Guests of Honour

Nurtured on anime classics from the tender age of Star Blazers et al., this reclusive fanboy-turned-voice actor/writer/ADR director/flake extraordinaire spent more years than he cares to remember in what might charitably be described as freefall before landing, mostly by accident, smack dab on the industry of his dreams. To this day, some believe the small crater made by the impact remains the source of his power.

Discovered by Funimation warhorse and visionary ADR director Christopher Bevins, who cast him as Rikichi in 2005's Samurai 7, Tatum's inexplicable luck has held long enough to see his flag hoisted on a slew of dream roles, most notably Kyoya Otori in the hit English language dub of Ouran High School Host Club, suave, demonic Sebastian Michaelis in Black Butler and the equal parts maniacal/vulnerable Okarin Rintarou from Steins;Gate. Other characters the man still can't believe he's had the crazy good fortune to play include: Doumeki in XXXHolic, Jiro Mochizuki in Black Blood Brothers, Isaac Dian in Baccano!, Both God Eneru and Dalton in the new dub of One Piece, Komui Lee in D-Gray Man, Dororo in Sgt. Frog, the titular loveable savage of Heroic Age, Ryosuke Takahashi in Initial D, Lawrence Kraft in Spice and Wolf, Zarbon in Dragon Ball Z Kai, Scar in Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood, and Sir Hammerlock in the videogame juggernaut Borderlands 2. His vocal "stylings," much to the chagrin of drama teachers everywhere, he's sure, have also been featured in Romeo X Juliet, Speed Grapher, Trinity Blood, Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple, Black Cat, Nabari no Ou, Ghost Hunt, School Rumble, The Tower of Druaga, Aquarion, Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles, Shuffle, Shigurui, Glass Fleet, Mushishi, Soul Eater, along with feature-length films such as Vexille, Summer Wars, and Dragon Age: Dawn of the Seeker, among many others.

And as if being involved with so many awesome shows wasn't enough, in late 2007 the fluky so-and-so tempted fate by officially branching out into ADR directing and adaptive scriptwriting for Funimation as well. His ADR directing credits to date include Aquarion, Jyu-oh-Sei, Romeo X Juliet, Big Windup, Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne and Shikabane Hime (Corpse Princess), while his writing credits include substantial work on Ouran High School Host Club, Heroic Age, Initial D, Blassreiter, Ga Rei: Zero, Hero Tales, Legend of the Legendary Heroes, Fractale, Deadman Wonderland, Steins;Gate and Dragon Ball Z Kai.

In early 2010 he teamed up with Terri Doty and Stephen Hoff to launch That Anime Show, a web-based chat show centered on colorful, often diabolically unhinged interviews with friends and colleagues within the dubbing industry, all episodes of which can be downloaded for free at http://thatanimeshow.com/

Ever the workaholic, Tatum is currently burning the midnight oil on a number of exciting projects due for release later this year. And before you ask, the "J" stands for... Well, it stands for whatever you'd like it to.

Monica Rial has been working in the anime voice over industry for 13 years. As an actress for ADV Films and FUNimation Entertainment, she has lent her voice to over 250 anime including: Baccano! (Chane), Black Butler (Mei Ren), A Certain Magical Index (Index), ef ~ A Tale of Memories (Chihiro), Fairy Tail (Mirajane), Hetalia Axis Powers (Flying Mint Bunny/Belarus), Highschool of the Dead (Shizuka), Mass Effect: Paragon Lost (Treeya), Negima (Konoka/Kazumi/Satsuki), One Piece (Tashigi/Carue/Kuina), Ouran Host Club (Renge), Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt (Stocking), Princess Jellyfish (Mayaya), Sgt. Frog (Momoka),  Shin-chan (Ai), Soul Eater (Tsubaki), Towanoquan (Tei), Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE (Sakura), Witchblade (Maria) and many more. She can be heard on the Cartoon Network in Deadman Wonderland (Shiro), Casshern Sins (Ringo), Samurai 7 (Shino) and Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (May Chang). You can also catch her on Nicktoons and the CW as Bulma in Dragonball Z Kai. She's appeared in several video games including Ms. Splosion Man, Comic Jumper, and Borderlands 2. Be sure to come by and say hello!

Nadia Baiardi, also known as NadiaSK, is an Italian cosplayer, fashion stylist, and designer.  Since her start in 2004, she has participated in many prominent Italian conventions where she has won over 50 awards for "Best Female Cosplay" or "Best Group."  Often invited as a special guest, she has shown her costumes at many conventions and countries internationally: TNT and CJMC in Mexico, Sicaf in South Korea, J-PopCon in Denmark, Connichi in Germany, IberAnime in Portugal, Cicaf in China, Japan, AnimeFest in Czech Republic, FICOMIC in Spain, Bristol UK.

She was the Italian representative at World Cosplay Summit 2008 dressed as Lia de Beaumont from the anime and manga Chevalier d'Eon.  In May 2010, she won "Best Cosplayer of Italy" at the Italian Cosplay Contest with the costume of Rydia (Amano version) from the videogame Final Fantasy IV.  In March 2011, she won third place in the Cosplay World Masters international contest in Lisbon dressed as Touhaku from the card game Sengokushi Taisen. In the same competition the following year, she won first place as Alice from Scissors Crown series by illustrator Thores Shibamoto. She was in the Italian Team at the European Cosplay Gathering 2012 and won third place. She was the European Solo Representative in Brazil at World Cosplay Master 2012 and won third place with Inphyy from N3. 

She has appeared in various cosplay magazines such as Cosmode, Cosmoplay and CosplayGen as well as several cosplay books such as Otacool 2, Fenomenal Cosplay, 100%Otaku and Cosplay, Alessia in Wonderland. MTV USA filmed a video documentary about her life as cosplayer called "NadiaSK", which was also broadcasted in Europe and Japan.  She is also a promoter on the website Worldcosplay.net. 

