Lillian Chan is an experienced animation filmmaker known for her work on various projects, including the award-winning children's film Jaime Lo, Small and Shy (NFB, 2007), an educational short for TEDed, and a VR prototype for the CFC Medialab. Her commercial clients include DisneyXD, Nelvana, Guru Studios, and Mozilla. Lillian serves as professor of animation at Seneca Polytechnic in Toronto. She holds a Master of Digital Media degree, emphasizing research in games and storytelling tailored for pediatric therapies.

Julie Charette studied animation at Concordia University, where she developped a strong interest in messy mediums, traditional animation and under the camera work. Her graduation film Dents de lait won the Prix de la Cinémathèque québécoise in 2013 and was projected at numerous festivals. Since then, she has worked as an animator on several independant short and feature films. She is currently directing an animated short film entitled La comète, produced by Embuscade Films

Francis Desharnais began his career in animation with Quebec City-based group Kiwistiti. In 2003, the collective released Rumeurs, a short film produced by the NFB. In 2012, he adapted Burquette, a comic strip created in 2008, into an animated web series. His comic book credits include Motel Galactic, La guerre des arts, La conquête du cosmos and La petite Russie. 2024 represents a comeback to animation as he prepares Le grand party annuel des créatures de la lune, a film conceived on the Alpine, the pin screen of La Bande Vidéo, an artist center in Quebec City.

Matt Kaszanek currently serves as Director of the Animation Is Film Festival in Los Angeles, a celebration of animation as a cinematic art form, presented in collaboration between GKIDS, Variety Magazine and the Annecy International Animation Film Festival. Prior to that, he programmed new releases at Film at Lincoln Center in New York City. He has worked at the New York Film Festival, New Directors/New Films, AFI Fest, and the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival; and, as a distributor, at Indomina Releasing and Glass Half Full Media. He resides year-round in Chicago, but still roots for the Boston Red Sox.

Emily Paige is a producer and co-founder of the animation studio E.D. Films based in Montreal. At the helm of the team, Emily led multiple projects for diverse platforms including cinema, VR/XR, and immersive experiences. Among Emily’s acclaimed projects are animated short films Retour à Hairy Hill (2023), Three Trees (2023), Giant Bear (2019) and public immersive attractions Indigenous Peoples Experience (2021), The Armillary Dome (2022), and In Linear Res (2022). Emily is a Board Member of Cinémathèque québécoise, and the award of Femmes du cinéma, de la télévision et des médias numériques (FCTMN) further underscores Emily’s commitment to entrepreneurship in the creative industries.

After graduating in Film production at UQAM, Jean-Christophe founds h264 in 2015. He then cofounded Plein(s) Écran(s), the world’s first film festival to take place on Facebook. h264 diversified its activities and launched a new aggregation service offer in a will to improve the accessibility and the distribution on digital platforms. 2021 marks a new chapter for h264 by launching into feature film distribution following the acquisition of Fragments, with the aim of offering an innovative distribution model. Finally, h264 rolled out its international sales activities in 2023, supporting the international release of Red Rooms and Humanist Vampire.

Ginette Petit has a number of feature-length fiction and documentary films to her credit, including Louise Archambault's Il pleuvait des oiseaux (2019), Patrice Sauvé's Ça sent la coupe (2017), Michel La Veaux's Hôtel La Louisiane (2015), Fernand Dansereau's Le vieil âge et le rire (2012) and Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette's Le ring (2007), all of which received critical acclaim. Ginette Petit stands out for her generosity towards creators, her understanding of the creative process and her sharp artistic eye, which she owes to, among other things, her beginnings as a set decorator. Passionate about the next generation of filmmakers, she also worked at L'inis between 1997 and 2021, including nine years as director of the film program.

A graduate in film studies from the Université de Montréal, Ariane Roy-Poirier began her career as coordinator and programming assistant at the Festival International du Film pour Enfants de Montréal (FIFEM). She was then responsible for educational activities and short film programming at Rendez-vous at Québec Cinéma. After a year as director of programming at Plein(s) Écran(s), her new position as general and artistic director allows her to put the organization's boldness and innovative character to use in bringing audiences together with Quebec short films. She has over ten years' experience in festival management, more specifically in audience development, and her passion is passing on her love of cinema.