Talent

Phil co-founded Jellyfish Pictures in 2001 and has overseen it's growth to become one of the most respected independent companies in the industry. During his career he has worked in all genres of content creation including film, commercials, animation, games and broadcast TV, winning multiple BAFTA, VES, RTS and EMMY awards.

Running Jellyfish has given Phil a unique insight into the industry and the variety of qualities needed to enable the company to compete and thrive on a global scale. He has helped the company work on brands such as Star Wars in film, Black Mirror in TV, and Floogals and Dennis and Gnasher Unleashed in episodic animation. Recognising the importance of future trends and the requirements of an ever evolving industry, he has overseen the development of pioneering cloud technology, resulting in seamless hybrid rendering solutions and the imminent virtualisation of all Jellyfish studios, a first for the industry.

Phil is also a BAFTA, RTS and VES judge and a member of the VFX/digital effects and Animation chapter of BAFTA. He sits on the board of UK Screen Alliance, Animation UK and the council of the Creative Industries Federation. He is a passionate supporter of the UK's Creative Industry, in particular ensuring the VFX and Animation industry maintains its position in the heart of Europe. He was selected in the RTS Broadcast HOT 100 most influential people in Broadcast Media in 2012/13.

Luke is an experienced VFX supervisor, with a career spanning 20 years. During his time at Jellyfish, he has been instrumental in contributing to the company’s rapid growth, bringing in Jellyfish’s biggest VFX projects, including Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Captive State.

Luke has spearheaded some of Jellyfish’s most complex work to date, including intricate robotic bees for Netflix’s Black Mirror: Hated in the Nation, a high-end CG sequence for Twentieth Century Fox’s Kingsmen: The Secret Service as well as his work on Journeyman, of which he was shortlisted for a British Independent Film Award (BIFA) in the Best Effects category

Now overseeing the smooth running of all Jellyfish Pictures' VFX and animation projects, Luke teams his strong leadership capabilities with a hands-on approach, understanding the needs of both the artist and the client.

Tom is an Emmy award winning (and four times Emmy nominated) Creative Director. He specialises in all creative aspects of visual storytelling: script, world building, character and production design, mise-en-scéne and art direction. With a background as an illustrator and TV director, Tom joined Jellyfish Pictures as a writer and Motion Graphics Director on the BBC’s ground-breaking CGI series, Planet Dinosaur. Tom now looks after Jellyfish's art department and oversees the creative direction of many of the key projects. Tom has a long track record of creating beautiful worlds for all types of film, TV and animation. Over the last ten years, he has creatively led successful projects for the world’s leading broadcasters and filmmakers, including BBC, Netflix, Apple, Sky, PBS, National Geographic, CNN, Participant, Channel Four.

Since joining Jellyfish in 2010 Tom has won an Emmy award for outstanding art direction on PBS’s Your Inner Fish and an AEAF Gold Award for animation direction for his title sequence work on Beyond Reasonable Doubt. In addition, Tom has been nominated for a further four Emmys and a British Animation Award.

Tom heads up Jellyfish’s Art Department, an incredibly talented group of artists, designers and story-tellers. The department now provides much sought-after design work for a host of live-action and animation development projects. Alongside this, Tom works with Jellyfish’s head of development, Natalie Llewellyn, to oversee the company's intellectual property (IP) creation, developing a slate of original Jellyfish series and feature ideas.

Tom is also a regular guest lecturer at University of the Arts London, teaching production design and mise-en-scéne to undergraduate film and design students.

Commercially driven, Michelle is a dedicated Financial Director, with a career spanning over 25 years. As part of the Leadership Team at Jellyfish Pictures Michelle works closely with the CEO to manage the finances and bring her expertise to ensure Jellyfish’s growth strategy is realised. During her time at Jellyfish, Michelle has implemented policies to ensure the company is on track to achieve its goals and manage sustained growth.

Prior to taking up her position at Jellyfish Michelle has held senior positions at commercial companies, including Pret A Manger, Selfridges, Cath Kidston, Brasher Leisure Limited and Azzurri Group.

Manuel is an experienced VFX supervisor with over 10 years industry experience. With both a technical and artistic background, Manuel has a second to none knowledge of the production pipeline. Manuel joined Jellyfish Pictures in 2016 as CG Supervisor on CBeebies animated pre-school show Bitz & Bob and now oversees all CG on Jellyfish’s original content pipeline.

Starting his career as a 3D artist working specifically on commercials, Manuel progressed to work as a lead 3D generalist on Hiroku: Defenders of Gaia, a fully CG 90 minute feature film, which went on to be nominated for the Spanish Film Academy Goya Awards

Shortly after this Manuel began work as CG and On Set Supervisor for CBeebies animated preschool show, Messy Goes to Okido. During this time Manuel also directed, produced and supervised his own short entitled Nouvelle Cuisine. To date the film has garnered 11 international awards including, Best Animation Short film at Sacramento Underground Film & Arts Festival and Best Animation Short Film for Children at ANIMA2017.