Aside from cosplay, one of NadiaSK's greatest passions is video games... she has every console! NadiaSK also runs a YouTube channel called VIDEOGIRLSKAI about gaming and reviews.

A manga-ka and illustrator, Ryusuke Hamamoto's notable works include character designs for Petit EVA and manga series Hiyoko Bocchi among many others.  He has a deep interest in comics, cartoons and culture outside of Japan, some of which can be seen in his works.

Using the name "Ryu Moto" for his activities abroad, his first work under the name was with the comic "COMPASS" in 2007 published by IMAGE. He looks forward to working more for the comic and related industries outside of Japan.

Official website: http://ryusukeworks.com/

Gurihiru is a Japanese artist/illustrator duo comprising of Sasaki (pencils and ink) and Kawano (colors).

For American comics, they mainly worked for Marvel and Dark Horse.  In addition to comic books and illustrations, they have also worked on character designs for video games and animation.

Notable works: Power Pack  (Marvel), Avatar: The Last Airbender (Dark Horse).

Veronica Taylor is a classically trained actress who has performed in NYC and around the U.S. in contemporary and classical theatre. Her voice has been a part of Saturday morning cartoons for some time now. She is probably best known for playing the roles of Ash and May on Pokémon, April on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and roles in Cubix, Dinosaur King, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Huntik, Tai Chi Chasers, and more. She can be heard on PBS kids’ Word World (Sheep), Lunch Lab (Mixiebot), and Chuck Vanderchuck’s ‘something something’ Explosion! (Ramona). Some anime favorites include Yukino on His and Hers Circumstances, Amelia on Slayers, all 7 Nana’s on Nana Seven of Seven, and Narue on World of Narue, as well as many others. She has done numerous voices for animation, video games, audiobooks, commercials, and documentaries.

David Vincent is a professional voice actor and television producer based in Los Angeles, California. He has lent his voice to a variety of animation and video game titles, as well as numerous national commercials for television and radio.

Some of his best known animation credits as seen on Cartoon Network include Grimmjow Jeagerjaques & Kouga Kuchiki in the hit series Bleach and Li Xingke in Code Geass. Other animation credits include Archer / Gilgamesh in Fate/Zero, Assassin in Fate/stay night, Van in GUNxSWORD, Seiji in Durarara!!, Arthur August Angel in Blue Exorcist, Daisuke Nagase in Persona 4, Kekkaishi as Sakon, Chester Barklight in Tales of Phantasia, General Logi in Blue Dragon, and Giichi in Blade of The Immortal. David was nominated “Best Voice Actor in an Anime” by the American Anime Awards for his work in GUNxSWORD.

Some of his more recent video game credits include Jin Kisaragi & Hakumen in the hit series Blazblue, Raymond Vester in Resident Evil: Revelations, Marshall Law & Forest Law in the smash hit video game franchise Tekken, Shin Kamiya in Tekken: Blood Vengance, Eliot in Dead Or Alive 5, Keiss in Final Fantasy: The Crystal Bearers, T-Hawk in Super Street Fighter IV, Morgan in Medal Of Honor, Blocter in The Last Remnant, Edward in Infinite Undiscovery, Richter in Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles, and Richard in Tales Of Graces F. Other titles include Halo 4, Soul Calibur, Fire Emblem: Awakening, Spec Ops: The Line, Alpha Protocol, and has many more new titles to be released this year.

In addition to voice acting, David has also appeared in front of the camera in guest and co-starring roles on prime time television shows such as NCIS, Criminal Minds and The Mentalist.

Conductor and Music Director Arnie Roth is a Grammy-winning artist known for his work with performers including Il Divo, Diana Ross, Jewel, The Irish Tenors, Charlotte Church, Peter Cetera, and Dennis DeYoung. Roth has conducted the London Symphony Orchestra, the National Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony, the Hollywood Bowl Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Dallas Symphony, the Houston Symphony, the BBC Symphony, the Czech National Chamber Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the San Diego Symphony, the Winnipeg Symphony, the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago, the Detroit Symphony, the Ravinia Festival Orchestra, the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, the Tokyo Philharmonic and the Sydney Symphony.

Roth is well known in the world of video game music for his work with Nobuo Uematsu and Square Enix as Music Director and Conductor of the Dear Friends: music from FINAL FANTASY, More Friends: music from FINAL FANTASY, VOICES: music from FINAL FANTASY, as well as his role as Music Director and Conductor of PLAY! A Video Game Symphony. He was the winner of the Best Score Award at the 2003 DVD Premier Awards for his score for the film Barbie as Rapunzel and was nominated for an Emmy in 2007 for his original song “Shine” from the movie Barbie in The Twelve Dancing Princesses. Roth has produced dozens of best selling CD’s.

Riddle was born and raised in Canada. Introduced to gaming and anime at an early age, it was only a matter of time before she would find a unique way to express her fandom: cosplay. Each costume presents its own set of challenges, requiring her to learn new skills like translation, sculpting, molding, casting and of course, sewing. What started out as a hobby, has now led to many unique opportunities such as getting to work on a couple films and commercials, as well as getting invited to conventions all around the world. Riddle is also the creator of “Cosplay for a Cause”, a cosplay charity group she started whose first project raised over 30,000 for the Japanese Red Cross tsunami disaster relief. When she isn’t working on her costumes, she is rescuing baby squirrels, or talking to her robot therapist about video games. She is one of the Cast members of SYFY’s new cosplay reality show “Heroes of Cosplay” premiering Aug 13th, 2013