Course tutor of London Academy | Tutors from London Academy of Media Film TV

The Tutors

The experience goes far beyond the highest of all expectations
A sample selection of the Tutors who contribute their experience & knowledge at London Academy

Peter Purves
Is one of Britain's most experienced Presenters and Speakers. Everybody knows Peter from his Blue Peter days. He is the legend.

Charles Brescia
A veteran production manager and Assistant Director and a member of the Directors Guild of America. Among his many credits are the television series Baywatch, Quantum Leap, Hunter, Murder She Wrote and Cheers. The feature films Midnight Run and Coming to America and over 200 music videos and commercials. Charles was also Supervising Producer at MTV for four years.

Mike Raycroft
Began his career at ITN as senior cameraman. While at ITN Mike devised many training programmes, winning ITN a national training award. Mike has continued designing and delivering training programmes for new digital start-up stations around the world, including the world’s first digital satellite network in Italy, followed by Asia’s first digital network in Malaysia. Now specialising in his passion for DV cameras and the revolution they have brought to broadcast production, Mike is here to help you backed by a wealth of experience.

James Bartholomew
Is a renowned anglo-american photographer whose international eye has produced many international exhibitions and several photo books, including 'The Magic of Kew' 'The City of London' and 'Inside the Tower'. As well as enjoying a successful commercial career spanning 20 years, his view of photography as a holistic life tool motivates him to explore social-psychological aspects of the media through personal stock images, and his interactive workshops such as 'Photo Diary' and 'Self-Image: using the camera as an emotional tool'.

Nick Hardcastle
As a Presenter, Nick has hosted Planet PolyGram for PolyGram Filmed Entertainment, Watch Your Own Wednesday and The Big Help News for Nickleodeon. Most recently, Nick has presented Creature Features Series 1-5, Kids In The Garden, Nick Gets The Knack, Rollercoaster Videochat and The Young Performer Awards for ABC TV.

Nick has also become the un-official face of ABC Kids, Australias most respected and largest-reaching childrens entertainment brand. Nicks vocals can be heard on the new theme song for Rollercoaster on ABCTV Great Adventure, a song he co-wrote that features as a bonus track on his debut, self titled album released April 10.

Nick is an active supporter of childrens charities including UNICEF, a National Ambassador for Variety and a Youth Ambassador for Life Education Australia. In fact his song, State of Mind has been selected as the Theme song for Life Education and he performs it regularly on his many school visits around the country.

Steve Blacknell
Started in promotions and A&R working for the likes of ABC, Decca and Chrysalis promoting acts such as The Moody Blues, Leo Sayer, Jethro Tull and Steely Dan. In 1980 he joined Jive Records and signed A Flock Of Seagulls, and was also instrumental in the success of bands such as Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

In 1982 he made the heady leap into TV- hosting the BBC's pop/fashion flagship show "Riverside", became a regular music correspondent on BBC Breakfast Time and was Europe's inaugural Video Jockey. He was a regular at Radio 1 hosting "In Concert" and also hosted “The Old Grey Whistle Test” on a number of occasions.

In 1984 as host/co-creator he won a coveted "Ace Award" in the USA for best music show with his MTV USA show "London Calling" and a year later took a pivotal role in "Live Aid", interviewing Phil Collins on his historic transatlantic Concorde flight between London and Philadelphia. He continued his TV career through the 90’s and in 2000 started Good PR and now specialises in PR and brand development.

Steve Campen
Steve is an award-winning commercial and BBC Radio Producer with many years of valuable experience working for LBC Radio and the BBC. Skilled in mentoring on-air talent over 20+ years, Steve has coached and worked with high-profile broadcasters including Ken Livingstone, Sandi Toksvig, Paul Ross, Anne Diamond and Jeni Barnett.

With a detailed knowledge and appreciation of converging media, Steve helped launch the UK’s first paid-for Podcasting site for LBC Radio, including managing and creating content for the site.

He is a former Gold and Silver New York Radio Award winner for comedy writing. With years of experience of Producing talk based format radio, he still works with LBC Radio and Classic FM and is also a content producer for a new media publisher in Soho.

