• Virtual Production: how real-time technologies can change the filmmaking process
  Frans-Willem Janssen [OR]

More and more we are learning how virtual production can improve the filmmaking process. Real-time rendering technologies are getting better and have become an important tool in the filmmaker's arsenal. But what exactly is the value of it? And how can you use this technology to enhance the creative process? With the graduate film ‘A Taste Of Friendship’, we investigated this by trying to apply virtual production at every stage of the filmmaking process. This meant that we created an extensive previz, for which we developed a tool to take live shots in a digital world. But it also meant that we used an LED screen to replace a green screen. During the presentation, I will share my experiences and insights with regards to using this technology.

Bio:
Frans-Willem Janssens ('s-Gravenhage, 1998) discovered his passion for film while studying Natural Science & Innovation Management. He continued this interest by enrolling as a student at the Netherlands Film Academy.

There, in recent years, he specialized as a post-production supervisor and technically savvy producer with a penchant for visual effects. By looking for innovative techniques, Frans-Willem hopes to make innovative films that will amaze the audience and transport them into unknown worlds.

Frans-Willem is now working at Planet X, a small Dutch vfx house, in the virtual production department.

• (Un)credible. Dutch film dialogue
  Jan Verburg [GS]

The film starts, everything goes well, until the first Dutch words are spoken and a certain uneasiness overtakes you. An uneasiness that only increases with every scene in which people speak in a way that no one would ever does…

A study of unconvincing Dutch dialogue. By trying out different things with actors, and discussing the method and results with them, we may gain some insight into what might or might not work to make Dutch film dialogue a bit more credible.

Bio:
Jan is now in his 4th year as a sound designer. From studying physics he switched to film and literature studies, and from there to the Film Academy. In the Greenhouse research, he now combines all these interests.

• Gaze is a Bridge
  Katarina Zdjelar [KK]

The film "Gaze is a bridge" is inspired by Nasta Rojc and her painting ‘Self-Portrait with a Rifle’ (1912), as well as by the work and personal story of photographer and video artist Ana Opalić. Their biographies, determined by the right to choose freedom and love, taking place in two different periods almost a century apart, intertwine with each other.
The gaze in Katarina Zdjelar’s film is a gaze of connecting autobiographies, of understanding, but also a gaze that challenges us to reach out and cross the bridge
between the known and the unknown, between the present and the past, to build a bridge of connection between us and them, me and you. To recognize
ourselves in our fragility, alienation, vulnerability, in the struggle for personal positions and places that belong to us all.

Bio:
Katarina Zdjelar grew up in Belgrade and is currently based in Rotterdam. Working mainly in the medium of video, her work explores the way one body encounters another as a site of resistance and possibility, pointing to the fragile agency of collective action in the present. Voice, music, sound and language have been the core interests throughout her practice.

Katarina represented Serbia at the 53rd Venice Biennale and has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions internationally, and has also shown her work at various international film festivals.

Katarina is also an educator and worked in many academic and post-academic institutes; currently she holds a position of core tutor at Piet Zwart Institute (MA Fine Art), WdKA Rotterdam and is part of the core team of the Master’s programme at the Netherlands Film Academy. 

• Conscious awareness of one’s intuition
  Faye de Wilde [GT]

How to increase students' intuition for the purpose of editing footage? While teaching, we noticed that the current generation has little awareness of their own intuition when they are editing. Based on these initial observations, we have developed new lessons that we will use to better see and explore what is going on, what it means and what can be done about it. 

Bio:
Faye de Wilde graduated as an editor from the Netherlands Film Academy in 2006. After several years as an independent editor, from 2008 she worked as coordinator, project supervisor, study supervisor and teacher at the Mediacollege Amsterdam in the Audiovisual program. Since 2015, she has been attached to the Dutch Film Academy as a professional teacher of Montage. In 2019, she obtained the Avid Licensed Teacher certificate.

Over the years, Faye became increasingly interested in the scientific side of what happens in the brain and body during editing.

• The Film Academy’s gender balance (or lack of it) 
  Lonneke Worm / Esther Schmidt [OR]

Studies show that in the film and audiovisual sector, the proportion and influence of women is lagging behind that of men in almost all areas. Stichting Vrouwen In Beeld is committed to improving that balance: in employment status, in visibility and in stories. 

The Film Academy equally strives for equal representation. Currently, in certain disciplines, it is difficult to motivate underrepresented groups to apply and/or actually start the programme. This led to a collaboration between the Film Academy and the researchers of Vrouwen in Beeld to delve into this. 

This research is still in progress, but we hope to already be able to show something of the first results. During this meeting, we will give a short introduction, followed by an important discussion: what we are going to do with this knowledge, how to proceed? 

Bio Lonneke Worm:
After more than 10 years on the film set in the camera department, Lonneke entered art education. Initially out of love for the profession and the Film Academy, she soon discovered that her heart was in thinking about education and educational innovation. Lonneke is always looking to create a safe, creative, inspiring and motivating learning environment for students and colleagues. 

