New York Times bestselling author Robert Venditti broke into comics the old-fashioned way - by starting out in the mailroom. He began working for publisher Top Shelf Productions in 2002, and within a few months sold them the script for The Surrogates, his first comic book series.  The story was later adapted into the feature film Surrogates starring Bruce Willis and Ving Rhames. Venditti is currently writing the graphic novel adaptations of Rick Riordan’s international bestselling Percy Jackson & The Olympians series.  His most recent book is the political/medical thriller The Homeland Directive.

Ed Gentry is a published author as well as the lead writer and lead game designer for Quest Atlantis, an educational 3D Massively Multiplayer Online Game for school children ages 7-14. Since 2005, Ed has published a number of stories in professional markets, and his novel Neversfall was published in 2007 by Wizards of the Coast, the seventh largest publisher in the United States. In his narrative fiction, Ed focuses on character development and dialogue, with a particular interest in believable antagonists. In game design, his works focus on flexible narratives and player agency, allowing the player to be an active participant and author of the story. He is a member of Playable Fictions, a group dedicated to bringing legitimacy and engaging design to the genre of serious games. One of the major projects from Playable Fictions is the game River of Justice, which examines the concepts of justice and forgiveness in context of the socio-political struggle in a fictionalized Uganda.

Flint Dille is the living embodiment of what is now called transmedia. His career started by turning toys into TV Shows with G1 Transformers, G.I. Joe, Inhumanoids and Visionaries. He has designed games with Gary Gygax and written movies for Steven Spielberg. Flint has sold game design documents as feature films (Venom, Dimension 2006 and Agent In Place, Lionsgate 2010).  He created the ‘Comics Module’ for TSR, a comic book that contained both roleplaying and tabletop gaming content way before transmedia. His Agent 13 novels are in feature film development.

Flint himself has become a transmedia character:  Frank Miller immortalized him as Dillios, the narrator in 300, and Gary Gygax made him a Barbarian named ‘Chert’ (in geology, a low grade of flint). Currently, Flint is teaching a class on Alternate Reality Games at UCLA. His follow-up book to The Ultimate Guide to Video Game Writing and Design is about transmedia.

Troy DeVolld began his writing career in comics in 1991, creating quirky titles like Ike and Kitzi and Jinx Oople: Psychic Performance Artist. Since graduating from Full Sail with an Associate of Science Degree in Film in 1996, Mr. DeVolld has worked on over twenty network and cable series including Mtv's Fear, The Osbournes, The Surreal Life, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, Flipping Out and Dancing With the Stars, most often credited as a Producer, Story Producer or Supervising Story Producer. Non-writing efforts include the 2004 Jenna Fischer comedy feature Lollilove, which he co-produced. Troy was nominated for a shared Daytime Emmy® Award for his work on the Style Network series Split Ends in 2009 and joins the Full Sail Hall of Fame in 2010. He is a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the Caucus for Producers, Writers and Directors, and the Writers Guild of America West's NonFiction Writers' Caucus.

Mike Raicht is a former Marvel Comics editor (X-Men line) and current freelance comic book writer. He has written stories for multiple publishers including Marvel Entertainment (Spider-Man, Hulk, X-Men, MAX Zombie), DC Comics (Batman, Superman), IDW (GI Joe), Dynamite (Army of Darkness, Raise the Dead II) and BOOM! Studios (Finding Nemo). The first volume of his book, The Stuff of Legend, was published by Villard, an imprint of Random House, and debuted at #2 on The New York Times’ Paperback Graphic Novel bestseller list. It was also named to multiple Best of 2010 comic book lists. His upcoming work includes a new creator-owned werewolf book called The Pack and the graphic novel adaptation of the bestselling series, The Mortal Instruments. Mike is currently an adjunct professor at LeMoyne College and a faculty member of the YMCA’s Downtown Writer’s Center in Syracuse, New York.

Dave Drabik is the owner of Fine Line Productions and an award winning writer, director, and producer with more than 20 years of experience in the entertainment business.  Prior to launching his own production company, Dave held staff writer positions on the Late Show with David Letterman, Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher, and in Cartoon Network’s On-Air Department.  Since then, Dave has created, written, and produced a live-action comedy series for Adult Swim, and currently has projects in development with TBS, PBS, BET, Centric, and Adult Swim.  Other clients include ESPN, with whom he is currently working on his 10th Espy Awards.  Dave earned an Emmy nomination in 2009 in the category of Original Song for helping co-write Justin Timberlake’s Espy performance of Why I Love Sports.  He is a member of the Writers Guild of America and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.