Federica
Nocerino
Marketing Manager at Linux Foundation Europe
Kim
Goossens
Senior Graphics Tools and Pipeline Engineer at NVIDIA
Paula
Angela Escuadra
Director of UX Strategy at Xbox Game Studios Publishing
Shana
Vandercruysse
Lead Character Artist and Art Producer at Showprint Studios
Deon
van Heerden
Composer & Sound Designer at PolyForge Media
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Jeff
Luyten
Managing Partner at Uncanny
Since childhood, Jeff has been fascinated by technology and innovation. He was fortunate enough to turn his passion into his profession during his studies in Business Engineering. Uncanny was born. As a creative studio, Uncanny engages in visual productions. They partner with brands and agencies to create stunning visual experiences with impact that resonate.
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Paula
Angela Escuadra
Director of UX Strategy at Xbox Game Studios Publishing
Paula Angela Escuadra (She/Her) is the Director of UX Strategy for Xbox Game Studios Cloud Publishing, co-founder of the IGDA Climate Special Interest Group, and co-author of the Environmental Game Design Playbook.
When she's not working with game developers to create great games that foster meaningful communities at Xbox, Paula focuses on reducing climate anxiety through collective action. She co-founded and collaborates with an international grassroots community of over 900 game developers, researchers, and activists striving to create a more sustainable and resilient gaming industry.
As a self-identified neurodivergent queer immigrant woman of color, her 15+ years of work across indie, AAA, and nonprofit educational gaming intentionally sit at the intersection of inclusion, sustainability, and mental health. Her rationale: to keep making and playing the games we love, we as game developers and players need to feel welcomed, resilient, and safe. Currently based in San Francisco Bay Area, Paula has deeply loved gaming since booting up DOOM on MS-DOS (thanks dad), and is forever inspired by the unique power games have to redefine our relationship with failure, create meaning, and sustain hope in all its possible forms.
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Joris
Corthout
CEO of Prismax BV
Joris Corthout is the founder of Prismax, a leading company specializing in innovative video solutions for entertainment and events. With a strong passion for technology and creativity, Corthout has revolutionized the audiovisual industry by designing captivating video setups for concerts, festivals, corporate events, and TV productions. His dedication to pushing the boundaries of visual technology has established Prismax as an industry leader and made him a respected figure in the field.
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Tara
Beutels
Expert Commercial Consultent at AMPLO
Tara has been a dedicated commercial consultant at Amplo for 8 years, specializing in Belgian remuneration, copyright laws, social reforms for artists, and more. With her extensive knowledge and genuine passion for her field, Tara is a reliable guide for navigating the complexities of compensation and legalities in the creative sector. Whether you're an artist seeking advice on social reforms or a professional looking to improve your remuneration strategy, Tara’s insights and experience are here to help.
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Kim
Goossens
Senior Graphics Tools and Pipeline Engineer at NVIDIA
Kim Goossens is a Senior Graphics Tools and Pipeline Engineer at NVIDIA with over 30 years in 3D multimedia and software design. His expertise ranges from procedural modeling to technical art direction, significantly influencing major titles like Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. A seasoned speaker, Kim has presented globally on game development technologies. His educational contributions include a stint as an educator at NHTV, where he taught procedural modeling for games.
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Gregg
Young
Innovation Lab at VRT
Experienced Project Manager and Creative Producer with a demonstrated history of working in the motion pictures and television industry. Skilled researcher and product owner in immersive media projects. Startup collaborator boosting media technology at VRT Innovation.Project lead for VRT in winning the Technology Innovation Award at NAB with the Content4All project in 2020.
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Martijn
van Zwieten
Videogame Business Coach
Martijn is an independent game business coach and consultant. After 14+ years in the games industry, he’s seen what works and what doesn’t, and knows exactly what it takes to run and grow a game company. He has helped 70+ CEOs, founders and leaders to build better game companies, and to lead them with more confidence and less hassle.
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Luna
De Groote
Associate Character Art Lead
Luna De Groote graduated from Howest Digital Arts and Entertainment back in 2020 and first joined Larian Studios as a Character art intern, where she worked on the production of Baldur’s Gate 3. She has since then grown to the position of associate character art lead and now strives to support them in their mission to create diverse, compelling characters that the player can relate to.
