Our program

Sound is the invisible architect of a film’s world. This studio has developed imaginative and playful work in which sound functions as an active creative force rather than mere technical support to our visual productions.

Studio leader Georgia Martin is a multidisciplinary artist and educator. Her creative practice spans experimental music, video, and immersive sound installation, as seen in Dark Mofo and New York Fashion Week.

This studio forms bold ideas on how to sharpen the distribution, marketing and release of local content, and get Australian audiences more excited about Australian films. At TomorrowFest, they present a collaborative short-form creative project where they visualise their research on the ‘future’ of Australian cinema.

Studio leader Timothy Despina Marshall is an award-winning writer/ director/ producer. In 2013, Timothy's short film Gorilla won the Iris Prize in the UK, the world's largest LGBTQIA+ short film prize.

Docathon, an ethical global storytelling movement, empowers students to become storytellers, connecting them to learning, people, and positive change. This studio has produced a short documentary film on a local issue, story, or perspective, addressing the theme “bridging the gap.” 

Studio leader Dr. Hannah Brasier (she/her) is a teacher, researcher and media practitioner interested in how noticing can be used to engage with the world ecologically. She has multiple articles published in Studies in Documentary Film journal and her recent short film, Surface Levels (2023), was commissioned by the Mobile Innovation Network Association (MINA) in collaboration with Australian Environments on Screen.

The studio explores the critical and narrative possibilities of sound, both in relationship to media such as podcasts, film and games, and as an art form in its own right. They have created a series of audio narratives in various mediums about small, weekly sketches and a major project.

Studio leader Michelle Macklem is a sound designer, mixer and artist working across film, podcasts and games based in Naarm. Her work explores how sound is used to create social and political meaning. She’s sound designed and mixed for Apple, Audible, ESPN, the Guardian, Radiotopia, TED and Wondery, among others.

This studio explores how science fiction can be used as a creative tool for thinking about change — technological, social, emotional — and turned those ideas into compelling media works. They have produced various science fiction projects in the forms of film, audio work, and interactive work. 

Studio leader Alan Nguyen is an international-award-winning filmmaker, artist and designer. He writes for TV (SBS TV, Apple TV+, Disney+, NBCU, ABC), live performance (Melbourne Theatre Company, Arts House) and creates with new and emerging technologies (EyeJack, National Museum Liverpool).

In this Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) partnered studio students have produced short media and audio pieces that interview MIFF audiences and volunteers. The media pieces ask audiences about their experiences at MIFF, including their responses to particular films and public events at MIFF.

Studio leader Lucie McMahon (she/her) is a film practitioner based in Melbourne. Lucie is currently working at The Australian International Documentary Conference (AIDC) and undertaking a PhD at RMIT University. Her works include Things Will Be Different (Lucie McMahon, 2024), Jeanette is the Dog (Pat Mooney, 2019), and Mercury (Alena Lodkina, 2019).

Studio leader Daniel Jenatsch is a multimedia artist and composer based in Melbourne. His work combines hyper-detailed soundscapes, music, text and video to create experimental documentaries, installations, radio works and performances. In 2021 he received the John Fries Award for The Close World, at UNSW Galleries, other works include The Sheraton Hotel Incident (2019), presented by ACCA, and Mysterious Illness (2018), presented by Arts House.

Melbourne in _ Chapters, an anthology film studio, is a unique hands-on filmmaking workshop, where students come together to create something truly unique. In small groups, they have created numerous short films that form chapters of a larger, interconnected work. Together, these chapters combine into one official film, with the final title—Melbourne in Chapters—completed by the number of films we make as a collective.

Studio leader Hamid Taheri is an award-winning filmmaker, screenwriter, and creative thinker based in Melbourne, Australia. His work spans both cinematic practice and critical scholarship. His films—ranging from acclaimed shorts to his feature debut The Lower Ground—have screened at festivals around the world.

In this studio, they have explored screen editing as a storytelling tool. Students have learnt to edit intentionally and intuitively, building a series of edited works that will be shown at TomorrowFest.

Studio leader Sebastian Bertoli is a freelance creative who works as a director, editor and educator. He is a 2017 Masters (Film & Television) graduate of the Victorian College of the Arts. As a screen editor he has edited commercial and narrative screen content.

Run in partnership with Triple R FM, this studio explores broadcast radio as a collaborative space and enduring audio medium. They have produced multiple “as-live” pre-recorded radio shows that have broadcast the early morning timeslot on Triple R FM. 

Studio leader Jacinta Parsons has been working in radio broadcast for nearly 20 years. She is a current broadcaster on ABC Radio Melbourne, co-hosting the Friday Revue with Brian Nankervis and hosting Saturday Morning breakfast.  

Studio leader Kon Karamountzos is an award–winning broadcasting professional with 30 years experience in editorial leadership, technical operations, audio engineering and emergency broadcasting. Currently, he is Operations Coordinator at ABC Radio Melbourne and ABC Radio Victoria.

This studio is dedicated to experimentation in the development and realisation of film content that sits somewhere between documentary and fiction. They have created highly individual short film pieces from an experience or observation with an emphasis on the subjective essence of the observation. 

Studio leader Robin Plunkett is a cinematographer and has worked in all capacities in camera departments for more than 35 years. He also has experience as a producer, director (of non-fiction) and editor. For the last many years he has been teaching elements of cinematography, and film production in general, at the VCA and RMIT.

In this studio, students have collaborated in a simulated writer’s room. Week-by-week ideas have been pitched to form the founding bones of their TV narratives. At TomorrowFest, they are screening seven filmed TV pitches with a Q&A afterwards. 

Studio leader Lucy Coleman is an award-winning screenwriter and director. Her TV series EXPOSURE (creator and sole-writer) premiered on STAN in 2024 and is nominated for seven AACTA Awards. Her debut feature (writer & director) HOT MESS (now on Amazon Prime) was nominated for Best Indie Feature Film at the 2020 AACTA Awards and Best Direction at the Australian Directors Guild Awards. 

In this studio, they explore the art of film symmetry, creating aesthetic perfection through micro cinema. They embrace the ‘show, don’t tell’ principle, utilising visuals to be more effective, engaging, dynamic and immersive. Students have created film, video and audio work that explore media applications and approaches such as colour theory, one-point perspective, film symmetry, the golden curve, chroma keying, LUTs and plugins as well as traditional filmmaking & foley techniques.

Studio leader Cat Lew is a Video Artist, Sound Designer, Audio Engineer and Educator. She has a diverse creative practice, having produced video art and sound design for Melbourne Fringe Festival, West Projection Festival, Incinerator Gallery, Mesma Studio, Cinema Viscera, City of Melbourne and City of Maribyrnong.

In this studio, students have experimented with radically different processes to identify their own way of working, clarify their distinctive voice, and begin to develop a slate of work that reflects them as filmmakers. They will be presenting a series of experimentations that become a body of work. 

Studio leader Jeni Bezuidenhout is an award-winning HOH/deaf screenwriter and producer from Pretoria, South Africa. Passionate about bold storytelling that pushes boundaries, she specialises in genre and narratives driven by strong female characters. Jeni has produced and written over a dozen short films and plays and cocreated the funded sci-fi anthology web series Fleshbags.