Jayashree Panjabi
Jayashree Panjabi began her television career in 1980 as a presenter on children's staple Play School, which she later returned to direct. During (and after) eight years with programme powerhouse NHNZ, Panjabi directed and produced documentaries around the world.
Ramai Hayward
A pioneer of New Zealand film and star of 1940 classic Rewi's Last Stand, Ramai Hayward is credited as Aotearoa’s first Māori filmmaker, camerawoman, and scriptwriter. At the 2005 Wairoa Māori Film Festival she received the inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award for her contributions to Māori filmmaking; the following year Hayward was made a Member of the NZ Order of Merit. She passed away on 3 July 2014.
Anthony Stones
Anthony Stones worked in design for NZ television for over 20 years, with credits ranging from drama to current affairs. After five years as TV2's head of design, he returned to his English birthplace in 1983. Outside of television, Stones made well-known public sculptures in Aotearoa, the UK and China; he died in China in September 2016, aged 82. Image credit: Photo taken and supplied by Dave Roberts
Kell Fowler
During his 34 years as a National Film Unit cameraman, Kell Fowler filmed throughout New Zealand, and travelled as far afield as China and the South Pole. Career highlights included his work as cameraman and director of Oscar-nominated Antarctic film One Hundred and Forty Days Under the World (1964), and the filming of the sweeping three-screen vistas that featured in Expo 70 hit This is New Zealand.
Geoff Steven
Geoff Steven's career spans documentary, experimental film and photography. In 1978, he directed acclaimed feature Skin Deep, the first major investment by the newly established NZ Film Commission. Steven followed it with Strata and a long run of documentaries, before time as a TV executive at both TV3 and TVNZ. He now heads the Our Place World Heritage Project.
Alun Falconer
Alun Falconer started his film career at the National Film Unit in 1946. Early in 1948 he and cameraman Roger Mirams left the NFU and founded the Pacific Film Unit. A year later he went to China where he worked as a journalist and was an eyewitness to the fall of Shanghai. He left in 1950 for London where he returned to film production and later made his name as a television script writer.
Bruno Barrett-Garnier
Bruno Barrett-Garnier calls his company soundnut for good reason. Barrett-Garnier began playing around with audio equipment as a child, and has gone on to work on sound for movies, TV shows, shorts and commercials. The sometime screen composer was one of the key soundies over four seasons of Spartacus; his CV also includes Fish Skin Suit, Giselle and Edmund Hillary movie Beyond the Edge.
Leon Narbey
Leon Narbey is one of New Zealand’s most prolific and lauded cinematographers. His talents have contributed to roughly 20 features, including Whale Rider, Desperate Remedies, The Price of Milk and No.2. Narbey's work as a director includes movies The Footstep Man and Illustrious Energy, an acclaimed drama about Chinese goldminers.
Bruce Allpress
Veteran actor Bruce Allpress has played true-blue Kiwis in everything from Ronald Hugh Morrieson classic The Scarecrow to 2011 feature Rest for the Wicked. Alongside a long run of supporting roles, he scored two Feltex awards as swagman star of 80s TV series Jocko.
Victoria Spackman
In May 2017 Victoria Spackman began as leader of creative campus Te Auaha, which is set to open in Wellington in 2018. Before that she was chief executive and co-owner of Wellington company Gibson Group, whose multi-media and interactive installations and TV programmes reach a large international audience. Studies in law, film, theatre and linguistics have all fed into Spackman's work.