Dave Nighswander CA
Chartered Accountant, Entertainment and Production
CASO Board of Directors - Chair, Finance

Dave Nighswander is a Chartered Accountant with 25 years experience, the
last 10 specializing in the film and television industry. Dave works with a
variety of clients preparing business plans, financing proposals, tax work
and general day to day operations. Dave has been a contract CFO for hire and
a project specialist in both production and post-production facilities.

Daniel McMullen
Royal Bank Of Canada, 
Entertainment Group

Daniel F. McMullen is a graduate of Concordia University in Montreal. 
Much of his 20 year banking career involved lending money to the Canadian
film industry.  He has financed numerous projects including feature films,
television series, documentaries and animation programming. Many of these
projects were complex international co-productions.  He has recently returned
to Royal Bank of Canada and has previously worked at HSBC Bank Canada
and Security Pacific Bank Canada.  He is a frequent speaker at seminars in
Canada and the US, and has been a guest lecturer at a number of
university courses.

Sara Tune
Business Officer,
Tax Credits & Financing Program, OMDC

Sara began her film and television career in New York City, working in
production. She was involved with a large variety of shoots, from tiny
indie films like James Toback’s “Black and White,” to large studio
features and TV series like Paramount’s “Zoolander” and HBO’s “Oz.” A trip
to the Toronto International Film Festival sparked Sara’s interest in
Canadian government support of film and television. So she picked up and
moved to Toronto to study the subject at York University’s Communication
and Culture master’s program. Combining her academic and professional
interests, Sara currently works at the OMDC, administering tax credits
for film, television, special effects and animation.

Michael Carter
President, Two Presidents Productions
CASO Board of Directors, Chair, Membership 

Michael has spent the last ten years immersed in the creative,
technical, and business of animation production, including work with
internationally acclaimed studios such as Aardman Animation in the UK.
A graduate of Sheridan College's prestigious Animation Program, he
became the first character animation-trained demo artist for Side
Effects Software’s program Houdini, working with Dreamworks SKG and
visionaries like Henry LaBounta (Senior CGI Supervisor) on Prince of
Egypt and Katsuhiro Otomo (Director of Akira) on 3D animation
techniques for Steamboy.

As an Executive Producer at AAC/Calibre Digital Pictures, Michael was
in charge of all series animation, managing two CGI series and an
integrated Stop Motion series simultaneously with 150 staff and a
collective production budget exceeding $5 million. His credits include
Executive Producer on the CGI/Live Action series' Ace Lightning II and
Shoebox Zoo I, as well as the Stop Motion series Henry's World II.

Andra Shefferr
Executive Director,
Bell Fund

Andra Sheffer is the Executive Director of three private funds supporting the 
Canadian new media, television and film industries:  the Bell Broadcast and 
New Media Fund which invests in Canadian television programs and their
associated interactive digital projects; the Independent Production Fund 
which invests in dramatic television series; and, the COGECO Program 
Development Fund for the development of dramatic series, MOW’s and 
feature film companies as well as the production of MOW’s.

From 1979-89 she was the founding Executive Director of the Academy of
Canadian Cinema and Television.  She lectures on the business and financing
of television and new media and is the editor of New Media, New Business:
The Producer's Guide(2001) and Create a Winning Proposal - The Handbook for
New Media Producers (1999) as well as the co-editor of MAKING IT: the
Business of Film and Television Production in Canada (1986 &1995). 
Previously she served as the Managing Director of the Toronto International
Film Festival, and with the federal government as a Certification Officer
setting up the original CAVCO office(and Canadian content “point” system),
and at the Film Festivals Bureau promoting Canadian films internationally.

Slavica Ceperkovic
Investment Analyst, New Media

Slavica Ceperkovic is a New Media Investment Analyst for Telefilm Canada
based in the Ontario Nunavut office.  The Department of Canadian Heritage
has allocated $14.5 million dollars per year to the Canada New Media Fund
for a period of two years. Administered by Telefilm Canada, the Fund is a
national program which supports the creation and the distribution of
interactive digital cultural content products.

Previous to her role at Telefilm, Slavica held a faculty position at the
Alberta College of Art and Design in the Media Art Digital Technologies
Department, managed the co production division at the Banff New Media
Institute and was manager of the Interactive Art and Entertainment program
at the CFC Media Lab. She holds a BFA from Ryerson University in New Media
and a MFA in Cinema and New Media from Le Fresnoy, the National Studio of
Contemporary Art of France.