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Sander
Vanhove
Lead Developer at studio Tolima
Sander Vanhove, after graduating as a Master in Computer Science and a short career in Data Analytics, is the lead developer at Studio Tolima. In his free time he likes to experiment with new game concepts and shaders within the Godot Game Engine.
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Arno
Schmitz
Technical Art Director at Guerrilla
Arno Schmitz is one of the Technical Art Directors at Guerrilla. He graduated in Game Architecture and Design at the Breda University of Applied Sciences and later studied at the Florence Academy of Arts where he did the Intensive Drawing Program.After that he started as a Character Artist at Guerrilla where worked on games such as: Killzone Shadow Fall, Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West.Outside of work he enjoys traditional figure drawing/sculpting and working on his personal work. Ranging from Fantasy Characters to 3D Portraits of his family members.
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Chagall
Artist & Innovator
Singer, performer and electronic music producer Chagall creates audio-visual live music performances that reimagine the world of live electronica, visual arts and choreography. The application of real-time motion capture technology allows her to use the movement of her body to control all electronic sounds and visuals as she moves around the stage. Having toured her work across the globe, she aims to humanise the digital and to create experiences that have a deep emotional impact as well as being sonically, visually and technically breathtaking. Chagall has no educational background in either music or technology, but is a living example that technology, computer programming and electronics can be mastered if you know what you want to get from it. With this philosophy she has also recently started LoveLace - a foundation to support female identifying artists to learn and apply technology in their work.
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Rami
Ismail
Indie Game Developer
Rami Ismail is a Dutch-Egyptian independent games & tool developer with over 20 titles across PC, console, web, and mobile. The co-founder of the influential now-retired indie games studio Vlambeer, Rami worked on award-winning and genre-defining games such as Ridiculous Fishing and Nuclear Throne. His development of tools like the industry-standard dopresskit.com, his prolific & popular public speaking, and highly-regarded consultancy and insights have helped shape industry opportunities for game communities & independent game developers worldwide. Rami continues to advocate the creation of a fairer and more equal industry for developers anywhere through his work at gamedev.world. His versatility and work resulted in him receiving a wide range of recognition, including the prestigious Game Developers Choice Ambassador Award, the IndieCade Gamechanger Award, and a Forbes 30 Under 30 nomination.
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Deon
van Heerden
Composer & Sound Designer at PolyForge Media
Deon van Heerden is an award-winning composer and sound designer, best known for his work on games like Broforce, Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood and Teef, and From Space. Over the past decade he has scored over 30 video games, dozens of trailers and an animated feature. He has a passion for indie games and education, and loves mentoring young composers.
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Anton
Roebben
CEO & Producer at Walking The Dog
Anton Roebben (Toon), is an animation film producer and co-founder of the Belgium-based animation studio Walking The Dog, which he co-founded with Eric Goosens in 1999. He started his career as graphical animation designer at CPS (Creative Picture Systems). In 1991, Anton Roebben became Art Director and Graphical Director at LBO (Little Big One) in Brussels, where he was responsible for the realisation of 3D animated projects. In this capacity, he was co-director of the first 3D ride-movie, Devil’s Mine, in 1993. In 1994, as co-founder and creative director at TRIX, he was responsible for the preparation, monitoring and supervision of all graphic, commercial and artistic projects for both Television and Film. Walking The Dog has always been at the forefront of both traditional and cutting-edge CGI animation. The studio's achievements include Oscar-nominated classics such as "The Triplets of Belleville" (2003) by Sylvain Chomet and the enchanting "The Secret of Kells" (2010) by Tomm Moore. The appeal of Walking The Dog extends to projects such as "A Monster In Paris" (César 2012), "The Congress" (Cannes 2012), "Jack and the CuckooClock Heart" (Berlinale 2014), “Another Day of Life" (EFA 2018), "Where is Anne Frank"(Cannes 2021), "Richard The Stork 2" (Annecy 2023), “Fox and Hare Save The Forest”(Berlinale 2024). Currently the studio gears up for upcoming releases - "The Magnificent Life of Marcel Pagnol" by Sylvain Chomet and "Outfoxed!" by Paul Bolger.
