2022 AIS Summit at Skywalker Ranch Guests

Gerwin Damberg serves as SVP Cinema and Chief Technology Officer ad interim at Barco NV. He is an entrepreneur at heart and has advanced image science and technologies for the cinema industry over the last two decades both through tech start-ups and in established media and technology companies in R&D, business development and senior management roles. Gerwin holds a mechatronics engineering degree from the German Hochschule Karlsruhe - Technik und Wirtschaft as well as a PhD in Computer Science (Graphics) from the University of British Columbia, Canada.
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As the leader of WBD’s Supply Chain, Research Engineering, and Distribution team, Josh Derby develops new technology solutions and software for WBD’s global portfolio of networks and platforms.  Josh leads WBD’s internal Media Technology R&D team as well as heading up Discovery’s cloud-based supply chain and media distribution systems in his role within the company’s Global Technology team. Josh has been part of many technological evolutions in his 20+ years at WBD.  Coming from the Discovery side of the company, he has played major roles in Discovery’s transition from SD to HD, from tape-based to file-based, and now from linear to direct-to-consumer.  He’s a proud member of the team that earned Discovery a Technical Emmy in 2020 for pioneering work in moving media supply chains to the cloud. Derby is a long-time member of SMPTE, a board member of the Advanced Imaging Society, and an alumnus of James Madison University’s School of Media Arts and Design (SMAD) in Harrisonburg, Virginia.
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With almost 30 years of experience in the field and 8 years at Comscore, Paul Dergarabedian is the movie industry’s most recognized and widely quoted authority for media-based information and analysis. In his role as Senior Media Analyst for Comscore, Paul provides expert analysis on results that come from Comscore’s real-time movie and television measurement services. Considered one of the industry’s most accomplished experts, Paul founded Media By Numbers in 2006, which later became a division of Hollywood.com, where he served as President of the box office division until October 2013 when he then joined Rentrak (now Comscore).  In addition to weekly credits online and in print, including The Associated Press, CNBC, CNN, Bloomberg News, The Wall Street Journal, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, The Wrap, Deadline, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, among many others, he is regularly featured on television and radio programs.  Paul has also appeared in movie-related documentaries including Being George Clooney, This Film Is Not Yet Rated & The Blockbuster Imperative. Paul holds a Master’s degree from USC’s Annenberg School of Communications & a Bachelor’s degree from Long Beach State’s Television and Film school.
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As Head of Production Technology for The Walt Disney Studios, Eddie oversees Production and Post technology for Marvel Studios, Disney Motion Picture Productions, 20th Century Studios and Searchlight Pictures.  He is in his 16th year with The Walt Disney Company, and prior to overseeing Production Tech, was Vice President of Product Development responsible for providing solutions across Disney Studios’ Operations, Distribution, Marketing and Direct to Consumer organizations.  Prior to Disney, Eddie co-founded an IPTV Startup acquired by Siemens in 2005. Eddie is a 25-year veteran of the Media and Entertainment Technology industry and holds over 50 patents in the space. He also has a creative background in editing, animation, compositing and graphic design.
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Michael Ford serves as Chief Technology Officer of Sony Pictures Imageworks. Drawing on his extensive VFX and animated feature production experience, he is responsible for innovation across the studio. Most recently, Ford served as SVP, Software Development and Systems Engineering and Visual Effects Supervisor. As Visual Effects Supervisor, he collaborated on Sony Pictures Animation’s HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA 3: SUMMER VACATION and SMURFS: THE LOST VILLAGE, and CONCUSSION for Columbia Pictures. While at Imageworks, Ford served as CG Supervisor on STORKS for Warner Animation Group, Sony Pictures Animation’s HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA, ARTHUR CHRISTMAS, and CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 1 & 2. Ford’s Imageworks credits also include the Academy Award®-nominated film SURF’S UP and OPEN SEASON. Prior to joining Imageworks, Ford has worked on numerous feature films at Industrial Light and Magic and Centropolis FX including THE MUMMY, THE PERFECT STORM, and GODZILLA. Ford is an active participant in the VFX and animation community as a member of the Short Films and Feature Animation Branch of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences and governing board member of the Academy Software Foundation (ASWF). He has been nominated for four Visual Effects Society Awards. Ford is a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles.
