In 2026, moviegoers came back to cinemas, packing theaters to see blockbusters like “The Odyssey,” “Project Hail Mary,” “Spider-Man: Brand New Day,” “Toy Story 5,” “Michael” and “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” and low-budget films like “Backrooms” and “Obsession.” But all those movies needed skilled artisans to complete the directors’ visions, including those on Variety’s 10 Artisans to Watch list. The honorees will be feted at the SCAD Savannah Film Festival, which runs Oct. 24-31.
Past honorees have often gone on to earn Oscar nominations. Last year, “Sinners” DP Autumn Durald Arkapaw, “KPop Demon Hunters” songwriter EJAE and “One Battle After Another” editor Andy Jurgensen all went on to win Oscars.
Anne Jimkes
Supervising sound editor, “The Mosquito Bowl”
Jimkes approached the film’s World War II Pacific Theater setting with a focus on authenticity, researching the specific weapons used by the Japanese and American military forces, including the M1 Garand rifle.
The sounds of the soldiers were a priority. The breaths and physical reactions recorded on set were pushed forward against the chaos of the battle to ground the characters’ humanity. Even in quieter scenes, the jungle location was alive with sound, creating a sense of pressure surrounding the soldiers.
The sound needed to move the story forward. For Jimkes, that meant determining which sound should take priority in each moment while never losing sight of the people at the center of the film’s story. — Tanya Fedak
Aulo Licinio
Image Credit: Credit: Marion Van De Graaf
Animation supervisor, “Project Hail Mary”
Licinio navigated that by developing physical language for the alien rock creature. Licinio oversaw a team of animators who studied the physical puppet used for filming, using its on-set movements as a reference while expanding Rocky’s mannerisms. “[Rocky’s puppeteer and voice] James Ortiz did a good job getting expressions out of this rock,” he says. “How can we enhance it in a way that we can use in reference? How can we tie the loose ends?”
Landon Lott
Art director, “Pluribus”
SCAD alum Lott recalls “Pluribus” production designer Denise Pizzini reaching out to help develop a Norwegian ice hotel that would be built entirely on stage. Lott recalls, “The brief was to create a hotel that felt authentic and entirely sculpted from ice, while designing it around the practical limitations of a stage build.”
Lott saw it as a great opportunity to bring together his background in illustration, architecture and set design.
On his process, Lott says, “The initial scope of the set was actually larger than what ultimately appeared on screen and included a hotel lobby, foyer, bar and the individual hotel rooms. That meant thinking through the hotel as a complete environment from the beginning, establishing how the spaces connected and giving each one its own identity while making sure they all felt like part of the same place.”
Blair McClendon
Editor, “Clarissa”
For McClendon, editing films is a lot like music. It’s all about finding the right rhythm, texture, pace and cutting where the beat falls. Sometimes finding this groove is deliberate and difficult, and other times, like on “Clarissa,” the experience is filled with happy accidents. “It’s like a rooster crows at exactly the right moment to keep the shot interesting and keep it going, and we were like, ‘Oh, that’s great, that guy has to stay,’” McClendon says.
It also helped that the actors delivered great performances, McClendon explains.
Stars David Oyelowo, Sophie Okonedo and Ayo Edebiri worked with directors Arie Esiri and Chuko Esiri to allow scenes to unfurl naturally and used editing to enhance characters’ emotions. To McClendon, this is the way it’s supposed to be. One of the biggest misconceptions he shares about editing is the idea that it’s a place for fixing as opposed to fine-tuning.
Adam Newport-Berra
Image Credit: Variety via Getty Images
Cinematographer, “The Invite”, “Club Kid”
Newport-Berra’s range is on display in two films this awards season: “The Invite,” directed by and starring Olivia Wilde, and “Club Kid,” directed by and starring Jordan Firstman.
“I tend to enjoy working with actor-directors because we get this dynamic experience on set where they get to direct the film both from outside and from within during the scene, which I think is a special opportunity for a director to be inside the moment,” Newport-Berra says.
“The Invite” takes place over one night and follows two dynamic couples inside one apartment. The premise provided Wilde and Newport-Berra with a creative challenge. “We loved the script, but we thought, ‘How do we make this really sing on screen?’ It can’t just feel like a play. It can’t just be about presenting the material. It needs to be dynamic.”
Newport-Berra sought ways to liberate his camera within the confines of the space.
“We really used composition and the focal lengths of our lenses to either compress people and make things feel flat and claustrophobic, or we would use a wider lens to make it feel very intimate, gentle, sexy and seductive.”
Raül Refree
Composer, “La Bola Negra”
When scoring Netflix’s “La Bola Negra,” Refree knew he wanted to pursue a timeless, orchestral and avant-garde sound.
The film recounts the story of three generations of queer men whose lives are connected through love and loss.
As the three stories intersect, the music follows suit by blending these different colors and timbres, building toward the final climax.
Jessica Ronane
Image Credit: Yellow Belly Photo
Casting director, “Elsinore”
To do so, Ronane and “Elsinore” director Simon Stone worked closely together scouring their web of actors and building a “story map of all the real people and then started to think about instinctively who has the spirit of the character, and how are we going to identify the right actors to put forward,” Ronane says.
“What an incredible thing to be able to build on your instincts like that, to be able to really feel that your taste is appreciated by collaborators who want kind of more of that,” Ronane says. — I. F.
Allie Shehorn
Working with the blood rigs presented another technical challenge, particularly because the team filmed scenes out of order. “We actually shot the end sequence of the movie before we did the blood rigs to establish the blood looks,” Shehorn says.
Grace Snell
Costume designer, “Sense and Sensibility”
Snell was also inspired by family portraits. She wanted the Dashwood women to share clothing in the way that sisters do. “The dynamic of those sisters and how they share clothes and how they’re inspired by each other was important,” she says. “We do rework some of the fabrics so that the garments look like they have a life themselves and how garments are loved and shared and borrowed within a family.” — Mya Copeland
Danny Vermette
Production designer, “Backrooms”
One of the challenges was designing the drop ceilings. “My key thought was to keep this original to the series but bring it up to that next level of cinema and make it beautiful,” Vermette explains. The ceilings were customized, which turned into a major undertaking. “There were a lot, a lot of lights — 375 individual lenses and troffers on the set.”