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Eric
Goossens
CEO & Producter at Walking The Dog
Eric Goossens is an animation film producer and co-founder of one of Belgium's renownedanimation studios, Walking The Dog, which he set up with Anton Roebben in 1999.Walking The Dog has consistently been at the forefront of both traditional andcutting-edge CGI animation. Studios achievements include Oscar-nominated classics suchas "The Triplets of Belleville" (2003) by Sylvain Chomet and the enchanting "The Secret ofKells" (2010) by Tomm Moore. The appeal of Walking The Dog extends to projects such as"A Monster In Paris" (César 2012), "The Congress" (Cannes 2012), "Jack and the CuckooClock Heart" (Berlinale 2014), “Another Day of Life" (EFA 2018), "Where is Anne Frank"(Cannes 2021), "Richard The Stork 2" (Annecy 2023), “Fox and Hare Save The Forest”(Berlinale 2024).Currently the studio gears up for upcoming releases - "The Magnificent Life of MarcelPagnol" by Sylvain Chomet and "Outfoxed!" by Paul Bolger.
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Shana
Vandercruysse
Lead Character Artist and Art Producer at Showprint Studios
Traveling a meandering path, Shana is a former beautician turned game dev. Not being a gamer herself, she chose her path based solely on the premise of being able to do art and earn a living with it (she likes a good challenge, too). After 12 years in the industry as an Art teacher at DAE, freelancer for names like Fortnite and Warner Bross, and working on todays largest Mobile Warhammer game Tacticus, she has gathered a broad spectrum of experiences she's eager to share. Specialized in Character art, her main passions lie in sculpting anatomy, expressive faces, stylized textures and pretty renders. The link to beautician is easily made. Character artist is however not the only hat shana wears, as she has grown into the role of Art Producer, ensuring the production of all art coming out of the Snowprint Tacticus team runs smooth and on schedule, and is up to quality standards. Shana's rich background and atypical profile provides interesting and refreshing viewpoints that might leave you feeling better equipped for this fast paced, high pressure lifestyle called Game Dev.
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Deloryan
Hommers
CEO and founder at Studio Deloryan
Deloryan Hommers is the CEO and founder of Studio Deloryan, a women-led game studio known for the browser game Horse Reality. Inspired by her childhood love for horses and a desire for more mature horse games, Deloryan developed a horse management game featuring realistic genetics and stunning art. Since its launch in 2018, it has grown into a vibrant community of over 370,000 players. Deloryan offers insights on balancing creativity and business in game development, drawing from her journey to becoming a game studio CEO.
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Jan
Kaluza
Senior Technical Artist at Epic Games
Jan Kaluza is a Senior Technical Artist at Epic Games working on Fortnite. In the past he has worked as Lead Technical Artist at Yager and Fishlabs, and as a freelance Unreal Engine Technical Consultant for various game and non-game clients.
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Thomas
Waterzooi
Founder & Creative Director
Thomas Waterzooi is a solo-dev from Brussels who previously worked on Divinity Original Sin and Hitman. Now he makes accessible games inspired by human interest. His games are not about skills or high-scores, but about relaxing, reflecting, experimenting, and being absorbed into the story & aesthetics.‘Please, Touch The Artwork’ received several awards at a.o. Google Play Indie Festival ‘22, Tokyo Game Show and the Belgium Game Awards.‘Please, Touch The Artwork 2’ was downloaded more than 400.000 times.
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Jeroen
Janssen
CEO at Happy Volcano
Jeroen Janssen is the CEO and one of the founders at leading creative videogame developer Happy Volcano. He manages the studio’s day to day, makes sure the team is happy and healthy, and has a passion for growing the company. In his spare time, he likes cooking over an open fire and sharing food and wine with friends.
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Stephan
Bugaj
Chief Creative Officer
As Genvid’s chief creative officer Stephan Bugaj brings a wealth of past creative andtechnical direction experience, including as CCO of DJ2 Entertainment, the Hollywoodcompany behind the Sonic the Hedgehog movie, forthcoming Tomb Raider anime, andmore. Stephan has held senior creative roles at Hanson Robotics (developing the AIpersonality of the Sophia android and premiering his short films starring her at Cannes)and Telltale Games (overseeing creative and story for beloved narrative games includingGame of Thrones and The Walking Dead). Earlier in his career, Stephan spent a dozenyears at Pixar on both creative and technical teams, with credits including Cars, TheIncredibles, Brave, and Wall-E.
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