Chris Lycett
Chris Lycett has over 30 years experience working for BBC radio. Chris also spent 10 years as editor and producer for BBC radio 1. In 1984 he was responsible for the Radio 1 broadcast of 'Live Aid' in which he received a Sony Gold Award.

Chris was responsible for developing live music for both BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 2 throughout the 90's. The most notable during Chris’s tenure were Glastonbury, Sound City, Reading, Oasis from Knebworth (another Sony Award), and U2 from Sarajevo - in fact, broadcasting virtually every leading contemporary artist and group.

Chris has risen from BBC sound engineer in the 60's recording the likes of Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Elton John, Rod Stewart to his present day love of Radio. Chris can teach you all you need to know about production and presentation and is a highly respected individual within the media industry.

Chris has worked closely with the BBC and University of Westminster in recent years lecturing and running “White Network” initiatives involving studio,OB and reportage.

Maryellen Lamb
Maryellen Lamb is a leading international makeup artist. From Catwalk shows, beauty, advertising and editorial, she has worked with some of the world's top designers, photographers, and brands. She's had extensive experience working at the BBC, Channel 4, and various satellite channels.

Mary Ellen also has considerable teaching experience and likes to encourage new talent and collaborations. She's taught at London College of Fashion, Morley College and London Academy of Media Film and Television.

Milfid Ellis
Is a freelance Actors Coach and film maker, working with Directors such as Altman ( The Player ) and Peter Greenaway ( The Pillow Book ) Milfid's career working with actors has enabled her to collaborate with actors such as : Bernard Hill, Joely Richardson, Juliet Stephenson, Miranda Richardson, Bruno Ganz, Sir John Gielgud, Helen Mirren, Ralph Fiennes, Ewan Mc Gregor, Sir Michael Gambon, Tim Roth, John Malkovitch, William Dafoe, Eddie Izzard and vinnie Jones and most recently with John Cusack.

Her performance films for the BBC and C4 have won several awards at Berlin and San Sebastian.

Astrid Schulz
Astrid is a freelance media photographer with a specialized field in portraiture for both corporate and conceptual photography. Her experience is backed up by 7 years of design work for film, TV and media. She is also working for editorial and reportage publications such as magazines and books. Many of her projects take her abroad and she developed a descriptive style in documentary photography on urban and environmental issues as well as people and homes.

Astrid is mainly working with a digital SLR camera, which made her an expert in PhotoShop. But she also still uses a medium format film camera on many of her assignments and exhibition projects

Ian Massa Harris
Ian is a specialist in Prosthetics, SFX, Historical, Character and Theatre Makeup. Started his career in fashion but his talent and passion sent him towards specialist makeup.

Ian is a leading international make-up artist in Theatre, Ballet, Opera, Stage Musicals and Panto. Recent stage credits include make-up designer for The Menier Chocolate Factory and with Milkwood Productions on a new film to be presented in 2012.

He currently also teaches SFX and Prosthetics to both BTEC and City & Guilds levels at Morley College, Westminster College and various Universities. Previous client include The National Theatre, Lyric Theatre, The Round House, Opera Holland Park, Theatre Royal Drury Lane and National Theatre Madrid, Spain.

Ian has also attained the following professional qualifications; BSc Hons, Dip Opera Performance, ENO Baylis Programme Knack, Charles Fox SFX, FHT Associate, City & Guild II, ITEC III. Ian also holds MAC Pro Membership.

Adam Roberts
Adam Roberts has worked in all areas of broadcasting, including as editor, director and producer. He has also worked in programme acquisition and commissioning. He has worked on Panorama and Newsnight, as well as more recently as a producer developing documentaries at Zenith Entertainment.

Adam has also made documentaries, dramas and dance films for both Channel 4, French TV and the BBC. Several of his films have won festival prizes. He is currently experimenting with time-based work for gallery exhibition.

Catalin Brylla
Head of post-production, a freelance editor and filmmaker, Catalin supervises our editing courses and teaches documentary production. His area of expertise is Avid and any technical issue involved in the editing process. However, an aficionado of film theory and aesthetics, he also encourages his students to be self-reflective and proactive in order to achieve the best artistic outcome of their film.

