JURY PANEL
Ozge Gozturk:
Ozge is the founder of The London Independent Story Prize. She is a published author, journalist, and multi-award-winning scriptwriter. After traveling from country to country, she settled down in London.
Fred Ireland:
Fred has been a script judge for several nationwide screenplay competitions for the past seven years and has been a screener for the Atlanta Film Festival shorts program since 2016. Fred has written and directed several short films which have been screened at several film festivals. He has provided script consultation to writers nationwide in both the short and feature-length format and is currently involved with the Wilmington Filmmakers group, a cooperative for all aspects of filmmaking. His interest is primarily focused on narrative scripts and films.
Dakota Reinike:
Originally a native of New Paltz, New York, Dakota fell in love with television development while pursuing her B.A. in TV/Film at DeSales University. While attending, she completed an internship with ASR Media Productions as a Production Intern and was thrilled to officially join the team following her graduation in May 2018. She currently holds a position as a Digital Producer and is based in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. For the past four years, Dakota has been a Jury Member for the New York International Screenplay Awards (NYISA) and frequently collaborates with friends on filmmaking and writing projects. She has a love for writing comedy but enjoys the creative spark and energy from any genre when writers come together. In her spare time, she enjoys painting, playing piano, and volunteering at the local humane society.
Emine Dursun:
Emine is a Sundance-Alum, New York-based Screenwriter, Script Doctor, and Screenwriting & Creative Writing Teacher. She is a jury member of lots of Film Festivals and Screenplay competitions such as The Writers Lab US and Europe – which is supported by Meryl Streep, Oprah Winfrey, and Nicole Kidman and is produced by New York Women in Film & Television. She is leading workshops named “ How To Write An Award Winning Screenplay”, “Character Creation”, “Building A Strong Structure”, “Efficient Moving Dialogue Writing”, and “Creative Writing”. Also gives private lessons in New York. She is the owner of the MAE Media House. Emine is selectively doing script doctoring and script analysis for special projects. Emine & NYISA also offers the workshops “How to write An Award-winning Screenplay” and “Advanced Screenwriting Development Programs”.
Greg Davies:
After high school, Greg went straight into university, City Varsity in Cape Town, where he studied Animation for Film and TV. He learned traditional 2D animation drawing, stop motion animation development, storyboarding, screenwriting, 3D modeling and environmental design, After Effects, Photoshop, and film editing. In his final year, he specialized in After Effects for Visual Effects and Video game design. Straight after graduating from Animation, he went on to do a degree in Acting for Camera at the same university, where he learned professional theatre acting, voice work (he has worked on his American accents as well as his rooted British accents), improv, screenwriting and acting for film and television for 3 years.
Michael Matasci:
Michael Matasci is a Brooklyn-based writer and composer. Having scored music for an independent film, Michael continues to produce instrumental and pop songs. Michael is also a screenwriter specializing in comedy and drama. An avid bicyclist, Michael enjoys touring the back roads of New York.
Christopher Ortiz:
“ I’ve been screenwriting and script consulting since college, where I also started my background in freelance film criticism for websites such as thescriptlab.com. I graduated from Brooklyn College with a degree in Film Studies and a minor in Philosophy, the latter of which is a big factor in my approach to my writing. In 2016, I started filmmaking and have written and directed 3 short films since then, all self-financed, along with having co-written a mobile stealth action game for iOS. These experiences redefined my approach and made me better equipped in being both a writer and script consultant. I’ve also been a judge and script analyst for NYISA since 2018. My biggest influences are the heartwarming, educational Nickelodeon shows I grew up in the 1990s, the innovative writing of Christopher Nolan and Aaron Sorkin, and the genius storytelling of game designer-writers Hideo Kojima (the Metal Gear Solid series) and John Garvin (the Syphon Filter series). “
JURY PANEL
Ozge Gozturk:
Ozge is the founder of The London Independent Story Prize. She is a published author, journalist, and multi-award-winning scriptwriter. After traveling from country to country, she settled down in London.
Fred Ireland:
Fred has been a script judge for several nationwide screenplay competitions for the past seven years and has been a screener for the Atlanta Film Festival shorts program since 2016. Fred has written and directed several short films which have been screened at several film festivals. He has provided script consultation to writers nationwide in both the short and feature-length format and is currently involved with the Wilmington Filmmakers group, a cooperative for all aspects of filmmaking. His interest is primarily focused on narrative scripts and films.
Dakota Reinike:
Originally a native of New Paltz, New York, Dakota fell in love with television development while pursuing her B.A. in TV/Film at DeSales University. While attending, she completed an internship with ASR Media Productions as a Production Intern and was thrilled to officially join the team following her graduation in May 2018. She currently holds a position as a Digital Producer and is based in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. For the past four years, Dakota has been a Jury Member for the New York International Screenplay Awards (NYISA) and frequently collaborates with friends on filmmaking and writing projects. She has a love for writing comedy but enjoys the creative spark and energy from any genre when writers come together. In her spare time, she enjoys painting, playing piano, and volunteering at the local humane society.
Emine Dursun:
Emine is a Sundance-Alum, New York-based Screenwriter, Script Doctor, and Screenwriting & Creative Writing Teacher. She is a jury member of lots of Film Festivals and Screenplay competitions such as The Writers Lab US and Europe – which is supported by Meryl Streep, Oprah Winfrey, and Nicole Kidman and is produced by New York Women in Film & Television. She is leading workshops named “ How To Write An Award Winning Screenplay”, “Character Creation”, “Building A Strong Structure”, “Efficient Moving Dialogue Writing”, and “Creative Writing”. Also gives private lessons in New York. She is the owner of the MAE Media House. Emine is selectively doing script doctoring and script analysis for special projects. Emine & NYISA also offers the workshops “How to write An Award-winning Screenplay” and “Advanced Screenwriting Development Programs”.
Greg Davies:
After high school, Greg went straight into university, City Varsity in Cape Town, where he studied Animation for Film and TV. He learned traditional 2D animation drawing, stop motion animation development, storyboarding, screenwriting, 3D modeling and environmental design, After Effects, Photoshop, and film editing. In his final year, he specialized in After Effects for Visual Effects and Video game design. Straight after graduating from Animation, he went on to do a degree in Acting for Camera at the same university, where he learned professional theatre acting, voice work (he has worked on his American accents as well as his rooted British accents), improv, screenwriting and acting for film and television for 3 years.
Michael Matasci:
Michael Matasci is a Brooklyn-based writer and composer. Having scored music for an independent film, Michael continues to produce instrumental and pop songs. Michael is also a screenwriter specializing in comedy and drama. An avid bicyclist, Michael enjoys touring the back roads of New York.
Christopher Ortiz:
“ I’ve been screenwriting and script consulting since college, where I also started my background in freelance film criticism for websites such as thescriptlab.com. I graduated from Brooklyn College with a degree in Film Studies and a minor in Philosophy, the latter of which is a big factor in my approach to my writing. In 2016, I started filmmaking and have written and directed 3 short films since then, all self-financed, along with having co-written a mobile stealth action game for iOS. These experiences redefined my approach and made me better equipped in being both a writer and script consultant. I’ve also been a judge and script analyst for NYISA since 2018. My biggest influences are the heartwarming, educational Nickelodeon shows I grew up in the 1990s, the innovative writing of Christopher Nolan and Aaron Sorkin, and the genius storytelling of game designer-writers Hideo Kojima (the Metal Gear Solid series) and John Garvin (the Syphon Filter series). “