The Talented Hollywood Female Producer Anila Nugmanova

Every child has that beautiful moment of fantasy whereby what they see makes them dream a world of wonders. While many ladies dreamt of being a Cinderella when young, it was the opposite for Anila Nugmanova. Her imaginative world was filled with cartoon Asterix and Cleopatra and the trilogy of Back To The Future movies. She would become so immersed in these worlds to the extent that she often fantasized about traveling in time to ancient Egypt and the Wild West. These motion pictures influenced and ignited her love and passion for filmmaking and the creation of movies.

Today, Anila has been credited for the works on films that are nationally and internationally acclaimed and received prestigious awards from different film festivals. She partook in movie productions where she worked with great filmmakers like Jeff Vespa on Paris Song that received awards at various respected film festivals and Shaun and Andrew Higtons on Dead of Night that became the most-watched web series in the history of Snapchat. 

Faced with the challenges of being a female producer in the male-dominated industry, Anila never let that get to her nor feel intimidated; rather, she let her passion for filmmaking be her strength. Anila understood her job perfectly and earned praise from filmmakers for her professionalism in handling situations on-set. A particularly tricky situation occurred during the shooting of the short film The Burning Blue.  A fight broke out between the sound mixer and the director of photography, making the sound mixer leave angrily without fully uploading all the sound files. Realizing what it might cost, she used her psychological instinct to get the sound mixer back and masterly resolved the issue. She has been tagged as a brilliant producer who understands the importance of communication. The Burning Blue has been officially selected by 12 national and international film festivals and has already received several prestigious awards including the best short film and best producer award at Uruvatti International Film Festival. 

Anila currently works at Bazelevs Productions Company and develops projects in Screenlife format, a new film format where all actions of a movie take place entirely on the screens of computers and smartphones. Her recent project iBible series premiered at South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival 2021. Besides it, she has been working on development and production of more than dozen of Screenlife projects that also include five projects for Universal Studios.

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One Of The World’s Best Personal Trainers – Giorgio Merlino

 

Giorgio Merlino should be in the movies. He is built like a gladiator and has the good looks to match. He has chosen a different path, however, that of personal trainer. Of course, let’s not close the door on Giorgio and the movies yet, he has a plenty of time. Giorgio hails from Milan, Italy, one of the great centers of fashion and design, and he is rather famous there because he is constantly featured in magazines and he is a personal trainer at the most celebrated gym Ceresio7 Gym & Spa.

Giorgio earned his Personal Trainer certification at the world renowned World Fitness Association in Florida. This world-class trainer is sought out by people who want to get fit and stay fit for health and beauty reasons and Giorgio’s reputation is one of excellence and he has years of solid teaching experience and is filled with knowledge of how the body works and how it responds to certain movements and exercises. His company Don’t Judge My Journey (DJMJ) is a highly successful online personal training program that provides its over 500 very loyal clients with work out and training programs along with personal coaching and nutrition information.

He is the personal trainer to many European VIPs such as, Chiara Ferragni (the most famous fashion blogger in the world 17 million followers), Fedez (famous Italian singer and TV star 9million followers), Giovanni Castiglioni (the CEO and owner of MV Agusta motorcycle), Chiara Biasi, Stefano De Martino, Marcelo Burlon (famous fashion designer) and Prince Pelayo, to name a few.

Giorgio has also worked with numerous international brands who have endorsed him such as Nike, Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein Sport, Hugo Boss, Audi, Land Rover and many, many more. He is the Official Training Ambassador and Social Networks Ambassador for Nike in Italy and he also does group classes and training for the company.

He hosted a class as Fitness Influencer for the Condé Nast Social Academy.

His nutritional recipes, you can find plenty of them on Giorgio’s Instagram profile (@giorgiomerlino) are so deliciously healthy and tasty that the famous Match Café invited him to design the DJMJ Bowl for their customers. There is no end in sight for this conscientious and innovative personal trainer. This is only the beginning.

