Manuel is a full professor and the head of the film and media art department at Lusófona University.

He obtained his tenure in 2011 from Minho University in Portugal and holds a PhD in media studies from Universidade Nova de Lisboa.

He has worked as a trainer, consultant and producer in the audiovisual industry at a European and international level for more than twenty years and has a strong past experience as head researcher and project manager in several national and European research and development projects.

Sandra studied Communication Sciences and Audiovisual and is currently responsible for the Cooperation Projects Office for the Film and Media Arts Department at Lusófona University.

For the past years she has been managing all cooperation actions between partners, both from academia and industry, namely several cooperation projects under Media Programme Training and Erasmus Plus. She is the consortium coordinator for RE.Anima and Kino Eyes Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree and local manager for Docnomads Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree.

Geert Van Goethem is producer and director, specialized in animation films. He teaches Production, Production Management and Project Development at the Brussels based Royal Institute for Theatre, Cinema and Sound (RITCS), and Film Analysis at LUCA School of Arts Campus C-Mine in Genk (B). In 1987 he was co-founder of the Brussels based multidisciplinary production center for the arts S.O.I.L. (Sight Of an Ignored Landscape), where he still is artistic director. Over the years this organization became a leading independent production center for the arts in Belgium. Many of its productions were internationally awarded. In 2005 Geert was nominated for the prestigious Flanders Culture Award. He was member of the General Assembly of the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), and the General Assembly of the Institute for Visual and Audiovisual Arts (BAM) in Brussels. He also was member of the jury at several international film festivals.

Steven Malliet is a researcher and artist in digital media, music and game design. He teaches Art Based Research, Web Design, Game Design and (Digital) Media Theory. He has a strong international teaching experience, as a guest lecturer at among others the University of North Dakota, Erasmus University of Rotterdam, Tampere University and Aalto University, and as speaker at several international festivals and conferences, including South-By-Southwest. He is the co-editor of two international books on media culture: Moral Issues in Digital Game Play (ACCO, 2012) and The Borders of Subculture (Routledge, 2015). He was, among others, supervisor of the Seeing Sound project, which is still ongoing as a course module at LUCA School of Arts (www.seeingsound.be). His art, which mainly relates to music (videos) can be found at www.slowbear.be.

Executive in Residence Tuula Leinonen is animation director, teacher and researcher, who also has a long career in managing animation networking and developing projects with organisations from both private and public sector in Finland. She currently works as an executive in residence, who is responsible for teaching, research and curriculum of the Master’s programme in Animation at the Aalto University. In addition, she has directed several short films since 1990 and is the author of the comprehensive book 100 vuotta suomalaista animaatiota (100 years of Finnish Animation). She has been curating several animation screenings and organized international Animatricks Animation Film Festival as a board member for many years.

Paulo Viveiros holds a PhD in Film Studies and a MA in Video Art both by Universidade Nova de Lisboa. He is an Associate Professor and the Head of the MA in Animation Arts and the Graduation Course in Digital Animation both at Universidade Lusófona. He is a member of the R&D research unit CICANT – Centre for Research in Applied Communication, Culture and New Technologies. He is also jury in Portuguese Film Institute (ICA) for animation public competitions for financial support.

João Miguel Real is an award-winning Animation Film Director working in animation for the last 15 years in several animation studios. With a degree in Engineering, he has taken the path of animation, as an animator, compositor, and film director and his expertise has enabled him to work with different animation techniques as Stopmotion, 2D Digital Animation and 3D. Today he is Producer and Director of Easylab Animation Studio, where he researches new approaches in animation techniques. He´s been also Invited Assistant Professor at Lusófona University for the last 7 years in the Digital Animation Degree while enrolled in his final year as Phd student in Media Arts. Currently, he is Co-coordinator of REANIMA, European Joint-Master in Animation and member of the development committee of FILMEU, European Universities Alliance for Film and Media Arts.