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Jimmy Gadd is an experienced director and producer, starting in the industry as a film editor. He has worked on a variety of films and television; from Michael Mann’s, "Ali," starring WIll Smith, Golden Globe nominated, "Bernard and Doris," starring Susan Sarandon and Ralph Fiennes, and Paramount’s 2020 holiday blockbuster, "Clifford the Big Red Dog." He has also worked on multiple documentaries, including Netflix’s "The Great Train Robbery: A Tale of Two Thieves," "Don Jon: The Oldest Castle in France," and a new documentary, entitled "The Pistoleros: Death, Drugs, and Rock & Roll," about the band's rise/fall in the 1990s to today. His television background spans over 17 years with the hit, "The Mentalist," starring Simon Baker, FX’s "Dirt," starring Courteney Cox, Steven Spielberg’s "Amazing Stories" for AppleTV+, focusing on the Visual Effects for the series.. His talents have earned him work with major studios (Warner Brothers, Fox, Paramount, Sony, Disney, Marvel, Netflix, Apple, Hulu, Youtube Premium, etc.) and he is a WB Certified Director from the prestigious Warner Brothers Directing Program. he ended his editing career in 2021 by helping launch Disney+ streaming service and bring the $200+ million dollar Marvel series, "WandaVision" and "Hawkeye" to life. For the last year, he has served as the Head of Development of Original series for Dixon Collective in Santa Monica, focusing on 180 projects, from Dramatic and Holiday Feature Films/Documentary Features, to Television series, (Animation, Dramatic, Comedy, Unscripted Nature Series, and Reality Projects). Now, solely focused on hsi producing and directing, he is just finishing production of a feature documentary film, called "Girl on Wave" about a female surfer going from ameture to professional in the sport of windsurfing in just 7 years. He is also in pre-production on a feature film he will be producing/directing in Mallorca, Spain early next year, entitled "The Spanish Garden," along with a new television series for Universal Studios called, "Rome Rome."
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As Vice President, Worldwide Content Relations for Dolby, Ron Geller is responsible for global strategy to support the adoption of Dolby technologies among studios, content creators, and others in the content community. Ron is a media and entertainment industry veteran with broad global experience. He has played a key role in a wide variety of initiatives, including the launch of new television channels, television production joint ventures, and other significant projects involving interactive television, broadband and mobile content, post production, media supply chain services, and satellite communications. Prior to Dolby, Ron worked at Sony Pictures Entertainment for ten years where he held business development and operations roles in traditional television and digital media. Ron then worked in the post production and media services sector for Ascent Media Group and Deluxe Digital Media. He started his career at Hughes Communications marketing satellite transponders to television and radio networks. Ron received a BS in finance and marketing from Syracuse University and an MBA from the University of California at Los Angeles.
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Imaging & Audio specialist, Dominic Glynn has delivered 22 Pixar feature films and countless theatrical shorts to their big-screen debut. Dominic’s purview at Pixar includes binding yet-to-emerge technologies with the creative processes of storytelling. He remains at the forefront of groundbreaking technology launches in cinema and homes including the world’s first DolbyCinema exhibition (Inside Out, Cinemacon 2015), the world’s first cinema release in Dolby ATMOS (Brave) and the worldwide premiere of the first DCI Next Generation HDR cinema releases (Lightyear/Elemental) in 2022/2023. Dominic serves on the SciTech council for the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences and is currently leading Pixar’s endeavors in High Dynamic Range (HDR), mastering and exhibition.
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Meetal is a multi-award-winning creative veteran, he has been working for nearly two decades across the Film, TV, Visual Effects and Postproduction industries across the UK, Europe, Middle East, India, New Zealand, Canada, and America. He started his career working for an industry pioneering technology vendor, Quantel. Coming in as an intern and working up to Senior Product Specialist in Stereoscopic 3D and Colour – This led to, working directly for Sir Peter Jackson for almost 7 years, heading up the Stereography Department at Park Road Post Production and innovating alongside Weta FX. Meetal was part of the award-winning team that created the world's first HFR 3D workflow for the Hobbit Trilogy. From the South Pacific Meetal moved to North America to run multiple departments and large teams at global organizations including StereoD/Deluxe Entertainment and Legend3D/VFX/DI. He also collaborated with SouthBay Motion Picture Technologies, a startup technology company fore fronting AI and innovative thinking for the Visual Effects and Stereoscopic 3D community. Most recently Meetal was part of the Senior Management Team in the Chief Quality Office at IMAX Corporation and collaborated with Christopher Nolan on his latest epic Tenet, as well as several other high profile film makers.