He draws on his vast filmmaking and editing experience in documentaries, fiction, corporate videos and community films. His work was selected and screened at festivals around the world, such as 100% Art (Tel Aviv), Assim Vivemos (Rio de Janeiro) The Other Film Festival (Melbourne), the Hawaii International Film Festival, the Black International Film Festival (London), FESPACO (Burkina Faso) and the Goteborg International Film Festival, and broadcasted on TV Brazil and SVT1 (Sweden).

Sally Gray MBE
Is a very multi-talented TV Presenter and writer. Sally earned a nomination from the Royal Television Society, Best Presenter Award. Sally has also presented various TV shows including: BBC1's The Holiday Programme, ITV's "Moving Day" , "Our House". CBBC's "50/50", "Record Breakers", "It'll Never Work" "Real Rooms", "Holiday", "The Really Useful Show", "The National Lottery" for BBC and many more TV shows for UK and worldwide distribution.

Melinda Lawler FRSA
Melinda is Head of Speech and Drama at the Academy and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. She has ten years experience as an actress/broadcaster in commercial radio, radio drama and voice overs. She was trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama before working in repertory theatre and moving into commercial radio as a presenter.

Her credits include WDR, 2TEN fm, Capital Radio, GLR and Xfm. She also lectures in Music Production and Music Culture at the BCUC University in Buckinghamshire.

John Phillips
John Phillips' career at the BBC spanned 27 years from film editing at BBC Scotland to Chief Picture Editor BBC Television News, taking in directing and producing Business programmes along the way. Since leaving in February 2007 John has edited a variety of drama documentary, corporate and teaching projects. He has a Final Cut Pro editing suite at home and can advise on the latest developments in HD shooting and editing hardware and software, he is also a photographer contributing to Getty Images.

Andi Reiss
Andi Reiss is a film writer, producer and director. Despite a background in English, design and painting, he was drawn to cinema. Rarely distinguishing between the two, he now freelances as a writer/director and producer of drama and documentary. In addition he has directed,shot,edited and produced a number of music promos and commercials.

He is the director of the critically acclaimed refugee feature docu-drama "Cargo" (which he also produced), and the short films "Sleeper" and "Little Angels" amongst others. He is the director/producer of the documentaries " Special Delivery", "Empty Vessels" and "Killer Cure" (which he also produced).

He has worked in many different mediums, and on a variety of formats from 35mm to HDV, and is employed as a cinematographer, editor and cartoonist as well as a writer,director and producer.

Javier Ideami
Javier is a multidisciplinary award winning artist, skilled in different creative areas, from filmmaking to photography passing through music and design. Founder of Ideami Studios, as a photographer he has worked for many european firms and individual clients and has exhibited his works around the world.

Javier combines his expertise in photography with his advanced knowledge of Digital retouching, producing works that blend different creative areas. You can view his online portfolio at http://www.ideami.com and you can contact him on ideami@gmail.com

Oriona Robb
Oriona Robb is an experienced fashion stylist and a trainer with a portfolio that includes BBC, London Fashion Week, Warner Bros. and the Aston + Hayes. Oriona is a qualified Image Consultant, being registered as an Affiliate of the International Federation of Image Consultants.

Tim Rogg
Tim Rogg is an award winning freelance director and editor. He studied at Bournemouth Film school in 1991-1993. He started out making short films and was represented by British Council for a comedy short film called “In Frank’s Head”.

He was signed with advertising company Sneezing Tree where he made several commercials and has worked with several agencies (including JWT & Mother). Tim has also made many internet virals for MTV, Virgin Media and Sony Ericsson.
He currently works in both television and advertising..

Andy Jaye
A presenter and producer for over 11 years, working on a raft of different programs and channels. From CiTV, to international property shows, Record of the Year to Sci-Fi anime reviews, interviewing A list celebrities, hosting the latest sport news, and even interacting with a crazy puppet of Sir Paul McCartney

Andy enjoys a fun and varied career, works with a wide range of production companies and broadcasters including the BBC, ITV, Sky Sports, Shine and Talkback Thames. He also runs his own production company developing formats with BBC Entertainment, Done and Dusted, and Hot Iron Productions.

