Breeder is one of the industry's leading motion design studios. Collaborating from concept onwards, they design, direct, animate and film to tell stories and create authentic motion content.
Founded in 2010, Breeder’s garnered a track record for delivering highly-original short-form content time and time again. Most recently they worked with Patrick Clair on the opening titles for HBO’s True Detective, which won the Outstanding Main Title Design Emmy as well as the SXSW Excellence Award in Title Design.
Other people Breeder have worked with include: Analogue/Digital Creative Conferences, Interactive Media Holdings (the new Myspace), FCB Chicago, SyFy Channel, Alabaster, Pause Fest, TEDxSouthbank and more.
James has built a reputation for being a director of style, and one of those few gifted directors able to handle talent and comedy. His talent has taken him all round the globe directing award winning spots for many big brands. His experience and impressive understanding of film-craft and post-production gives his work an edge and pushes boundaries. He began learning his craft at art school, majoring in painting and film while also acting and directing in theatre. This led to a natural crossover into advertising where he has always been a director to watch.
Whether it’s beautiful polished car commercials or quirky comedy spots, Holt always brings a strong sense of storytelling and visual look to his work. He has now gained the reputation working with high-end celebrities, including Hugh Jackman, John Eales, Michelle Yeoh, Rebecca Gibney and Kim Cattrall. He is regarded an actors director which is why agencies and celebrities insist on working with him.
Patricio Schmidt began to direct commercials at the age of 23, and since then has shot TV commercials all over the Americas, North and South Africa, Europe and East Europe for top clients and agencies, such as Y&R and JWT (where he held the position as advertising producer/director for many years).
Schmidt has worked on campaigns for every imaginable product– from cars to toothpaste. He has been involved in several major projects, including the commercial for Chevron/Texaco’s 100th anniversary, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Colgate, Toyota, Wella, Palmolive, Almette, Procter & Gamble’s Naturella, the New World Campaign for Reckitt Benckiser, and Lipton’s Nature Green Tea. He is currently working on a feature film that consists of nine poetic vignettes about different ethnic groups living in South America; The film portrays real people, performing the roles of each story. A couple of these stories have been screened in festivals around the world, received awards for best photography/film and won the Jury Prize in the Cuzco festival.
Babak’s working life began as a runner for RSA Films, the production company of Ridley and Tony Scott. He worked his way up through the company, working as Ridley Scott’s assistant. He then became a freelance Assistant Director working with some of the top names in the movie and commercials industry such as Ridley Scott, Tony Scott, Mike Leigh, Alan Parker, David Bailey, Mehdi Norowzian, Graham Rose as well as many others. During this time he began to work more and more on his own film projects and this, in turn, led him to shoot a test commercial. At this time, he also began shooting music videos for Black Dog films (the music video production arm of RSA Films), including work for Asian Dub Foundation and Nightmares on Wax, for which he was awarded film prizes at the Edinburgh film festival
He has worked for international clients around the world making commercials and corporate films, including HSBC; Royal Bank of Scotland; Uniliver; Nestle: Honda; Landover; General Motors; Nokia; Videophone, and Nestle and Barilla. He has also directed the award winning TV show Top Gear for BBC. He has just completed a global cinema campaign for Samsung Galaxy and several commercials for Nescafe and Lipton’s Tea, Nescafe and McDonalds.
Babak’s work has a strong photographic visual style and this in turn gives his work a striking emotional intensity. His passion is for natural imagery, he is able to work with everyday images and give them a richness and character far beyond themselves.
He approaches each project like a breath of fresh air, with enthusiasm and total commitment to producing the best possible film.
His work in commercials has given him an insight into the most cutting edge visual techniques. He has recently become interested in VR and the new development’s in VR visually technology and is working on pushing the boundaries in this new story telling medium.
Kevin T. Willson loves directing comedies with heart and collaborating with fun people. He has directed three top rated Super Bowl commercials. Kevin wrote & directed COWBOY KID that received #2 on the USA Today Ad Meter out of all 2014 Super Bowl ads and also ranked #2 Most Memorable Super Bowl Ad by Nielsen Ratings. He directed and co-wrote SLING BABY, which won #1 out of all 2012 Super Bowl ads on the Facebook-USA Today Ad Meter, #1 Most Liked and #1 Most Memorable by Nielsen, and CBS rated it as the #5 Best Super Bowl Ad of All Time. He directed CASKET that got rated #1 Most Memorable Super Bowl Ad by Nielsen in 2010 Kevin wrote and directed a short film collaborating with The Lonely Island (Andy Samberg and Jorma Taccone). He is attached to direct an action-buddy comedy feature film with Broken Road Productions. Kevin draws his own storyboards & creates animatics for every narrative project he directs. He has also directed/DP’d dozens of documentaries in 14 countries for non-profit humanitarian organizations, has graduated from 12 Upright Citizen Brigrade Improv classes, and years earlier graduated college as a film major while paying the bills working at Medieval Times as a “serf” (the male version of the “wench”). After college Kevin worked as a Special Education Teacher for 3 years and kept pursuing comedy storytelling with short films. Kevin enjoys writing, ultimate frisbee and playing catch with his French bulldog puppy, Walter.
