Meet Our Mentors
Cinzia Angelini
Cinzia Angelini, director and creator of animated films, has worked for major international studio sin the animation industry for more than twenty-five years. While she started out as both a 2D and 3D animator, she later became a story artist for Warner Brothers, Sony Imageworks, Duncan Studio, Disney Animation Studios, Dreamworks and Illumination Entertainment. Her body of work includes Balto, Prince of Egypt, The Road to Eldorado, Spirit, Spider-man 2,Bolt, The Minions Movie, Despicable Me 3, The Grinch and Abominable.
Cinzia is currently directing HITPIG, an Aniventure upcoming animated feature produced at Cinesite Studios.Cinzia has also written and directed “Mila,” a CG short film about a little girl, whose life takes an unexpected turn in WWII.Her idea of bridging cultural diversity through the magic of animation, led to an invitation to speak at TEDx Trento, and at TEDx Vail-Colorado.Cinzia moved to Los Angeles in 1997, where she currently lives with her family.
Donna Brockopp
Donna is a passionate storyteller with over 30 years in the animation Industry and has been leading storyboard teams for a dozen years.
After graduating from Sheridan, Donna relocated to Vancouver and cut her teeth on shows like Beetlejuice, Batman the animated Series, and various Delaney and Friends projects. She then started a 10 year, 17 title journey with DisneyToons studios as a 2D animator both in Vancouver and Sydney, Australia.
She returned to Vancouver in 2006, and found her true calling in storyboarding. Donna has boarded on many projects between several studios (Viva Pinata, Escape from Planet Earth, Barbie: Princess and the Popstar, Packages from Planet Earth and Mother Up among others) before receiving the opportunity to direct a short for Rainmaker (Luna 2011).
Since then, Donna has directed story teams on projects at Atomic ( Hello Ninja, Lego: Jurassic, Marvel and Star Wars, and Princess Power), Bardel (DinoTrux, Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Sausage Party: Foodtopia) and Mainframe (SpyKids: Mission Critical.) Currently she is working with an amazing team at Atomic for Disney's Zombies:The Reanimated Series. Donna is a natural leader with experience instructing life drawing classes at The Art Institute and has continued to share her knowledge and experience with up-and-coming artists and team members. Donna is also a voracious reader who loves the outdoors and gardening.
Genevieve Vincent
Genevieve Vincent is a Canadian composer, vocalist, songwriter and music producer based in Los Angeles. Vincent’s scores include Sony Tristar’s critically acclaimed rom-com The Broken Hearts Gallery for which her score won a 2021 BMI Award, the Apple TV+ docuseries Gutsy, executive produced by Hillary & Chelsea Clinton, What Happened, Brittany Murphy? for Blumhouse and HBO Max, Moving Art Hokkaido for Netflix, additional music for Bad Vegan on Netflix, Now Is The Time (NY Times), the feature thriller Safer At Home for Voltage Pictures, and the Fox TV series drama Fantasy Island, for which she has also written and produced original songs, and won a 2024 BMI award.
Genevieve recently completed the biopic feature drama Audrey’s Children for Amasia Entertainment directed by Ami Canaan Mann which one Best Feature Film at Tribeca X in 2024, the romantic thriller podcast Underwater starring Jason Derulo and Alexandra Shipp which debuted as the Number 1 Fiction podcast on Apple Podcasts, and the upcoming feature documentary The Stand for The National Film Board of Canada which premiered at VIFF 2024. In addition to her scoring, Genevieve is the lead vocalist and co-writer producer of the electronic duo darkDARK. She has written and produced songs with artists such as HEYZ, Sean Rowe, J.I.D., Pusha T, Madge, and remixed iconic songs for Sony Music such as “New World Coming” by Nina Simone, which was the title track of the re-release of New World Coming in 2020.
In 2024, Vincent was commissioned by The Wolford House Gallery to create an audio installation of music consisting of 6 new works for indoor and outdoor spaces in the historic James Delong home in Los Angeles, entitled «A Story Of Light And Music.» those works consisted of modular synth based tracks as well as two song based collaborations with LA Master Chorale vocalist Holly Sedillos and New York based folk singer Sean Rowe. Vincent’s French classical art-song EP Petit Rêve, was performed by Grammy-Winning Pianist Nadia Shpachenko and Soprano Monika Beal and is represented by Downtown Records. She has been commissioned to create new concert music by The Echo Society, The Hollywood Chamber Orchestra, La Société de Concerts de Montréal, Local Opera Local Artists, The Music By Women Festival, Sigma Alpha Iota, The Kalistos String Orchestra, the Esterhazy String Quartet, The Instrumental Wind Ensemble of Argentina’s National University of Villa María (UNVM), and as part of The Elements Concert Series.
Heather Renney
Heather Renney has 25+ years of experience in animation production and currently is a Supervising Producer at Atomic Cartoons. She has worked on many award-winning productions, most notably the Peabody Award-winning (2019) and Emmy nominated Molly of Denali for PBS/GBH.