Louis De La Foret
An Emmy award winning Television News writer, designated as one of the 100 Best in the business by the "Washington Journalism" review magazine, and won multiple Associated Press Broadcaster's Association awards for documentary work for CNN, ABC, CBS.

Jonas Hurst
Jonas has been a regular presenter on Five News for a number of years, covering news, showbiz stories, movie reviews, current affairs and conducting studio based interviews. He co-hosted The Five Breakfast Show, a live programme with guests. He can also be seen fronting Thomas Cook TV, both in the studio and on location.

Other credits include; ITV2, ITN Sports News, ITV series In Good Company, Sky news, Eurosport, The Money Channel, London TV and RI:SE for Ch 4. He also has numerous co-operate videos, 'live' events and countless voice-over credits to his name, across many genres and channels(tv and radio).

Natalie Oparah
Natalie Oparah is a Makeup Tutor here at the Academy and is also one of the resident makeup artist providing her makeup expertise to the Film and TV department.
Natalie has always had a passion for fashion and makeup,which then led her to pursue her career as a Professional Makeup and Image Stylist. Her career within the fashion industry has carried her through a variation of interesting and unforgettable projects including a wide variety of TV & Film, catwalk, photographic, fashion shoots and not to mention awesome Weddings making Brides beautiful on thier special day.

Giorgia Polizzi
Giorgia Polizzi is a young, experienced Filmmaker and Editor. She works as a Freelancer for major Production Companies in London, both as an Editor and as a Director/Camera Operator.
She graduated in New York from the NYFA in 2005 and since then she has been successfully working in the industry as a professional

She directed Award winning Music Videos, Documentaries and Short Films as well as Edited Award winning Tv series. Her Credits as an Editor include the Channel 4 Shows JD SET and Red Bull Music Academy as well as Award winning Music videos such as Michael Fakesh- Miko and the latest Pendulum Behind the Scenes. To see her work please visit her website: www.mynameisgee.com

Brian Deacon
Brian’s film career began when he played Gunner Barton, opposite Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed in “ The triple Echo”. He then made “ Il Bacio da una Morta” in Italy and took the role of “ Jesus, His life and Times” ( Warner Brothers) shot on location in Israel. In his last film, he played Oswald in Peter Greenaway’s “ A Zed and two Noughts”, co-starring his brother Eric.

Brian’s voice can be heard on numerous TV commercials: The Times, Fiat Punto, Timotei, Yellow Pages and BT to name but a few. He has also voiced numerous characters for Lucas Films Stars Wars games “ Knights of the Empire “

Rupert Such
Has 15 years’ experience directing prime time British TV drama for the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 on some of Britain’s best loved shows including Casualty, Doctors and EastEnders.

Col Spector
An award-winning writer/director who started as a documentary and drama director at the BBC. He then wrote & directed a prize-winning short starring Keira Knightley, and two features - both relationship comedies "Someone Else" (starring Stephen Mangan) & "Honeymooner" (starring Gerard Kearns)

Eric Deacon
During the last five years Eric has become increasingly in demand for his teaching. He is Head of Acting at the London Academy of Media Film and Television. Lecturer of Screenwriting at Queen Mary’s University. Visting Lecturer of Acting at Redroofs Drama School and Central St. Martins, London.

25 years experience as a professional actor, includes many leading roles in theatre, television and films. For the last 11 years has worked extensively for all the major UK broadcasters as a scriptwriter.

His work includes… Prime Suspect: Granada. BAFTA nominated. Relative Strangers: RTE. IFTA nominated. Statement of Affairs:Carlton. Blind Ambition:YTV. McCadden:RTE. The Bill: Pearson/ITV. The Lodge: YTV. Lovejoy: BBC.

Michael White
Is a passionate and talented Photographer. Michael has been based in London for 10 years and has had a successful professional career covering many areas of commercial, editorial and advertising photography working on significant campaigns for Asda, Sofitel, Harrods and Jaguar.