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How to Succeed in (show) Business Without Really Trying

Actor Manuel Soro has enjoyed success in ‘the Biz’ across the board- in both film and television productions and also live theater. He is best known for his work on ‘Black Jesus’,’ Meeting Mr. Abingdon’, ‘The Dr’s Monster’ and ‘Witnesses', and also stars in ‘Emerald Run’ directed by Eric Etebari, which premieres this month at the Milan International Film Festival.

Soro, a former award-winning bartender, is an Italian transplant to LA and has tread an unusual path for an actor in the City of Angels. Unlike many LA actors who barter on their good looks alone, Soro (who has good looks to spare) credits his success to his training and background in theater. He spent three years training at the world famous Stella Adler Studio- alums include Harvey Keitel, Bryce Dallas Howard, Benicio Del Toro, Robert De Niro and many other big names. After honing his craft at the Studio’s conservatory program he graduated to theater work, including the West Coast premiere of ‘My Big Gay Italian Funeral’. Soro’s work was noticed by some industry heavy weights and soon he was getting auditions and then offers for film and TV roles.

Manuel Soro is represented by Take Off Artist Management and is currently starring in ‘Emerald Run’ which is due for nation-wide theatrical release in January 2020 and ‘Witnesses’ which is streaming on all major streaming platforms.

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The Outstanding Work of Alberto Accettulli

Acclaimed director Alberto Accettulli has worked on the “Jeep Limited Compass,” campaign which was shot in India for the Indian market, filmed the “Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk” in Nevada for the worldwide market -as well as the “Jeep Legends” campaign shot in California for the United States market. The campaign has been a huge success in terms of numbers and achievements.

In addition to his work with Jeep, Alberto also worked with DKMS - a blood cancer charity non-profit organization, as well as being the world’s largest international donor center. Over its course, DKMS has assisted in registering over 8 million potential donors and facilitated over 70,000 blood stem cell transplants worldwide –a crucial part which takes care of people looking for bone marrow transplants.

Alberto, happened to be the exact director they were looking for as he was able to give a fresh and rejuvenated look to their films -without cutting out the emotional and key factors. Through the incredible work of Alberto and the rest of the team, they debuted their first movie at the New York Gala Love in 2018 for DKMS and raised an astonishing $4.4 million dollars! In addition to the astronomical amount of money that was raised, the film also received a record amount of views on their social media pages. This was an incredible accomplishment for Alberto to work on a project for the health industry with real patients who had survived cancer –in addition to working on projects for companies like Jeep.

All this high praise is well deserved. Once you see Alberto’s finished work you immediately recognize that the highest quality motion capture and filmmaking in general has been accomplished by Alberto. He is a true artist and as we have said many times before, a very well organized person who knows how to get the most out of a camera and how to bring the best out of a product.

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Jing Han

Telling Stories Through Her Creativity – Editor Jing Han

Jing Han is a film and video editor and she has learned a lot through intensive studying at two film schools and of course by working on real films and music videos as an editor. We asked her what else she learned in the film business and she told us that editors should be able to handle all genres and anything that they are assigned. She said style is important but one can see in some editors’ work that they always use the same style and it never really changes. She believes that an editor’s cutting style should always fit the film’s story and tone. 

She doesn’t want to become stagnant, that is, maintaining the same editing style all her life. She wants challenges. She welcomes the opportunity to work on different genres because it would require her to constantly learn new things. Each story that is worth telling is unique and has its own style, tone and pacing. She wants to know what the director has in mind and she believes that the editor should be open to collaboration with the director.

Some of the projects that Jing has edited are: Nooks, a TV pilot; Crier, a short film; First Time Since, a short film; Born in the Flame, a Promo video; Dreams, a music video; Five Love Pieces, a short film; Drawn Curtains, a short film which was the 2018 LA Shorts Fest official selection and the 2018 official selection of the Encounters Film Festival; Love in Canton, a short film that was a 2018 official selection at the LA Shorts Fest; Your Fukubukuro, a web series, among others.

