Fritzi Haberlandt studied acting in Berlin and, as a member of both the Thalia Theater Hamburg and Maxim Gorki Theater Berlin ensembles, has been awarded the Boy Gobert Prize and the Alfred Kerr Prize. In 1999, she expanded her acting career to the film and television industries. She won the Bavarian Film Prize for “Kalt ist der Abendhauch” and the German Film Prize for “Liegen lernen”. She has celebrated other successes such as with “Erbsen auf halb 6” and various audio book productions.

With her experiences as an assistant director, Simone Bär opened her own casting agency after the Wende in 1990. She is now counted among the most successful casting agents in Germany and fills roles in both national and international productions. Some of these films include “The Reader”, “Jerichow” and “The White Ribbon”. Even Christoph Waltz, who just won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role in “Inglorious Basterds”, was casted by her.

Fred Kelemen studied direction and cinematography at the dffb, receiving the 1995 German Film Prize for his student film “Verhängnis / Fate”. As a cinematographer, he has worked together with people such as Hungarian director Béla Tarr, whose collaborative film with Kelemen “The Man from London “premiered at Cannes in 2007. In this country, Fred Kelemen can be counted among the most recent film auteurs who have already had retrospectives at the Tate Modern Gallery in London devoted to them.

Hans Funck has been drawing attention to himself with his first-rate editing since 1992. Many of his works have been nominated for prizes, starting with “Bandits” (1997), “The Experiment” (2001), and “Opera Ball” (1998), for which he received the Golden Lion Prize. For the silver screen, he has edited among other films Oliver Hirschbiegel's “Downfall”, Marc Rothemund's “Sophie Scholl” - both nominated for Oscars - and most recently Sönke Wortmann's “Pope Joan” (2009).

Michael Coldewey began his career as an assistant in Wolfgang Urch's animated feature “Peterchens Mondfahrt” and directed the animated films “Die furchtlosen Vier” and “Heavy Metal 2000”. In 1998, he founded his production company TRIXTER and produced his first Walt Disney live-action film “Hexe Lilli: Der Drache und das magische Buch”, winning the Bavarian Television Prize and the German Television Prize in 2008. “Hexe Lilli 2: Die Reise nach Mandolan” was also nominated for the German film prize.

Kathrin Albers studied illustration and was already working as an animator and designer before she founded her own animation studio Stoptrick with Jim Lacy in 2002. She not only animates short films in the traditional animation styles, but also advertising spots, music videos and trailers. Her stop-motion animated films “Peters Prinzip” and “Die schiefe Bahn” were given many awards and ran at numerous festivals. She has received, among others, the ADC Award and the Murnau Short Film Prize for her work.

Thousands of Internet surfers now know the "Shining" Cuckoo Clock, zombie comics presumed lost in time, and all kinds of well-made art. As creator of the blog nerdcore.de and fuenf-filmfreunde.de, as well as the Adolf Grimme Prize-winning spreeblick.com, René Walter sets the standard in today's blogosphere and teases out content from the teeming masses of the Internet worthy of publication.

Dirk Bertram started as a comic book artist and learned the rest at the TFC Trickcompany in Hamburg: coloring, production management in animated features and direction. Animation directing for the television followed, such as for the well-known evening series “Berlin Berlin”. He has produced over 300 films in 2D and 3D animation for Sesame Street and has remained, with his cut-out animations from children's book and stop-motion work, firmly in the "children's realm."

Gesa Marten studied theater, film and television studies. Since 1991, she has freelanced as an editor and dramaturge. She has been awarded many prizes for her montage in documentaries. She was nominated for the German Television Prize for Abnehmen in Essen. More recently, she received the Bild-Kunst Editing Prize for “perestroika” in 2009. Two of the films she has edited will be in cinemas in April: the documentary “Auf der sicheren Seite” and the feature “LowLights”. Gesa Marten is currently a professor at the HFF Potsdam.

Sung-Hyung Cho's first film experiences were had as an assistant editor for television series. She had already conceived a few documentary clips and alternative music videos as well. Her breakthrough as a director came with the 2007 full-length award-winning documentary “Full Metal Village”, which won the Max Ophüls Prize. Her follow-up project on her home country “Home from Home” celebrated its premiere at the Berlinale.

Christian Beetz founded Gebrueder Beetz Filmproduction in 2000 and has produced numerous award-winning international documentaries. He oversaw the film FC Barcelona, which was awarded an Adolf Grimme Prize, and received a Golden Lola for the “Die Akkordeonspielerin”. He won two more Adolf Grimme Prizes at once - the Culture and Audience Prizes - for screenplay and directing for his documentary “Zwischen Wahnsinn und Kunst”. His film Hotel Sahara was just recently in theatres, and “Herbstgold” begins in July.