In his career he has worked with and alongside big named photographers such as Tim Walker and Ken Niven to name a few. His work has taken him all over the world from Italy, Spain and Morocco to Cape Town, South Africa.

He is currently dedicating his time to personal projects consisting of fashion and portraiture and teaching at the academy. However, there are not many areas of photography that Michael hasn’t covered in his career, giving any student who wishes to take his course with the academy a great opportunity to learn broad aspects within photography.

Stuart Bray
Stuart Bray has worked as a freelance prosthetic and makeup effects artist in the film and television industry for fifteen years.

He works in all aspects of makeup effects from design,lifecasting, sculpting, moulding, casting and final application on set. His work can be seen in movies such as Dr Who, Saving Private Ryan, Gladiator, The Mummy and Harry Potter films, Shaun of the Dead, In Bruges and Stardust.

In the last several years he has also taught a number of courses for makeup schools. He is still actively involved in the industry and ensures that the methods and materials used in courses accurately reflect those used in productions today.

Kristiane Backer
Kristiane Backer is a TV presenter and journalist based in London with a pan-European career. She currently presents a monthly travel show for travel channel in Germany, and “Matters of Faith” for Ebru TV a program that deals with all aspects of faith and culture, which is broadcast in the US.

She also hosts galas, conferences and corporate events around Europe. At the age of 24 she became one of the leading presenters n MTV Europe where she interviewed most of the major artists and musicians of her time. She created her own youth show on German TV and won several TV awards for her work. She later went on to present daily guide to Culture and entertainment, “The Ticket NBC” for NBC Europe where she also interviewed film directors, actors and playwrights many of whom became personal friends.

After taking a break from the media world in order to do private studies and qualify as a homeopath Kristiane presented and researched a health slot for a magazine program on RTL and later presented and produced an interfaith program “Nexus” for Press TV in 2007. She went on to present and produce the weekly news round- up and analyses WWW for Press TV till the end of 2008.

Sital Patel
Sital's interest in makeup stemmed from a young age and worked in the cosmetic industry as early as 1998.She qualified professionally in 2005 and has been working actively as an International Makeup Artist since then.

She is also an experienced teacher in TV & Film, Photography and Bridal Make up. Her wide breadth of experience includes Editorial (Harper’s Bazaar (India), Bombay Times, Star Magazine, Daily Express, She and Filter Magazine), Musics videos (Hoosiers), Commercials (Sony Blu-ray, Heinz, Warburton Bread, Natural Collections) and working with a variety of international photographers.

Clients include Channel 4, Virgin Trains, Tesco and Marks and Spencer. Sital is also experienced in providing make up for a number of fashion shows including work for London Fashion Week, Lakme Fashion Week and HDIL Couture Week.

Andrew Kuchanny
Andrew Kuchanny is a professional Orange BAFTA short nominated lighting cameraman specialising in digital formats. He has had a varied career; spanning terrestrial broadcast news, high budget corporate video, music promos, broadcast commercials and feature films.Working as Head of Production for Chapters Digital TV, Andrew was responsible for training all production staff, in the work flow and production techniques and focused on the then new Sony XDCAM format, as well as preparing the network into changing over to HDCAM. He later left to take on more production roles as a cinematographer and post-production consultant, specialising in the building, filing structure and workflow of final cut pro suits for production companies.

Andrew was Director of Photography on the Dhallywood feature “Radio Bhai” which was the first feature film to be shot digitally in Bangladesh, and was a national theatrical release. This film has since gone on to wing awards in its home country.

His work has been used by Televisual Magazine, and Sony when discussing the new word of tapless production, and its postproduction workflow. Currently, Andrew splits his time as a freelance Lighting cameraman / DOP, a freelance editor and colourist, and teaching various media production skills, for both in front and behind the camera

Othello De’Souza-Hartley
Othello De’Souza-Hartley was born in London England. He received a postgraduate in photography from Central St Martins School of Art. He is photographer and Visual Artist. His photography work has appeared in a range of magazines, Trace Magazine, Neo 2, The Guardian, Clam Magazine, and Amica Magazine.