Jing is a movie lover who did all the work necessary to get where she is. She is a film and video editor who can work on any type or any genre of films, TV shows, music videos, commercials or documentaries. She went to university for six years and achieved an advanced degree in editing and film production and she has a firm grasp of what it takes to make a movie and how to edit it once the film has been shot. When asked what she would tell aspiring artists Jing simply said that it is an honor to tell great stories and it comes with big responsibilities. She also added that everyone should stay curious and keep learning every day.

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The Incomparable Work Of Sound Engineer Jerome Renard

Movies and music are wonderful because they not only entertain us but they can actually make us feel things. A lot of people go back and see the same movie over and over again and listen to the same song simply because they want to experience the emotion that they felt when they first saw the film or heard the music. Movies all begins with a script, as we know, and the director and actors and cinematographer are all key elements in helping shape the emotional backbone of the film. But if you stop and listen closely to a great movie or a terrific piece of recorded music you will find something that most of us have never imagined before: layers and layers of added or mixed sound that you never noticed before.

Jerome Renard is an excellent sound engineer and he is the one who magically adds and mixes sounds to the original sound track and those seemingly tiny and almost unnoticeable digital bits that can make a good piece of music a great piece of music and a good movie a great movie. Next time you watch a movie or have your ear buds on listen closely to what is coming through your ears and into your brain. Jerome can up the volume on a guitar here and lower the bass in the next bar and he can add the sounds of lions roaring in the distance if your film is showing an African savannah or put you at ease by adding the soft and comforting calls of crickets in the backyard.

Being a mix or sound engineer takes a lot of creativity and a great deal of focus.  It also takes a lot of experience, which is something Jerome Renard has plenty of. He studied Electronics and IT after high school in his home country of Belgium and then went on to earn a Bachelor’s degree in Audio Engineering from SAE International Institute. He interned at  Sos-Recording during his college years but also in various studios such as Real World. After graduation Jerome was hired at Sos-Recording and became the Second Main Engineer.

His career blossomed and moved forward at a fast pace because of his immense talents and his ability to focus and get the job done. He worked with scores of well-known artists and even worked with the government of Belgium as the main engineer for new studio development. Jerome is busy as ever and the artists he work with have appeared in many medium such as La Meuse, La RTBF, Air France Airline, BBC Radio 4, London Jazz News, Jazz FM etc..

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Immersing Herself In The World Of Filmmaking – Nichole Ruiz

Filmmaking can be fun! Just ask anyone who has immersed themselves in it and you will see that not only are they pretty satisfied with their careers but they love hanging around film sets that creative people gravitate to. We asked Nichole Ruiz, the Filipina director/cinematographer about all of this and she told us that she couldn’t imagine doing anything else with her life. Some of her films like YOU have chalked up a number of awards on the film festival circuit and the other films that Nichole has worked on as director of photography have also been very well received. Nichole has been involved in over forty productions so far and she has a very busy schedule in the coming months.

She is very focused on the social issues of the LGBTQ community and is drawn to narratives that gives voice to this often marginalized group of people. Nichole thrives on real stories that project real characters in real situations. Her compassion for humanity goes back to the small town of Laoag, in the Philippines, where she was raised. She was always around people who were passionate about what they did and passionate about relationships and family. She was greatly influenced by that in her early life.

Another big influence on Nichole’s life was and is Emmanuel “Chivo” Lubezki, the great Mexican cinematographer. He utilizes the Steadicam quite frequently and has been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography eight times and has won three times in three consecutive years for Gravity, Birdman and The Revenant.

Nichole would love to work with Lubezki and she feels that he is able to elevate movie story telling with his cinematography and apparently, a lot of people agree with her. She pays close attention to all of his movies so she can see what he is doing with the lighting and the camera placement and movement and how he sets the mood for a particular scene.

She understands that it would be easy for aspiring cinematographers or directors to drop out of the business because other people might doubt their skills and their creativity but she says that’s when you must keep holding your art to a high standard and be strong and continue to move forward.

Nichole has a number of projects in the works including a web series called Bombshell, which she will photograph. The shoot is scheduled for the end of March and the first week of April and is about the adventures of a trans gay guy living in Los Angeles.

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