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As Chief Architect for Cloud Gaming, Adrian is a subject matter expert for virtual studio, realtime rendering, simulation, streaming, transcoding, and emerging technologies around The Metaverse, Digital Twin, and immersive experiences. Adrian works across Google and Alphabet organizations on any workload that depends on GPU acceleration and visualization such as AR/VR, desktop/application streaming, rendering, and simulation. Adrian spent two decades building Visual Effects pipelines for companies like Industrial Light + Magic, Digital Domain, Technicolor, and Double Negative. In 2013, he moved into a Product Design role at Autodesk, defining the user experience for Bifrost in Maya. Adrian is currently Chief Architect for Cloud Gaming in Los Angeles where he leverages his industry expertise to help define next-generation game development, digital twin, immersive experiences, and content creation workloads on the cloud.
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Barbara is a media and entertainment executive, advisor, and former CTO, who has been working in film, series, and location based entertainment production for over 25 years. She most recently served as President of Prysm, NEP Virtual Studios, leading development creative services and operations for global virtual production in film and series production. As CTO at Meow Wolf, she led the company’s mixed-reality platform and IT divisions. Before Meow Wolf, she served as SVP, Digital Production at HBO overseeing studio production and post-production operations, and next-gen technologies. She previously worked at entertainment companies Digital Domain, Sony Pictures Imageworks, and DreamWorks Animation, where she enabled new digital human animation and rendering, digital story and post production workflows, and simulations technologies. Her credits include groundbreaking Film and TV productions Game of Thrones, Maleficent, Alice in Wonderland and the Shrek franchise. She is a member of both the Television Academy and the Motion Picture Academy, currently serving as Chair of the Scientific and Technical Awards Committee, is a member of the Technology Committee of the Visual Effects Society.
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David Grindle is the Executive Director of SMPTE and former Executive Director of the United States Institute for Theatre Technology, Inc. Since taking the staff leadership position in 2010, USITT has created the Rigging Safety Initiative providing safety inspections and rigging training to more than 150 high schools in 36 states. The USITT Presents program has provided training online and in person to individuals at all skill levels. Also under his leadership USITT has seen a growth in non-dues income which allowed an expansion of services while holding member dues steady. He has worked to grow the educational opportunities for professionals at all points in their career, from entry level to advanced. His partnership with the USITT Board of Directors earned USITT an Honorable Mention in the 2014 Prudential Leadership Awards from BoardSource. He was also named 2014 Show Manager of the Year by Trade Show News Network and the Expo Group for his leadership of USITT’s Stage Expo. In 2015 he was presented with the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Berry College Alumni Association. He holds the Certified Association Executive designation from the American Society of Association Executives and was accepted into the Fulbright Specialists Program in the US Department of State. Mr. Grindle comes with a varied background as a professional stage manager and educator. He specialized in stage managing opera with regional companies across the United States. Notably he spent 8 seasons with the Atlanta Opera at the Fox Theatre, was the stage manager for Opera Grand Rapids’ production of Aida in front of 8,000 people at the Van Andel Arena with a cast of over 500 people and 100 animals. He has managed productions of plays, musicals, ballets, and special events including world premier operas. As a professional director he was lauded by the Washington Post and Washington Times for refreshing productions of traditional operas at the Washington Summer Opera. He led the team that drafted the national standards for undergraduate degrees in stage management and wrote the stage management curriculum at Indiana University. That curriculum has been used as a basis for other programs in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom. He also developed immersive learning experiences in entertainment management with Cirque du Soleil, Walt Disney Parks Entertainment, and Norwegian Cruise Lines. He has been invited to speak across the US as well as in China, Australia, New Zealand, Nigeria and Europe on topics related to theatre design, technology, education, and management. Originally from a dairy farm between Dahlonega and Cleveland, Georgia, he holds degrees in music from Berry College and Indiana University.
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Ben Grossmann is Co-Founder and CEO of Magnopus, a cross-reality experience & technology company. He is an Oscar-winning and Emmy Award-winning visual effects supervisor, virtual production supervisor, and immersive experience director, with two decades of experience in media & entertainment on large projects. His resume includes working with filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, JJ Abrams, and Jon Favreau.  Beyond feature film work, he has directed and worked on award-winning commercial campaigns, music videos, theme parks, museum exhibits, games, and more.  In the past 10 years, his work though Magnopus includes designing numerous cross-reality experiences covering the full range between the physical and digital worlds, at the intersection of film & games. Ben is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and the Visual Effects Society.
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