Click on the Video Below and Sample a Session from a previous Digital Hollywood event. For Additional Video Sessions, Click Here Digital Hollywood, May 4-7, 2009 Tuesday, May 5th Presented by The International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood Special Session Panel 5: 3:30 PM – 4:45 PM Zack, Boom, Kapow! – The Unrestrained Innovator: How Animation conquers Unimagined Realities through Art, Writing and Technology. Dave Vamos, Founder, Six Point Harness Studios Aaron Simpson, Founder, Cold Hard Flash, Lineboil.com Jorge Gutierrez, Creator “El Tigre,” Nickelodeon John Andrews, SVP, Klasky Csupo, ka-chew! Antran Manoogian, President, ASIFA-Hollywood Patric M. Verrone, President, WGAW Glasgow Phillips, Writer, South Park, Kung Fu Panda, Moderator Patric M. Verrone is a television writer, attorney, and President of the Writers Guild of America, West. In 2007-08, he led that union through the 100 day strike that won writers a contract covering the Internet. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College where he was an officer of The Harvard Lampoon and earned his J.D. from Boston College Law School after serving as editor of the Boston College Law Review. His television writing credits include The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, The Larry Sanders Show, The Critic, The Simpsons, Pinky and the Brain, Rugrats, Muppets Tonight!, Class of 3000, and Futurama. Currently, he is supervising the writing and production of 15 television pilots for Machinima.com. He has been nominated for eight Emmys in four categories and won two. He has also received an Environmental Media Award, an ASIFA Annie Award, a People’s Choice Award nomination, the Writers Guild’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Animation Writing, and the Association of Media and Entertainment Counsel’s Labor Counsel of the Year Award. He was #75 in last year’s Time Magazine poll of the 100 Most Influential People in the World. He has spoken all over the world on media, entertainment, and law including testimony before the Federal Communications Commission, the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, and the California state legislature. He is married to fellow TV writer and novelist Maiya Williams, they have three children who all want to be writers and two dogs who want to direct. Dave Vamos is a Co Founder of Six Point Harness Studios. He worked for Renegade Animation, Walt Disney Television Animation, Warner Bros Animation, Oxygen Network, Disney Toon Studios and a variety of other companies. Projects included features, television, games, and the web. After working as an animation director on the feature film Jake's Booty Call by Romp Films he helped found Six Point Harness Studios with key individuals from The Romp. At Six Point he helps run day studio operations while continuing to do creative work on projects that pass through the studio. Dave was a producer on projects such as Ratz-a-Fratz for Frederator's "Oh Yeah" cartoons and a Punisher DVD extra feature for Lionsgate. He has been a Technical Director on numerous Six Point projects such as Fox’s Phil Hendrie Pilot, MTV’s Dirt Squirrel Pilot, and Warner Brother’s Drew Carey Green Screen Show. He was a production executive on MTV's Where My Dogs At? and Game Tap's Atari spots which were nominated for an Online Emmy. Aaron Simpson is the Founder of Cold Hard Flash (coldhardflash.com), a popular news and entertainment site focusing on the rapidly expanding universe of Flash animation. Simpson is an Emmy-nominated Producer of "Coconut Fred's Fruit Salad Island," a Flash-animated series that aired on Kids'WB! in 2005. In addition, at Warner Bros., he produced over a dozen development shorts while producing the "Johnny Test" pilot for the 2005-2006 season. Prior to Warner Bros., Simpson was Senior Producer of Original Content at Sony, where he helped architect a forward-thinking entertainment portal, Screenblast. Also, in 2006 and 2007, Simpson held the title of Vice President, Animation & Development at JibJab Media. Jorge R. Gutierrez: Born in delicious Mexico City and raised in eclectic Tijuana, Gutierrez has completed various films, cartoons, illustrations and paintings exploring his love affair with Mexican pop and folk culture. He created "Carmelo", which won the 2001 Student Emmys in animation and has been screened at various festivals around the world, including Kodak's Emerging Filmmakers Program at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival. In 2001, he began creating "Jorge R. Gutierrez' El Macho", an animated web series for Sony Pictures. As a character designer, he’s been nominated for three Annie awards. His character design clients include Warner Brothers TV (“Mucha Lucha”), Walt Disney TV (“The Buzz on Maggie”), Cartoon Network (“Class of 300”) and Nickelodeon (“Chalk Zone” & “El Tigre”). Recently, Gutierrez created & executive produced the Annie & Emmy award winning Nickelodeon series "El Tigre, The Adventures of Manny Rivera" with long time collaborator and muse Sandra Equihua. John Andrews is a Senior VP at Klasky Csupo, Inc. serving as executive producer and creative director of ka-chew!, the company’s spot-making operation. Since joining in 1998, Andrews has developed a large roster of animation directors (www.kachew.com) and produced commercials for clients including among others Samsung, McDonalds, Gogurt, Campbells, Burger King, Mucinex, Keebler, Nabisco, and Minute Maid and promos and titles for networks including MTV, Nick, E!, A&E, Bravo, and ABC. John was formerly at MTV Networks in New York from 1992-1997 where he produced Beavis and Butthead. He became VP of Animation and supervised series including Daria, Aeon Flux, The Maxx, The Head and The Brothers Grunt and pilots including MTV’s Downtown, Bootzilla and Cartoon Sushi. He was also the co-producer of the theatrical feature Beavis & Butt-Head do America. Antran Manoogian is the president of the International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood, a California non-profit organization devoted to the advancement of the art of animation. Working primarily as a Producer, Manoogian has worked on numerous animated productions including “The Chipmunks” (NBC) at Bagdasarian Productions; “Captain Planet” (TBS), Inspector Gadget Saves Christmas (NBC) and “Sonic the Hedgehog” (ABC) at DIC Entertainment; “Genie’s Great Minds” (ABC), “Winnie the Pooh: ABC & 123” (Buena Vista HomeVideo) and “The Little Einsteins” – Pilot (Disney Channel) at Walt Disney Television Animation; “Biker Mice From Mars” (Syndicated) at Tom T Animation; and “Click and Clack: As the Wrench Turns” (PBS) at CTTV. Glasgow Phillips is a writer, producer, and director who works in film, television, print, and new media. In animated television, he has written for South Park (CC), Father of the Pride (DreamWorks/NBC), The Adventures of Chico and Guapo (MTVN), and Code Monkeys (G4). He is currently writing on the upcoming DreamWorks/Nickelodeon series Kung Fu Panda and completing post-production on Magic Reader Classics, an educational DVD series for children. He recently joined Acme-Smith, a boutique production company specializing in branded entertainment, and you can read about his adventures in underground Hollywood in his memoir The Royal Nonesuch.