Dr Nicholas Hellmuth
Founder
He has an undergraduate degree, Harvard; Master’s degree Brown University; then three different post-graduate research positions at Yale University.
PhD is from the University of Graz (Karl-Franzens Universitaet). Previously he was a research professor in digital photography at Rollins College (Florida) and then at Brevard Community College (Florida).
He was Visiting Research Professor (digital imaging and digital printing) simultaneously at BGSU (in Ohio) and Universidad Francisco Marroquin (Guatemala) circa 2000-2005. He now works full time on flora and fauna of Mayan areas of Mesoamerica and also works with the FLAAR Reports team on wide-format inkjet digital printing trends, T-shirt printers, and inkjet printing workflow equipment.
Administrative & Coordinator
Flor Setina
Administrative Manager
With over 16 years of working with us, she is responsible for all the administrative operations here in FLAAR Mesoamerica. Her work is essential to different areas of the organization: supervising daily support operations of our company, planning the most efficient administrative procedures, monitoring costs and expenses to assist in budget preparation.
Vivian Díaz
General Coordinator and Illustrator
Vivi is an environmental engineer, who is actually doing project management for FLAAR’s divisions: Flora & Fauna and MayanToons. She is also the chief storyboard director of the department of cartoon illustrators. She loves to share her knowledge of nature and also to raise awareness through her drawings about how to take care, preserve and appreciate nature as she does.
Flora & fauna Department
Alejandra Gutierrez
Photographer
Graphic designer and photographer of FLAAR Mesoamerica, she makes expeditions alongside with Dr. Nicholas Hellmuth to incredible places to shoot big format photographs of native flora and fauna. Based on her experience, she also helps with publicity and marketing.
Andrea Sánchez
Graphic Designer
Andrea is a graphic designer and creative director of the photo essays of Yaxha project for Yaxha-Nakum-Naranjo National Park, Petén, Guatemala. She is in charge of design the PDFs in a way to make the reader feel identified with the Essay. What she likes the most is to be able to harmonize each PDF with photographs captured in each field trip and make sure there is a graphic unit and breathing spaces in the PDF.
Daniel Galvez
Graphic Designer
Daniel is a communication sciences student, who is collaborator in the photographic essays of the Yaxha Project – for the Yaxha-Nakum-Naranjo National Park, in Petén, Guatemala. He design PDF files, our Photo essays, in such a way, so that the reader can appreciate its content and feel identified with the essay. His dream is to become a multimedia producer.
David Arrivillaga
Photographer & Graphic Designer
Photographer and graphic designer, David is passionate about capturing images of nature and complements the expedition team. He takes incredible pictures and video of flora and fauna and assists Dr Nicholas Hellmuth in all the expeditions. He also edits the material for print and digital media.
Victor Mendoza
Flora & Fauna Researcher
Environmental Engineer student, aquatic ecosystem enthusiast and lover of Guatemalan native biological diversity. He is in charge of the photographic database of FLAAR Mesoamerica. Not only does it organize it, but it also identifies the flora and fauna of the photographs we have. Because of his knowledge, he also serves as a research assistant.
Vivian Hurtado
Flora & Fauna Researcher
Environmental engineer student, artist and nature lover. Vivian Hurtado is part of the research team of flora and fauna, she collects information along with bibliographies of many to create documents with scientific and educational information which are posted on our pages. She hopes to promote research and educational content in Guatemala about native flora and fauna and its conservation for students, professors, children and everyone that could be interested.
Senaida Ba
Senaida Ba is a bilingual Q'eqchi' Mayan student. Her interests include photography. She is very adept at plant research, especially capable of finding rare plants deep in the rain forests. She has also done studies of inkjet printing technology in Germany, Italy, and Turkey. She will be a capable university student and we are looking for scholarship opportunities for her.
Ximena Arriaga
Digital Library Manager
Ximena is in charge of scanning and digitizing all content from previews investigations about the Mayan culture by Dr. Nicholas Hellmuth so that it can be available on all FLAAR’s websites.
MayanToons Department
Génesis Girón
3D Animator & Illustrator
Génesis Girón is a proud member of the Mayan Toons Animation Department, she loves expressing herself through her unique creations. In addition to animation, Génesis enjoys illustration and character design. Powered by fashion, fandoms and cinema.
Mariana Cabrera
3D Animator & Illustrator
A creative mind that wants to use her skills to promote environmental education. In Mayantoons she has worked in illustration, character design and, at the moment, in 2D animation. She believes that, with dinamic and interactive material, we can ignite the interest of people of all ages in Guatemala and its diverse nature.
Josefina Sequen
Illustrator
Josefina is a digital illustrator who enjoys drawing realistic and cartoon animals like crocodiles and felines. She also assists with photography inside FLAAR and during field trips. She is a senior student on weekends and works in the office during the week.
Rosa Sequen
Illustrator
Rosa is an intern learning about digital illustration and children books. Her strenght when it comes to drawings are butterflies and other Mesoamerican amphibious. She loves the idea that her drawings could reach children in order to teach them about animal welfare and conservation.
Valeria Avilés
Illustrator & Graphic Designer
An artist and illustrator, who stands out for the ease with which she works realism in analogous techniques. However, her work in children’s illustration is not far behind, always looking for her drawings and illustrations to be able to speak for themselves.
Desirée Cordón
Illustrator & Communicator
Desirée has a degree in communication and works as a digital illustrator specializing in editorial and children’s illustration. She likes to be able to provide information to children about fauna and flora so that together we can take care of our environment better. She works as a freelance illustrator and is also part of the MayanToons team of illustrators.
Web & Marketing Department
Juan Carlos Hernández
Web Designer
He is a graphic design student with knowledge of website design and programing, he assists the webmaster with the maintenance and administrations of the FLAAR website network: adding texts and photos, managing content, etc.
Paulo Nuñéz
Webmaster
Paulo Nuñéz is in charge of webmaster responsibilities for the entire FLAAR network of websites. He does updating and reviewing the more than one thousand pages of our diverse sites with new information and photos obtained from the site visit cases, lectures, trade shows, etc. He also assists the various teams about high-tech photography and lots of helpful tips about advanced digital technology. Paulo has directed digital panorama photography on the cooperative project between FLAAR Mesoamerica and the two managing entities (IDAEH, CONAP) of Parque Nacional Yaxha Nakum Naranjo (Peten, Guatemala).
María José García
Web Designer
María José is an industrial designer with experience in web design and community management. She is actually in charge of uploading content to all FLAAR Mesoamerica websites and keep them updated.
Roxana Leal
Community Manager
Roxana is a communication sciences student who is in charge of all FLAAR Mesoamerica's social networks and interacts with people by replying post comments and emails, at the same time she creates alliances with other companies. Roxana loves to learn new things and investigate, her dream is to become a journalist.
Former Employees Department
Elena Siekavizza
Flora & Fauna Researcher
Environmental engineer, forests enthusiast and lover of the guatemalan native flora. She is in charge of FLAAR Mesoamerica’s photographic database. Not only does she organize it, but also performs the flora and fauna identification of the photographs we have. Due to her knowledge, she also serves as a research assistant.
Marcela Sarti
Flora & Fauna Researcher
An environmental engineer student, Marcella Sarti is part of the research team of flora and fauna, she collects information along with bibliographies of many books to create documents with scientific and educational information which are posted on our pages. In addition, she has contributed to write storyboards for Mayantoons. Through her research, she hopes to contribute to education in Guatemala about native flora and fauna and its conservation.