Wolfgang Thaler can be called a cinematographer of extremes. Whether it be in the Arctic chill of the North Pole (Arktis Nordost) or on top of the highest mountain peaks (Am Limit), his work often pushes the boundaries of what is humanly possible to shoot. He attracted special attention for his work on “Megacities”, a 1998 documentary directed by Michael Glawogger. His great successes have also arisen from collaboration with Ulrich Seidl in the films “Dog Days” and “Import/Export”. The latter ran in competition at Cannes in 2007.

Brigitta Manthey studied American literature and theater in Berlin and the USA. She also led the film section of the Literarischen Colloquiums Berlin and produced literary film portraits. She worked as a freelance author, journalist and editor in the areas of culture and society and was responsible for radio features, documentaries and news reports. Since 1995, she has served as a consultant for the film promotion section of the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, entrusted with the evaluation of national and international film projects in development and production. Since 1999, she has also become a member of the selection committee for the Kuratorium junger deutscher Film and since 2005 for the children's film in BKM. In addition, Brigitta Manthey is an expert of the media training program EAVE (European Audiovisual Entrepreneurs).

Jürgen Seidler has been the business manager of Script House since 1997, concentration primarily on screenplay consulting and co-productions. In addition, he teaches a various film schools, leads workshops across Germany and Europe and realized different documentary film projects as an author and director. He is also member of the European Film Academy and a founding member of the union of German film and television screenwriters VeDRA e.V. Jürgen Seidler wrote “Love me Forever” and “Im tiefen Wald”.

Oliver Ziegenbalg was born in Böblingen in 1971 and studied business mathematics at the TU Karlsruhe and media art/film at the HfG Karlsruhe. He has been writing screenplays since 1999. His works include “Russendisko”, “Friendship!” and “13 Semester”, among others.

As a producer, Bärbel Mauch has helped realize films such as “The Colonial Misunderstanding” by Jean-Marie Teno from Cameroon and “Faro, Queen of the Water” by Salif Traoré from Mali. In addition, she works as a consultant for producers and filmmakers from Africa and for German companies shooting in Africa. She also organizes workshops and initiatives that focus on Africa for international festivals such as the Berlin Film Festival.

Born in Johannesburg, Michael Hammon studied painting and photography at the Cape Town Art Academy and at the dffb from 1985 to 1991. He got his break as a cameraman with his documentary work for Pepe Danquart. He shot multiple films with Andreas Dresen, such as “The Policewoman” (“Die Polizistin”, German Camera Prize 2001) and “Cloud 9”. He was given the Adolf Grimme Prize for his direction of “Wheels and Deals”, as well as multiple awards for the documentary “Hillbrow Kids” in collaboration with Jacqueline Görgen about South African street kids.

Ramadan Suleman was born in Durban, South Africa. He was initially educated at the Centre for Research and Training in African Theatre, and then founded the first "black" theater in South Africa, the Dhlomo Theatre. After completing his film studies in Paris and London, he received multiple international awards for his short film The Devil's Children. His first full-length feature Fools was awarded with the Silver Leopard prize in Locarno. His well-respected film Zulu Love Letter has also won many international prizes.

After graduating high school in the U.S. and Germany, Stephanie Blum began her education as a television journalist at Spiegel TV. In addition, she studied law and worked as a tv journalist on the side. From 2006 to 2008, she studied film production at the HMS and passed her first legal exams. Her films include “Gegengerade – Niemand siegt am Millerntor”, „Sors & Sirin“ (winner of the Prize for Best Producer 2009), and “Narzissen”.

Born in 1971, Sascha Schwingel studied business at the RWTH in Aachen. He was active as an intern and location manager on television productions during his studies. He eventually got his degree in production at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg. Since 1998, he has been part of the teamWorx-Television & Film GmbH, and is responsible for the television series and made-for-television event movies (“Hindenburg”, “Das Geheimnis der Wale”, “Unschuldig”, “Die Sturmflut”). Since 2008, he has been a part of the board of directors alongside his activity as a producer.

Swedish-born Ewa Karlström learned her craft from 1989 to 1992 at the Münchner Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film in the production and media studies section. After her studies, she worked as a production assistant, location manager and then later as an executive producer on six made-for-TV movies and two feature films. In 1996, she founded the film production company SamFilm together with Andreas Ulmke-Smeaton, which received the title of the most successful German film production company in 2008.

Born in Wiesbaden in 1971, Dirk Engelhardt initially studied law at the Ludwigs-Maximilians-Universität in München, where he completed a legal clerkship with the regional court of appeals in Munich in 1996. In 1999, he went back to school, this time studying production at the Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen „Konrad Wolf“ in Potsdam Babelsberg. Engelhardt has worked on the films “Hotel very Welcome”, “Du Bruit dans la tête”, “Oceanul Mare” and “Alle Anderen”.