About Atlantic Creative

Russ started his career in the music industry booking and managing bands in the 80’s. He and his brother decided to go the next step and founded Osceola Recording Studios in Raleigh. Osceola hosted a number of regional and national acts including Blues Traveler and Debra Gibson. The music industry is very exciting but volatile and meanwhile in the business world poor quality audio persisted. Therefore, Russ saw an opportunity to bring top quality audio to the business world in products ranging from telephone on-hold messages to radio commercials. Atlantic Creative Communications, Inc. was born and within a couple years we were working with Sprint, Revlon and John Deere. Since then we have grown to include a wide variety of audio and video services. He is the visionary behind our company who also enjoys sales and building long-term relationships. Russ is a musician and offshore fisherman when he’s allowed out of the office.

Kathy is a professional MBA with a background in business, nonprofit and environmental fields. She has worked for Atlantic Creative since its inception –in Osceola Studios on Boylan Avenue. Kathy oversees Finance, Operations, Marketing and Customer Service. Lately, she has been learning about SEO and how social media is impacting online marketing. In her spare time, she has served as Treasurer for OHMA and is the Volunteer Manager for Special Olympics Summer Games. Kathy also enjoys volunteering with Interfaith Food Shuttle, Eno River Association and other causes when possible.

Ammon is a Professional Video Producer with almost 10 years of experience creating HD videos and graphics for businesses and nonprofits throughout the country.  Since joining Atlantic Creative, Ammon has produced two award-winning documentary style videos for the American Heart Association, as well as many other videos and graphics programs for Digital Signage installations. In his spare time, Ammon spends a lot of time with his family and his band.  He is also puts in about 10 hours per week volunteering at his church.  Since he is the 5th sibling in a family with 10 kids, he is an incurable attention hog.  Maybe that's why he is so driven to make great videos!

Laura Faughtenberry started her career as a Reporter and Producer for WECT news in Wilmington, NC after graduating from the University of Georgia in 2007 wiht a B.A. in Broadcast News and Minors in Speech Communications and Spanish. While at the University of Georgia, Laura was President of DiGamma Kappa Broadcast Society and worked production for the prestigious Peabody Awards.  She also interned at CNN for World Report and at CBS 46 News where she worked closely with the Consumer Investigative Reporter. While at CNN she was a judge for the World Report Awards.  Laura is excited to now be working in the field of commercial video production. 

Eric has been DJ’ing and producing music since the early 90’s. After Chowan College he pursued an audio recording curriculum at Full Sail University in Orlando Florida. As a club DJ he has worked at clubs and event venues all across the United States. He continues to write and produce his own music, some of which has been used for Atlantic Creative clients. He is not available for weddings and bar mitzvahs.

Bryan is somewhat of an enigma. He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (where he studied Media Production), graduating in 2009. Also, each of his 5 siblings (all older) attended UNC. However, Bryan is a die-hard Duke basketball fan. Most people call it crazy; Bryan calls it loyalty to the team he has loved since he was 4 years old.

Bryan has been interested in media production since high school, but it really became a passion for him in college. After graduation,Bryan started an internship with Atlantic Creative before being asked to join the team full-time. Bryan also enjoys making music with his band, Supreme Fiction.

Derek DeStefano was born in Long Island, New York. At a young age Derek loved to watch movies. He would watch his favorite movies as many times as he could, sometimes only playing a certain scene that caught his eye. As he got older he took an interest in his parents video camera and started to shoot anything and everything he could. He had an interest in cars and motorcycles, so Derek and his father would go to motocross races and Derek would always be filming the event.

Later in his life Derek's parents got a Macintosh computer and he was introduced to the wonderful world of editing. Derek taught himself basic editing through using imovie. He enjoyed it so much that he was always on the computer trying to edit whatever he could. He pursued his dream of editing and attended The Living Arts college in Wakefield, NC and graduated with a degree in Digital Filmmaking. Now Derek loves what he does, because to him it's not work when you are having fun everyday.

Donna is a 20-year veteran of the broadcasting industry and longtime Triangle resident. She has been lending her voice to many companies throughout North Carolina and beyond for well over a decade. You have probably heard her on the radio, TV or even On-Hold at your favorite doctor’s office or restaurant. Donna recently took on additional responsibilities in our customer care department and has been reaching out to our customers in the company’s effort to provide proactive service.

Serge was born in Mexico City and moved to Charlotte, NC when he was 8. Serge attended graduatied from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in 2010. Originally, he decided to forget all about a creative career and took all business classes during his freshman year. He wanted to get into marketing. The camera changed all that.

During Junior year Serge switched to a Communications major.  It started clicked in his mind how similar photo and video are. Many of the things he loves about making pictures are present in video. Finally, he arrived at Atlantic Creative the summer after graduation.  "I love what I do and it's a weirdly satisfying feeling to know that everything I've done and learned before landing this job has been useful to me here. Video is a new frontier for me and I'm just going to see where it takes me. All I know is that I'm happiest with a camera in my hands."