Luca heads up Jellyfish Pictures’ large animation team consisting of over 80 animators, with over 30 years of experience as a lead animator, animation supervisor and story artist on many creature-heavy and animated feature films. Luca started his career as an animator, storyboard artist and character designer in Milan. Moving to Munich, Luca progressed to animation supervisor working on feature films such as Chinatown, Tobias Tod and Help I’m a Fish. Always striving for excellence, Luca further honed his talent working on an array of illustrious productions including, Sinbad Legend of the Seven Seas, Sherlock Gnome, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Man of Steel, John Carter, Chronicles of Narnia, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Alice in Wonderland, Snow White and the Huntsman and Watership Down.

A master of storytelling, body dynamics and animated performance, Luca is passionate about working closely with each of his animators, having developed into an artistic and collaborative animation director, adept at leading large teams and delivering consistently excellent work across long productions.

Jonathan is a highly adept VFX Supervisor and Senior VFX Artist, with a career spanning over 23 years. Jonathan’s extensive experience ranges from VFX Supervision, Compositing Supervision, Creative Team Leadership, Compositing and Graphic Design.

Starting out in the industry as a runner for London based VFX house Rushes, Jonathan soon rose through the ranks holding senior positions at a number of high-profile outfits including First Post Productions, Motion FX, uFX and Method Studios, working as 2D and VFX Supervisor on titles such as, The Hateful Eight, Ant Man, Terminator Genisys and The Fifth Estate.

Since joining Jellyfish Pictures in 2016, Jonathan has headed up the 2D team, overseeing all 2D work on the company’s VFX portfolio, with TV credits including Watchmen (HBO), The Innocents (Netflix), Black Mirror – Hated in the Nation (Netflix) and feature film credits including Solo: A Star Wars Story, Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Denis-Jose Francois, Joint Head of 3D at Jellyfish Pictures, has worked in CG for more than 25 years, in the UK and overseas in Japan, Netherlands, Germany, Singapore, USA and Spain. During this time Denis has worked in nearly all areas of the industry including TV, Film, Architectural & Product Visualisation and Engineering.

A versatile artist, Denis has worked in compositing, animation, FX, motion graphics and, most commonly, lighting. In recent years Denis has focused on CG production for long form TV series, including documentaries, drama and children's television. In his current role at Jellyfish Pictures, Denis is responsible for all animation projects, supervising across all active projects in the studio as well as overseeing R&D and pipeline at the studio.

With more than 20 years of Production experience in the VFX and animation industries, Cate Elliott is a veteran animation producer with experience overseeing VFX, CG, 2D Digital and traditional animation projects, from bid stage through to delivery.

Most recently, Cate has been collaborating with Jellyfish Pictures as Senior Producer on various animation projects, including Bitz & Bob and a DreamWorks feature animation, where she managed inhouse crews of up to 65 people, as well as managing the junior production team members, assuring high organisational standards for in-house productions. Responsible for all budgeting, production scheduling and client management on projects, Cate successfully handles the running of shows, with a keen interest in increasing quality and pipeline efficiency.

Cate worked up the ranks of animation production, initially out of CineGroup in Montreal and moved to the UK to oversee the production of the first animated series of Mr Bean the Animated Series with Tiger Aspect Productions. As Head of Production for Children’s and Animation at Tiger Aspect, she oversaw the development and production of many series, including the BAFTA award-winning Charlie and Lola and the Live Action Puppet series Me and My Monsters. More recently, Cate collaborated on the development of the BBC and Netflix series Watership Down as well as the Sky Moominvalley series of short Animation Films.

With a career spanning over 10 years, Lucy started her life in production at creative agency, Knifedge. Here she entered the world of live entertainment, cutting her teeth on the set, video and lighting design for Josh Groban’s World tour. At the beginning of her career, Lucy focused mainly on projection work and set design, boasting clients such as, Snow Patrol, Cameron Mackintosh and Glyndebourne Opera. Following her three year stint at Knifedge, Lucy joined a branding agency specialising in design packages for sports broadcasting, working with industry heavy weights such as, UEFA, FIFA, FIBA and FEI.

Further honing her skills, Lucy moved to a freelance position, focusing on both production and post-production for clients including, Sky, Saatchi, Netflix, BBC and PBS, before joining Jellyfish Pictures in 2018.

Since joining Jellyfish, Lucy has specialised in bidding, instrumental in securing some of the company’s biggest clients to date and has recently been nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy for her work on PBS documentary Neanderthal.

Amber started her career working for production companies in Soho, before securing her first job in post-production at Lola Post in 2010.

Joining Jellyfish Pictures originally in 2013, Amber worked on a variety of projects from high end commercials for SofaWorks to Lucas Films Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. During this time Amber was awarded a News and Documentary Emmy in the Outstanding Art Direction and Graphic Design category for her work as VFX producer on PBS’ Your Inner Fish. Following four years at Jellyfish Pictures, Amber moved to global VFX outfit Framestore. Working as a Producer in their TV department, Amber produced on television series’ including Sky One’s Curfew and AMC’s The Terror.

In 2019, Amber returned to Jellyfish Pictures to oversee the company’s prestigious projects, boasting clients including HBO and DreamWorks.

Other credits of note include, Outlander (Starz), Black Mirror (Netflix) and BIFA nominated Journeyman.