Born and raised in Kumamoto. Based in Japan & NYC.
In 2007, she established the English Drama Club in her hometown to organize a workshop to teach English using the acting method. In 2009 she moved to NYC, finished a full-time course at HB Studio after three years. She has organized many cultural events in the city, as well as Improv/Performance workshops for second language learners in over 40 places both in Japan and outside of Japan. Now she actively working on performance as an actor and production as producer/coordinator.

Her credits include：
・Web drama series『JapaDori of NY』 (Nominee of Seoul Web Fest NJ Web Fest, NYC Web Fest, and official selection of Miami Web Fest )
[Creator/Lead]
・Short 『Dream of a Boy』 ＆Documentary 『Neighbourhood』 (Dokkoisho Film Project presents)
[Producer]
・Feature 『Sonic The Hedgehog』 (Paramount)[Local Coordinator]
・HBOmax series 『Tokyo Vice』 [Production Coordinator]

As my past experiences with the wonderful and supportive communities at other web festivals, I am aspiring that Japan Web Fest will be one of your platforms where you can come back like your home, and expand your success in the efforts to spread your artworks. Let’s celebrate your remarkable creativities together, and get connected with other talented creators/audiences at the first-ever web fest in Japan! Arigato!

Born in Tokushima, Japan. Now inhabiting in Sydney, Australia.
Started his film industry career as an extra and stepped into producing more behind the camera as he has extensive sales and business development experience. Invited to Metro Screen Breaks Funding Hot House Session to learn more about filmmaking and made a short film called “RICEBALLS”, which screened over 40 film fests including Academy accredited film fest and received many awards such as The Best of The Fest, etc. Lately, he extended his coverage to film fest judge of international film fests and currently producing 2 brand-new film fests from scratch.

AACTA - Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts : Accredited Producer and Director
MEAA - Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance : Equity (Actors’ guild)
Appeared on : Hacksaw Ridge (Mel Gibson), Unbroken (Angelina Jolie), The Wolverine (James Mangold) etc.

If you have a story to tell and a huge passion to make it into film, it's a great place to start with. We do the rest. We have a vertical end-to-end platform with skilled community, experienced mentors and JWF to screen it to your audience. Jump in anytime, just like I did at the age of 45 as an extra. Never too late...

Elahe Nassr is an independent screenwriter, filmmaker, and photographer based in Japan. She is also a researcher of the film industry and tourism, women’s rights activist, as well as a qualified foreign language instructor. She was selected as a fellow member of the Kyoto Filmmakers Lab Masters Session, 2019. She studies Culture & Tourism at Hiroshima University and by winning the 2018 Henry Fong Award she went to study film and screenwriting at UCSC in Milan, Italy. She has also made the
short film L ife as It Is . Her photography works include the winning work for Olympics 2020 Torch Relay and the auctioned work S anity for COVID-19 medical donations in Italy. She is currently working on new projects such as an educational video for elimination of violence against women and a music video dedicated to people with visual impairments.

I should say storytelling has enriched my life a lot. Stories are reflection of our lives seen through any medium, films, plays, books, photos, music....
JWF is for sure a beginning of so many stories to come and I can't wait to hear yours.

Rika Nishikawa is an award-winning filmmaker currently working as a freelance based on Japan and US. She studied film making at the New York Film Academy and has experience in TV commercials, web movies, independent films and TV series.

I would like to give respect and praise to talented creators around the world, and to give movie fans the opportunity to meet wonderful works. And I would like to play a part in expanding the community of the web movies to the world. I hope this JWF will be a step towards a bright future for creators.

Takuma Matsuda is a filmmaker based in Japan. He was born and raised in Tokyo, and moved to New York at the age of 20 to pursue of becoming an established filmmaker. The first short he directed in the U.S. won Best Fiction Film at 2018 CUNY Asian American International Film Festival and it was screened at Asian American International Film Festival in New York 2018.

Kosuke Kiguchi is the chairman of the Obuse Short Film Festival (OSFF). Born and raised in Gunma Prefecture, Japan, he now works at a education startup during the day and runs the OSFF at night.
Kosuke became involved with the town of Obuse, Nagano after joining a summer school program the town hosted in 2015, and since then has been a part of the community development initiatives of the town. As part of the town initiative, he and his fellow members founded OSFF in 2018, and succeeded in having their first festival in March, 2019.
With his background in education and close relationships with the people of Obuse, Kosuke seeks a new form of film festival to develop a community and a space for communication through cinema.