Vrouwen in Beeld:
Stichting Vrouwen in Beeld was established to raise the visibility and strengthen the work and position of women in the Dutch television and film industry through research and activities.  See www.vrouweninbeeld.nl

• Performing Dissent: Resonances of Resistance
  Nduka Mntambo [KK]

In this presentation, I offer a visual abstract tracing the emergence of a cinematic dialogue with the subversive South African playwright, painter, and performer Gamakhulu Diniso. This artistic research inquiry positions Diniso's oeuvre as a living, performative archive - a site where reenactments and video archives become vehicles for probing the contested terrains of representation. Through the lens of moving image practice, histories from the margins are brought into relief. The project traverses the boundaries of performance art, painting, and literary expression, interrupting and disrupting dominant narratives of contemporary South African identity. By straddling these disciplines, the research invites a reconsideration of the modalities of resistance, challenging the conventional frameworks through which South African cultural memory is constructed and mediated.

Bio:
Nduka Mntambo is a multidisciplinary artist and academic whose work weaves together urban spatial practices, experimental filmmaking, and artistic research. His research examines the intersections between cinematic artistic practices and the lived realities of urban life within the 'global south’. Nduka is Head of the Master’s programme Artistic Research in and through Cinema at the Netherlands Film Academy. 

• Essay on the Method
  Stanislaw Liguzinski [KK]

‘Essay on the Method’ is the outcome of a collaborative effort between March 2021 and December 2022 by filmmakers, artists, academics, and vnLab’s Essay Film Studio working group. The publication reflects our practice-based research in essayistic filmmaking, combining audiovisual essays with creators' comments. We explored diverse practices centered on the essay form, focusing on the gestures involved in creating audiovisual works. Our aim was to create a subjective dictionary capturing the essence of critical thinking through film, highlighting individual methods rather than teaching universal techniques. Inspired by Descartes' Discourse on the Method, we shifted from telling to showing, experimenting, and sharing through ten distinct essays that revealed our personal approaches.

Bio:
Stanislaw Liguzinski is a Research Coordinator at the Netherlands Film Academy, the head Immersive Media programmer of Imagine Film Festival in Amsterdam (NL), an XR maker, and a former co-director of the Essay Film Studio of Lodz Film School (PL). Being a graduate of academic programmes in media, film and critical theory but also the Master of Film programme at the Nederlandse Film Academy, he combines practice and theory to develop credible forms of practice-based research in XR and film. He wrote for major Polish media outlets, edited journals, curated programs and XR experiences for international film festivals and cultural institutions including IFFR, Go Short, Kaboom or New Horizons.

• The Music of Sound
  Melle Posthuma de Boer [GS]

My fascination with sound design originally stems from my fascination for (film) music. I think that sound design and music are very close to one another, and actually have the same goal but use different means. I have immersed myself in various makers who very consciously use the combination of sound design and music. I hope this will help me to work with a composer in a different way, and thus approach the sound design process differently. I hope to inspire other creators with this, and show how important a good collaboration between the two is. How much extra power it can bring to a film. Whether it's conscious, or plays on the viewer's subconscious, it gives an emotional direction that you can't achieve in any other way.

Bio:
Melle Posthuma de Boer (24) is a fourth-year sound design student. With a background in music, he has a unique perspective on the power of the sound design profession. He studied bass guitar at the Herman Brood Academy and composing for the media at the HKU, before enrolling in the Film academy. There he started focusing entirely on sound design. In addition to his studies, Melle works as a sound designer and composer on short films, theater and podcasts. He also directed a short film in 2023, which was awarded best film at the Indy Library Film Festival. 

• You can’t kill a poem
  Eliane Esther Bots [KK]

I am interested in how people construct and tell stories - to themselves and to others -whether within the intimacy of a family, across generations, at work, or to strangers. I am particularly drawn to how people narrate (or are narrated into) disruptive events or conflicts in their lives. How do they tell these stories? What narrative position does the narrator take? How does the narrative affect both the one that speaks and the listener? 

At the core of working with narratives and narration is listening. What does listening mean in the specific context of the methodology of my documentary film practice? And how does listening shape narration, narrative construction and working with narratives?

In the context of this research, I discuss my work in progress publication ‘The daughters, The Interpreters and The family’. This publication is based on the interviews I conducted for three of my film projects. I will share elements of the audio layer I am creating for the publication, so that readers will not only be able to read and view the publication but also listen to it.   

Bio:
Eliane Esther Bots (1986) is a Dutch filmmaker / visual artist who is currently based in The Hague. She mostly works within the realm of documentary film, sometimes expanding this into installation, performance, audio works and publications. 

Eliane’s films have been screened at numerous national and international film festivals. Her film ‘In Flow of Words’ won several awards, among which the Pardi di Domani Best Director - BONALUMI Engineering award at the Locarno Film Festival, VIDEONALE19, Fluentum Collection Award and a Gouden Kalf for best short documentary at the Netherlands. The film was also nominated for the European Film Awards. 

Eliane has also worked as an educator for over a decade. She has recently joined the core team of the Master’s programme at the Netherlands Film Academy.