About
Welcome to the 13th annual Charlotte Black Film Festival.
We proudly remain one of the Southeast’s largest gatherings of multicultural content producers, thought provokes, and creative innovators. The Charlotte Black Film Festival is an annual event that empowers Black artists and showcases a wide range of entertainment content made by and about people of African descent. The festival brings together Black culture enthusiasts, executives and content creators from around the world for three days of screenings, workshops, fashion, comedy shows, exclusive parties and Industry networking. Come join us on the Boardwalk @ University Hilton hotel June 13 -16 in person and virtually streaming on the IOCTV.net platform.
Tommy Nichols who many call the newest Media Mogul of the south continuing to create and introduce media based assets into the marketplace.
Tommy Nichols is the CEO of Power Up USA, a technology, training and events company that’s closing the digital divided in underserve communities. Under the Power Up umbrella is the Charlotte Black Film Festival, IOC TV, a 24-hour streaming network created to support African American content creators which was selected as the best streaming/virtual event in Charlotte by Queen City Nerve. In addition, Tommy founded the Carolina Black Film Collective, a bi-monthly meetup that trains and equips African Americans in film and technology.
In 2020, he was hired by the National Endowment for the Arts to review and recommend $4 million in grants to media arts organizations across the US. In 2018, the mayor of Charlotte appointed him to the Charlotte Mecklenburg Public Access Corporation (TV 21) board of directors and has been board chair for the past three years. Tommy has been a film screening partner with Sony, Lions gate, Marvel and Fox studios. Under his Tommy Filmworks brand he was the Media director for the winning campaigns of Charlotte City Council women Dimpa Amera, Mecklenburg County Sheriff Gary McFadden and Mecklenburg County Judge C. Renee Little.
With over twenty years of experience Nichols has provided technology and film production training to over 3,000 youth and adults and part of a $10 million computer and network integration for Dayton Public Schools, as well as the procurement of a $1.2 million dollar technology upgrade project for the Department of Defense.
He is a man of faith and prayer and uses both to solve daily challenges . In addition he is the recipient of the Business Journal’s 40 under 40, The YMCA Black Achievers award, The Lifesaver award from Kennedy Charter school, The 2019 Charlotte Black History Maker from WCCB TV, and was nominated for the Mayor’s Educator Mentor of the year award. In addition to his many awards, Nichols has been featured on ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS, Charlotte Observer, Charlotte Post, National Publication Digital Journal and most recently the cover of Pride Magazine Charlotte. His experience and reputation in technology, media, and business have made him a sought after consultant, speaker and workshop presenter.