Our Team

We are a small, but solid team. Our staff and advisory board covers a wide range of skills and experience that allows us to remain agile and responsive.

Staff

Andrew McDonald

Design, Technology & Operations (co-founder)

Andrew McDonald has been working in the visual effects industry since 2002. Most recently he was a CG Supervisor at Industrial Light & Magic working Transformers - Bumblebee. He has a background in industrial design, animatronics, web development and photography. His professional career has been spent working in the digital effects industry for other studios such as Animal Logic, Ambience Entertainment, and Moving Picture Company.

Andrew’s film credits include Happy Feet, Harry Potter 5 and 6, Watchmen, The LEGO Movie, Suckerpunch, 10000 BC, The Chronicles of Narnia, Sweeney Todd, Fred Claus, Australia, Knowing, Legend of the Guardians, Walking with Dinosaurs 3D and Transformers: Bumblebee.

Alwyn Hunt

Sales & New Business (co-founder)

Alwyn has a background in fine arts and has been in the industry for over ten years. He has worked at a number of studios around the world including Sony Imageworks, The Moving Picture Company, Double Negative, Animal Logic, and Weta Digital.

His main film credits include Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Watchmen, The Wolfman, Alice in Wonderland, John Carter, Superman: Man of Steel, Ironman 3 and has just finished working on The Hobbit 1 and The Hobbit 2.

Sabrina Scalfari

Social Media & Editorial

Experienced film and television producer with marketing and product management training. Sabrina is our go-to expert in social media and editorial. She is responsible for keeping our message alive and kicking. She also manages the content on our Discover blog platform.

Steven Podleki

Lead Developer

Steven has 20 years experience building web based applications in education, entertainment and ecommerce. Steve is an expert in both front-end and back-end solutions that keep our technology at the cutting edge and running smoothly.

Justin Mohlman

Education Consultant

Justin has over 14 years of experience in the gaming world, contributing to 20 plus titles at studios throughout the Midwest. He has worked at High Voltage Software, Midway Games, Raven Software, Robomodo, Disney Interactive Studios and Phosphor Games.

Laura Palma

Education Product Manager

Passionate, dedicated and creative leader with over 10 years experience in education, program, product management and development. I am driven by developing strong partnerships and teams and delivering results in the form of growth, extraordinary customer experiences and innovative solutions.

Advisory Board

George Hedon

Founder Of Pause Fest

George is the founder and creative director of Australia’s premier creative tech festival Pause Fest. His expertise in design, advertising, festival and events lead him to create award-winning campaigns for Heineken, Target, Sony PS and Puma.

Ben Gunsberger

Entrepreneur, Advisor And Technical Expert

Ben has 25 years of experience in the technology space and is passionate about delivering technology-based solutions to problems.

He has extensive expertise in evaluating and building technology stacks, first in the film industry and then in his own company which he grew to a successful exit in 2017.

Anna Hildebrandt

Owner – Crispy Productions

Anna has 15 years experience working in screened digital entertainment specializing mainly in animation and visual effects. She is a Member of Screen Producers Australia and the Visual Effects Society for which she was a Board member of the Australian section from 2010-2014.

Lucy Faro

Director Of Professional Services – White Spring

Lucy specialises in sales training enablement and solutions from a sales technology and business performance perspective. Her focus is on sales technology initiatives as well as training and learning initiatives across multiple technology platforms.

André Luis

Founder – Trojan Horse Was A Unicorn

Several years ago he co-founded the first school in Portugal catering for the CG industry. He now runs Trojan Horse was a Unicorn which is like Burning Man meets TED – a global gathering of the world’s new generation of digital creators.

Wes Burke

Co-founder & Ceo At @cgcookie

An Illinois native, self-taught designer and a passionate sci-fi film fan, Wes Burke is an entrepreneur with perseverance to push through the unknown.

After four years in the United States Coast Guard, Wes’ lifelong urge to create has taken him from his alma mater, The Illinois Art Institute in Schaumburg, into the game industry where he developed expertise as an environment artist. After more than a decade of working on household titles including Stranglehold or Tony Hawk Shred, Wes saw a need for solid digital art education and decided to utilize his knowledge of the creative industry launching CG Cookie, supporting independent artists and studios to become successful in what they do.

David Loughnan

Head Of Digital – Traffik

David has over 16 years digital experience working across Sydney and London. He is ultimately responsible for the delivery of the company’s digital output including strategy, creative and execution. David is extremely passionate about the evolution of digital and emerging technologies, with a specific interest in creating experiences that fuse live and digital channels.