As soon as you meet Chris, you will realize that you are in the company of one the industry’s true professionals who passionately adds value to every project he takes on. While studying (and later achieving) a BA Honors Degree in Film and Photography, he freelanced for the BBC, as an Assistant Cameraman and then Editor before writing and directing a short promotional film that won the ‘Best Newcomer Award’ at Creative Circle. Sir Ridley and Tony Scott saw his potential and immediately signed him to join RSA Films in London and his commercials career took off. His impressive client list includes BMW, Sony, Honda, Coca-Cola, Esso, DHL, Vodafone, Ford, Chrysler, Johnnie Walker, Citroen and Haagen Dazs to name a few. His most recent projects include a multi-location shoot for Turkish Tourism where he had to conceptualize and shoot all the scenes and locations in a matter of 3 days during a local marathon, a pioneering Ford spot for Russia currently opening O&M’s showreel, Buick for China and two recruitment spots for UAE Armed Forces. As for drama / performance, Chris has also directed “The Hunger Trilogy” (featuring David Bowie ) judged ‘Movie of the Week’ by Showtime, several episodes of “Numb3ers” for CBS, and the movie “Ghost Machine”. His award list covers all the main recognized festivals including Cannes, British Arrows, Creative Circle and London International, plus innumerable nominations worldwide.
Director Gary Lankford is a native Texan and lives in Austin, Texas with his wife, photographer Sandy King Lankford. Gary & Sandy work together on photography art collections, when he is not on the road directing and shooting commercials. Lankford began directing in 1986, fresh out of the School of Design at the University of Houston. After directing throughout Texas for clients such as Exxon, Continental Airlines. International Home Foods, Builders Square and many others, Lankford went west and joined the directing roster of production powerhouse Harmony Films. While at Harmony, Gary became known to many of the large advertising agencies back East such as Grey, Saatchi & Saatchi, BBDO, and Ogilvy & Mather. “Harmony put me on the map. It was a really exciting time to be a filmmaker and I was working with some of the great creative and production teams in the world…many of which whom you still see with me to this day. In this business, it is all about trust and relationships and I am very proud of the friendships I have formed throughout the years.” Prior to joining Giraldi Media, Gary was working under his own production company banner, directing a number of spots for Havas World Wide and their many brands.
Susan Stitt is a true visionary. Her visuals are almost exclusively created in-camera. To this end, Susan was awarded a “Gong” for excellence as Cinematographer of the year in Advertising in Australasia.With all of this experience, Susan has become one of the world’s most exciting new visual directors. In her own words… “During my 27 years in the photographic industry, I have traveled the world extensively, and worked in many contrasting and often divergent countries. Seeing, touching, feeling, hearing and tasting so many different cultures, has given me a deeper understanding of the value of portraying honesty and meaning in every image I capture. I want to continue to explore the richness and depth in everything I see. I want my pictures to be inspirational, and also insightful. To tell the story…” Another unique talent of Susie’s is her incredible love, understanding and portrayal of food. She lives and breathes it like no other. Her photography is superb – you can almost smell and taste the food. As a Female film director, being a Woman helps her understand the Female / Male view of everything, which allows for a deeper empathy with her subjects; it brings a disciplined sensitive quality to her pictures.
Erica Brumage brings a unique interpretation of commercial filmmaking informed by her experience in theatre, art, literature and music.Directing for the past ten years, Erica has a strong awareness and understanding of current styles and trends and their incorporation into the visual communication. “I am totally in love with film – its texture, the way it deals with light, the way that a lens can shape the picture and the tone of the message, the way that it can manipulate time, the way that it enfolds and involves one so totally in some other life, and that it only allows you to see what is within that frame and lets the imagination fill in what is beyond it.” Previously a dancer/choreographer, creating and directing a number of works for the stage including exciting contemporary interpretations of classics such as Euripides’ Medea and Buchner’s Woyzek. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree majoring in Film Theory and History of Art. Since moving into film she has shot commercials for some of the world’s leading advertising agencies including Lowe Worldwide, Publicis, Saatchi & Saatchi, and BBH. Her theatre background and passionate love of film inform her intelligent and sensitive style, which encompasses evocative sweeping landscapes and intimate and tender performance pieces with graceful ease. Equally at home with cutting-edge styling or tongue-in-cheek humour, her work cannot be defined as a particular genre – rather she is able to intuitively identify and then build on the essential character of each brand, bringing something unique to each script and treatment.