Loni Peristere

Loni Peristere was born in Newton-Wellesley hospital on April 25, 1971. He grew up in the small town of Natick where he began his passionate pursuit of filmmaking at age ten. Loni and his best friend, screenwriter Paul Salamoff, began making movies in place of written homework in junior high. In high school they made their first feature film, ?War Remembered, Friends Forgotten,? a fictionalized portrait of Vietnam. Loni?s passion for the art continued through college where he graduated magna-cum laude in Renaissance Literature and Poetry and won the prestigious ?Paul Tucker? prize for his short film ?Twilight? upon graduation from The University of Massachusetts Boston.



During college Loni began to plant his roots in Los Angeles by becoming involved with The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror films. He directed the ?Saturn? awards in 1990 and 1992.



The success of ?Twilight? and subsequent development on a feature brought Loni and his young family to Los Angeles permanently in 1996. He began his career professionally at Digital Magic where he had done post production on ?Twilight.? Under the mentorship of Visual Effects Supervisor Ralph Maiers and uber-writer Joss Whedon he became more and more involved with visual effects, eventually becoming the Visual Effects Supervisor on ?Buffy the Vampire Slayer?. Loni went on to work with Joss for nine years.



He co-founded Zoic Studios in 2002 with partners Chris Jones, Tim McBride, Andrew Orloff, and Steve Schofield. He is an acting creative director for the commercial, episodic, and feature film divisions. Loni won the Emmy in 2003 for Special Visual Effects in a Television Series for ?Firefly?. He was a multiple nominee, with a second nod for ?Buffy the Vampire Slayer.? He also won the VES award in 2002 and 2003 for ?Outstanding Special Effects in a Television Series?.



In 2004 Loni began directing television commercials and early 2005 won a Clio, a London International award, and a Gold Pencil for his work on Mini-Cooper?s ROBOT campaign. Later that year Loni went back to work for Joss Whedon as his Visual Effects Supervisor and Second unit director on the feature film, Serenity.



In 2006 Loni supervised and directed second unit for the Twentieth Century Fox?s pilots ?Beyond? and ?Drive? (premiering April 2007). He recently sold an original drama to Imagine Entertainment titled ?Arbor Gate? which is in development for 2008.



Recently Loni was elected to the VES Board of Directors. He is the youngest board member at 35. Loni is also the Chairman of the Board for ?The Blank Theater Company,? the leading independent theater company in Los Angeles.