Heather is passionate about advocating for the advancement of women and BIPOC people within the industry, and does this by creating internship opportunities for underrepresented groups at Atomic. In addition to her role at Atomic, Heather serves on the Board of Directors at VIVO Media Arts and volunteers for the Women in Animation Vancouver ACE Program as Associate Producer.
Janet Perlman
Janet Perlman is a Montreal-based animation director, writer, and illustrator known for her absurdist sense of humor and distinct animation style. Her short films have gained global recognition, including an Oscar nomination, an Emmy, and numerous international accolades.
In addition to her films, she has written and illustrated four children's books, including Cinderella Penguin, and the graphic novel Penguins Behind Bars.
She has worked extensively with the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) where her films include “The Tender Tale of Cinderella Penguin”, “Bully Dance” and most recently, “The Girl with the Red Beret”. Her independent experimental films explore non-traditional storytelling, and include “My Favorite Things that I Love, “Sorry Film not Ready” and “Janet Perlman’s Pinocchio”.
Katherine De Vries
Katherine de Vries is a director and story artist originally from Mississauga, Ontario. After graduating from the Bachelor of Animation program at Sheridan College, she accrued diverse work experience in feature and television studios in Canada and the US, including House of Cool, Blue Sky, and DreamWorks, where she was Head of Story on the upcoming The Bad Guys 2.
Marc Bertrand
Marc Bertrand joined the NFB’s French Animation Studio as a producer in 1998. Since then, he has earned credits on more than 130 films, many of them award winners. He has worked with Theodore Ushev for many years, producing some of the filmmaker’s most important works, including Blind Vaysha (2016), which earned an Oscar® nomination in 2017, and The Physics of Sorrow (2019), the Cristal Award winner for best short film at Annecy in 2020. Bertrand also produced Patrick Doyon’s Oscar®-nominated short Sunday (2011). Over the years, he has worked with both emerging and veteran directors, including Jacques Drouin, Diane Obomsawin, Andreas Hykade, Michelle and Uri Kranot, Janet Perlman and Janice Nadeau.
Nadine Westerbarkey
Nadine has been working in the Animation industry for over 25 years, with vast experience in film and television working with well-respected studios such as Walt Disney, Dreamworks, Universal, DHX, Bardel and Atomic Cartoons where she currently holds the responsibility of Studio Creative Director. In her current role Nadine oversees all productions and is very involved in setting up all upcoming shows, supporting the creative teams during development and production.
In 2021 Nadine was awarded the YWCA Women of Distinction award for her work in the animation community with the focus on authentic storytelling, diversity and inclusion. Through WIA and Atomic Nadine dedicates a lot of volunteer and mentorship work towards support for artists to enter into the industry and growth towards creative leadership roles.
Oana Suteu
Oana Suteu Khintirian is a director and media artist of Romanian-Armenian origin who has lived in Montreal since 1995. She studied filmmaking, and over the last 20 years her dance films and documentaries, including Point de fuite, Passare and Flow, have won awards at numerous international festivals. In addition to her work as a director, Oana has edited many documentaries and animated films, and created installations and immersive environments shown at museums and galleries around the world. 2023 sees the release of her first feature-length documentary, Beyond Paper, produced by the NFB and nominated as Best Feature Documentary by the Canadian Academy of Cinema and Television.
Rose-Ann Tisserand
​Rose-Ann Tisserand is co-founder of Flying Kraken Creative Studios, a boutique, Canadian-based studio that creates original animation content and specializes in award-winning animation design services. She is also Founder and Co-Executive Producer of WIA Vancouver’s award-winning Animation CareerEXCELerator Program(ACE) which advances the careers of those who identify as women into key creative roles by providing mentorship, training, and hands-on experience as they make a short film. Over 5 years, ACE has grown from 5 initial key creative roles in BC to 8 roles from across Canada. ACE is currently sponsored by Netflix Canada, Telefilm and Creative BC. She has worked as a production executive for 22 years over seeing 300+ hours of film and television production. She was supervising producer at Bardel Entertainment, Consulting Producer with the NFB, and is currently Executive Producer/Co-Creator of a series in development with Silvergate Media. She also sits on the Spark Animation Leadership Board and is Executive Advisor on the WIA Vancouver board.
Tracey Mack
Tracey is honoured to Executive Produce the ACE program with Women in Animation. She is an award-winning Producer with twenty years of experience, producing over 120 hours of television in both live action & animated film, television and digital media. She is currently COO / Head of Production for Imagine Create Media, where she is a Producer on Scout & The Gumboot Kids for CBC, nominated for both a Prix Jeunesse and NHK Japan Prize.Through her own company, Urban Safari Entertainment, she has just finished development on the animated feature, A Christmas Crisis, with Hollywood Suite, which she also wrote, and has produced The Adventures of Little Jake & Many Skies for APTN, the award-winning Kids’ Cookhouse, and the web series PARKED.