RENDR Festival Returns With Epic Line-Up Of Film And TV Talent

Following the success of its debut last year, Belfast's RENDR festival returns to the city next month with an extraordinary line-up of creative talent from the global film and television industries.

The two-day creativity and technology festival, supported by Northern Ireland Screen, the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Studio Ulster, Ulster University, Ulster Screen Academy and Belfast City Council, takes place from 29 February – 1 March at Portview Trade Centre in East Belfast.

Over 30 speakers will deliver keynote talks across two evenings alongside live and interactive demonstrations of new technology, digital art and gaming experiences. For the first time, RENDR will also offer live virtual access to the event from anywhere in the world.

Speakers include award-winning French costume designer Jany Temime, best known for her work on the Harry Potter film franchise for which she earned numerous Saturn Award nominations; Pawel Grochola, FX and Look of Picture Supervisor at Sony Pictures Imageworks, whose most recent feature, Spider-man: Across the spider-verse, is shortlisted for Best Animated Feature in this year's Oscars; unit stills photographer Chiabella James, who has worked on the sets of Dune, the recently released Saltburn and the upcoming Bob Marley biopic, One Love; and Suzy Fagan Parr from Aardman, who served as a director and lead character animator on the recent Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget.

Other speakers include, from Industrial Light & Magic, Hal Hickel, who is currently supervising the animation for the Mandalorian series on Disney+ and Charmaine Chan, whose most recent credits include Gareth Edwards' The Creator.

Simon Jung from leading visual effects company Wētā FX will join the line-up to discuss the studios' work on some of the most iconic films and TV shows in the world, including The Last of Us, Guardians of the Galaxy and Avatar.

Among the local talent joining the line-up is Laura Livingstone, the Armagh-born VFX Executive at Netflix who launched her visual effects career with Marvel's Iron Man 2 and recently worked on the Addams' Family spin-off series, Wednesday, and is Danny O'Reagen from independent television production company Poli Productions, whose credits include How to Train your Dragon, Game of Thrones, Skyfall and The Bourne Ultimatum.

Festival director Michael Weir commented: "RENDR offers opportunity to gain insight into unique perspectives within the fascinating worlds of film, gaming and animation, and to network with highly esteemed professionals in these industries. This is an important festival to the ever-growing creative industry in Northern Ireland and we're proud to make a contribution. Building upon the success of last year, we hope RENDR can serve to inform, engage and challenge the creative community here to push the boundaries of technology in their work."

RENDRfestival.com