SPEAKERS 2023

Adam Lauwers is an Artist Manager and People Experience Business Partner at Scanline VFX in Montreal, Canada. He began his career in San Diego, California in 2010 as an artist before moving up to Toronto and making the transition into the people side of the industry. He has worked at multiple studios across Canada, including Method, Zoic and DNEG. Adam is passionate about the lives and experiences of those working within the industry and partners with team members on community outreach projects, mental health initiatives, and shaping/implementing policies that impact employees.

Alan Chen is a Look Dev. Supervisor at Sony Pictures Imageworks with two decades of experience working on live-action and animated features. He most recently completed work on the visually innovative Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.

Previously, Chen served as Lead Look Dev. TD on features including: the Academy Award®-winning Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Over the Moon.

Chen joined Imageworks in 2004 and his additional credits include: Hotel Transylvania 2, Captain America, both Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs films, and Surf’s Up.

Chen received a bachelor of arts degree in computer science from William &  Mary and a masters degree in computer animation from Georgia Institute of Technology.

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.

Bernard Lajoie co-founded Tonic DNA in 1983, in Montreal. His passion for animation and strong stories lead him to associate with one of-a kind artists like Alexander Petrov, who won the Oscar for best animated movie in 2000. In 1996, he collaborated with Sylvain Chomet on La Vieille Dame et les Pigeons, winning a BAFTA and an award at Annecy Festival for best animated short movie.

Chloë Grysole is an Emmy-nominated VFX expert, boasting over 25 years of experience as a visual effects producer and business manager, having worked on critically acclaimed projects such as the Harry Potter franchise, HBO Film’s Into the Storm, Skyfall, and Edge of Tomorrow. In her current role as Managing Director of Framestore Canada, Film & Episodic, Chloë is leading a dynamic growth phase, managing a packed schedule of upcoming projects in Montreal and Vancouver. Her extensive production management experience and passion for fostering excellence will be used to uphold the creative studio’s high standards across an increasingly diverse portfolio of work.

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.

Corey Smith is ReDefine’s Senior Vice President of Creative Operations, where he plays a leading part in the studio’s creative direction, providing guidance, oversight and support across ReDefine’s global projects. Corey joined ReDefine from DNEG, where he spent several years as a VFX Supervisor before being promoted to Head of CG in Montreal. As VFX Supervisor, Corey was part of the DNEG Feature Animation Division in London. Before joining DNEG, Corey spent many years at Walt Disney Animation Studios, working on projects such as ‘Dinosaur’, ‘Chicken Little’, and ‘Meet the Robinsons’, and was VFX Supervisor on ‘Gnomeo and Juliet’.

Damien Fagnou is vice president, of software at NVIDIA, working on NVIDIA Omniverse, where he brings together his expertise in software and VFX production to help build Omniverse Kit and Omniverse Code. Previously, Damien was the senior vice president of technology for Technicolor, where he oversaw technology and software strategy for the VFX group, as well as CTO for MPC Film, working on Oscar-winning films The Jungle Book and 1917. During that time, MPC also created the VFX for the groundbreaking Lion King remake. With almost 20 years of experience in VFX, Damien looks forward to contributing to the future of graphics software at NVIDIA.

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.

Proud of three years as a solutions architect / Technical Account Manager at Epic Games Montreal and now Mocap Supervisor at Squeeze Studios, David Hurtubise had the chance to present two Tech Talk to Siggraph with Epic Games. He has helped many companies such as Netflix, DNEG, Rodeo FX and Moment Factory. He worked as HOD in Virtual Production for Rodeo FX and Director of Technology in virtual production at MELS Studios. And on films such as Transformer 7 and Beau Is Afraid. He completed is master’s degree at NAD / UQAC. And is now starting is Doctorate in Computer Science.

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.

Dylan Sisson is a digital artist with over two decades of experience in VFX and animation. He began his career animating commercials, creating game cinematics, and honing his skills with award-winning independent shorts. In 1999, Dylan joined Pixar and has been instrumental in the development of Pixar’s core rendering technology, RenderMan. Dylan is also the creator of the RenderMan Walking Teapot.

Aside from his work at Pixar, Dylan is constantly pushing the boundaries of digital art by exploring new frontiers in VR, AI, and 3D printing, and has made a name for himself as a creative innovator in the industry.

Edward Luong has been a software engineer at Pixar Animation Studios for 12 years. He has worked on developing tools for sets/environment artists as well as integrating USD into various third-party packages in the pipeline.

I wanted to be Batman, but because I’m not a rich boy with cool karate moves… I settle for the second-best job… Sr. VP, Real-Time Production at Reel FX! I have been implementing my “HOP” arsenal over 3 continents and for more than 25 Earth rotations around the sun. I love cartoons, people, planning, and solving problems and I love art and technology. So now, I am in charge of this brand-new Real-Time pipeline division at Reel FX.

With a rich experience as an international TV & event presenter and producer, Eric is passionate about the creative industries, in which he evolves between Paris, Abidjan and Montreal.
Holder of a “VFX and Animation Project Manager” certificate acquired at the prestigious NAD school in Montreal, Eric co-founded Afro VFX in 2022, an initiative aiming to develop a VFX and Animation ecosystem in French-speaking Africa, capable of meeting local and international demand, by relying on the expertise of the Montreal industry.

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.

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.

Now Senior Head of 3D at Rodeo FX, François Couette joined the company in 2016 as a Lighting Artist then moved to Lighting Supervisor and eventually department supervisor for a few years. Versatile and experienced, in his short time with Rodeo, he’s contributed to many areas of company growth such as animation, compositing, and lighting. His impressive roster of projects includes season 4 of Stranger Things, the film Zombieland, Amazon’s The Aeronauts, Marvel’s Ant-Man and The Wasp, and HBO’s Game of Thrones season 7 among many others.

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.

Frederic Servant is a Director of Engineering at Autodesk and is based in London, where he looks after the Arnold, Bifrost, look development and color management development teams scattered around the globe. Previously in charge of the Arnold team, he once was the main developer of the Arnold integration in Houdini. Prior to working on Arnold, Frederic worked as an R&D Engineer at The Mill in London and La Maison in Paris.