De’Souza-Hartley has received commissions from The National Portrait Gallery, The Photographers’ Gallery, The Victoria and Albert Museum, Camden Arts Centre, Platform Art, Orleans House Gallery and The National Trust.

His work has appeared in three publications:
Colour in Fashion Published by Maomao Publications ISBN 978-981-245-714-1.
New Londoners. PhotoVoice  Published by Trolley ISBN 978-1-904 563-87-7.
Platform for Art. Art on the Underground Edited by Tasmin Dillian Published by Black Dog Publishing  ISBN 978-1906 155 063.
For examples of his work: www.othellodesouzahartley.com Col Spector is an award-winning writer/director who started as a documentary and drama director at the BBC. He then wrote & directed a prize-winning short starring Keira Knightley, and two features - both relationship comedies "Someone Else" (starring Stephen Mangan) & "Honeymooner" (starring Gerard Kearns)

Carole Machin
Carole Machin has worked in the TV Industry for over 10 years, firstly as a Researcher and a 2nd Assistant Director and now as a TV Presenter.
Currently she can be seen hosting 'The National Lottery Draws' and the undercover travel show ‘The Secret Tourist’, both for BBC1.

Prior to this, Carole presented a consumer rights show ‘Don’t Get Screwed’ for BBC3, various consumer strands on GMTV’s ‘LK Today’ and the hit Channel 4 series ‘How to Look Good Naked’. Carole has also presented ‘The Entertainment News’ for MTV and TMF.

Nabeel Masih
Videography, Digital Cinematography, Digital Video Editing, Video for Web, Sound Design, Post Production Coordination, Web Design.  Software expertise:  Final Cut Pro Studio,  Audio Logic, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Premier, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Flash, Adobe Dreamweaver, Soundtrack Pro, Pro Tools, Maya,  Mac OS X and Windows, WordPress, XHTML, CSS, PHP and Visual Basic.

Anastasia
Anastasia is a professional photographer with over 15 years experience of photographic assignments. Her work has included working within the advertising industry for 7 years, and has also worked with the British Red Cross, as well numerous other charities, as well as personal projects in Greece, Australia, India and the Amazon.

Anastasia has shown her work world wide and is at present preparing yet another project entitled Naked Exposure-Naked Britain, which again will be exhibited. She is very knowledgeable in both film and digital photography, and also has a MA in Visual Anthropology.

Debra Hawkins
Debra Hawkins has worked as a freelance makeup artist in the film and television industry for twenty years. She trained at the London College of Fashion and has an Art & Design background. She works in all aspects of makeup from design, direct modelling, sculpting, moulding, and final application on set. Her work can be seen in productions such as Green Streets, King Arthur ,Rockface Series 1 & 2 Razor Fish and Casualty. She has also taught at a number of courses for makeup schools. She is still involved in the industry and ensures that the methods and materials used in courses accurately reflect those used in productions today.

John Raggett
John is a lighting cameraman (DOP) with 15 year experience. He has been the DOP on nine medium and low budget feature films, all with international DVD releases. He has also shot a large number of ads, music promo's and short films. Of late John has been working with several Asian broadcasters on a variety of entertainment content including chat shows music magazine programs and live event work.

John has also worked in the corporate information and training filed. He has a wide experience of camera formats including 35mm spherical and anamorphic 16mm , DVCAM, HD tape, HD solid state and DSLR

Erin Cramer
Erin is an American screenwriter and director from New York, based in London. Slingshot is producing her directorial debut SELF-STORAGE, a love story of jazz standards, with New York-based Belladonna. The script is out to cast, jazz pianist Diana Krall is doing the music with Larry Klein producing the soundtrack. Erin wrote THE FATHER OF MY CHILD, an edgy romantic comedy, as part of the prestigious Writers’ Training Scheme. Her romantic comedy 100 WEDDINGS is in development with Working Title/Wildgaze Films. She has had film projects commissioned by BBC Films, the UK Film Council, Hart Sharp, Ecosse, Celador, Forward Films, and Finola Dwyer Productions.