is currently working on his next animated feature film – a 3D Samurai film entitled Heart String Marionette due for completion in January 2010.