Alumni Success Stories

OUR ALUMNI, THEIR IMPACT

Here are just some of the esteemed alumni who’ve worked on award-winning productions in film, TV, music, animation and countless other notable projects.

Jeff Barnes

Jeff's music business career took off once he landed an internship at Record Plant Studios in Hollywood. Unbeknownst to Jeff at the time, Record Plant would become a foundational job path and lead him to spend most of his career with the studio as President.

Paquita Hughes

Hughes credits her creative streak and early interests in photography, theatre and film as the driving force to pursue a career in the film and entertainment industry. Hughes has worked on sets for major projects including, Marvel Runaways, HBO’s Perry Mason, and Hulu’s Little Fires Everywhere.

Randy Marx

As an Angeleno, Randy Marx is making a name for himself in the music world here in Hollywood. He graduated in 2017 with a degree in Music Production and has since landed a partnership with The Wrecking Spot Music Group and Optimistic Records.

Matt Villines

Matt Villines was a director best known for his sketch comedy work with professional partner and fellow film school alum, Oz Rodriguez. Together, they created the comedic directing team Matt & Oz. Matt used his keen sense of humor to create some of the most successful videos on SuperDeluxe.com

Phillip Bladh

Phillip Bladh is an Oscar-winning production sound mixer who is most known for his work on the film Sound of Metal starring Riz Ahmed as Ruben Stone. Phillip Bladh graduated from The L.A. Recording School in 2008 and has been active in the film industry for more than a decade.

Alex M. Ferrufino

Alex M. Ferrufino is best known for the HBO Latinx-winning short film, Slipping Into Darkness. The film follows a young Mexican American named Juanito, who is struggling to provide for his family and not follow in his incarcerated father’s footsteps. Slipping Into Darkness was a breakout project for Alex Ferrufino and is loosely based on his rough upbringing in Los Angeles.

Kevin Atkinson

Kevin Atkinson made short films with classmates and learned how to operate film cameras as a student from the inaugural class at L.A. Film School. After graduation, Kevin found his niche in comedy sketches at Funny or Die with fellow alumni and Spotlight Academy member, Oz Rodriguez. Each production job he landed led to slightly bigger jobs in the industry.

Daniel Zaidenstadt

Over his 10-year music career, Daniel has contributed to more than 30 RIAA Gold and Platinum albums and countless #1 hits. Daniel has worked with top artists like Bruce Springsteen, Lady Gaga and Zayn Malik. Daniel shifted from engineering to producing as he’s grown in his recording career. He’s worked extensively with Zayn Malik and Carly Rae Jepsen as a vocal producer.

Angelina Faulkner

Angelina is an Emmy-nominated dialogue editor with a sharp ear for assembling audio with maximum punch and clarity. You can hear her dialogue work on the award-winning show What We Do in The Shadows. Her latest post-production work is on the animated show, Dunkcanville starring Amy Poehler.

Corey Drake

This '10 computer animation alum found his passion for animatronics while visiting Disneyland as a kid. With his heart set on working as an animator for Disney, Corey enrolled in the Animation program at The L.A. Film School.

Damian Szeibert

If you’ve ever seen a Disney character collectible, you are likely looking at Damian Szeibert’s work. Damian has devoted his career to bring characters from the silver screen into the homes of Disney and Pixar fans everywhere.

Jessica Sterling

Jessica has photographed some of the most recognizable faces in the world in her 10-plus years as a portrait photographer. Her work has appeared in MTV.com, The Huffington Post, Fortune and The Wall Street Journal. Jessica’s film and entertainment background led her to work in branding and promotion for top Hollywood talents.

Henrique Andrade

Henrique sacrificed his free time to pursue his audio engineering career at Record Plant, which led him to work with iconic musicians like Justin Bieber, Zayn Malik and Carly Rae Jepsen. Henrique’s dedication to his creative pursuits has paid off with the success of each album he mixes or engineers.

Oz Rodriguez

Over the years, Oz has worked on more than 50 episodes of SNL and directed the Emmy®-winning show Creating Saturday Night Live, which documents the making of America’s most iconic sketch comedy TV series. In 2019, Oz personally won a Primetime Emmy for Creating SNL.

Kyle Newacheck

With more than 90 combined directing, writing and producing credits spanning the past decade and a half, Kyle has made a name for himself in the comedy world. Whether you’ve seen his work on popular TV shows like Workaholics, Parks and Recreation or Community, you’ll find yourself doing one thing while watching—laughing.

Andrés F. Borda Zabala

In the eight years since Andrés graduated from The L.A. Recording School, he’s won five Grammys® for his work with Natalia Lafourcade and Carlos Vives. As an audio engineer and mixer, Andrés has contributed to more than 60 albums and feature films.

Brandon Trost

With a thriving career in cinematography, Brandon Trost is part of the new generation of filmmakers in Hollywood. His contributions to popular feature films like This Is The End, The Disaster Artist, Can You Ever Forgive Me?, and Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile have earned him acclaim in the entertainment industry.

Hannah Lux Davis

For more than a decade, Hannah Lux Davis has transformed artists’ music into visual masterpieces. Hannah is an award-winning music video director known for her work with chart-topping pop icons like Ariana Grande, Halsey, Demi Lovato, Nicki Minaj and Kacey Musgraves.

Jordan Wilby

Jordan's work appears in popular shows like Stranger Things, The Twilight Zone and The Vampire Diaries. His dedication to post-production sound landed him multiple Primetime Emmy nominations and two Primetime Emmy wins for his work on seasons 1 and 2 of Stranger Things.

Martin Pensa

Martin is the first alumni to receive an Oscar nomination for Best Achievement in Film Editing for his editing work on Dallas Buyers Club. That year, Dallas Buyers Club won three Oscars including Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Makeup and Hairstyling.