Film Festivals To Enter If You Can Afford Them

[lulaassassina]

www.fest.pt (http://www.fest.pt)

Espinho's Video and Cinema Youth Festival.

[dobermunk]

Cool!

Here's a new festival in Thailand: http://www.bangkokfilm.org/
and the very interesting http://www.theanimationshow.com/ by Judger and Hertzfeldt.

[jmBoekestein]

The Rotterdam Film Festival is dedicated to more of the arthouse thing.

If you're brave enough you could send in your own cg film. Slowly and steadily cg is coming into an artform anyway. Here's the link (you ignoramous, forgetting a great arthouse filmfestival, pfah)

LINK (http://www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/en/index.html)

[scotttygett]

What was I thinking?! Thank you, Rotterdamites.

Yeah, who else have I forgotten...



www.hypefest.com (http://www.hypefest.com/)



Standard fee structure, but LA area, so a little more glitz, and they have a short screenwriting contest in 2005.




www.slamdance.com (http://www.slamdance.com/)This isn't going to be a screenwritnig thread, though slamdance has built up a pretty nice cachet over the years for both film and writing. I think it's in Aspen at about the same time as Sundance.www.tromadance.com (http://www.tromadance.com/)Here's how it works: the makers of "Surf Nazi's Must Die" ARE located near Sundance, same dates. How are your chances of having your film seen? Well, this one is definitely FREE to enter, so maybe only fair, and it's getting some buzz I'll betcha.

[maddogmike]

For a listing of festivals and conventions specific to the HORROR genre, visit the Horror Fests & Cons Database:

http://maddogmovies.com/almanac

[ilasolomon]

http://www.tehran-animafest.com

The forth festival will be held in Feb.

[scotttygett]

Directories of Festivals:

And from another thread: a directory of film festivals, with a search for animation

http://www.britfilms.com/festivals

If you perform a search for animation, 240 or so are listed, though many do not "feature" animation. It gave me a quick chance to see who was missing from this list though.

www.ifilm.com (http://www.ifilm.com) may have a festival directory buried somewhere at the site, but I don't have the URL for it.

http://news.awn.com/index.php?ltype=cat&category1=Call%for%Entries is the "Call for Entries" page at Animation World, the website of the publishers of Animation Magazine. When I checked this page, it had 611 listings from multiple years, including some unexpected entries like a VFX talent search by Ridley Scott in 2003.

www.withoutabox.com (http://www.withoutabox.com) produced a list of 25 animated film festivals using the search terms "animation" and "animated" which is obviously a glitch.

There must be other directories -- I'll edit this post soon hopefully...

[scotttygett]

As we all know, this is the Cinematography thread of CG FIlmmaking, so it shouldn't veer too far into the writing part of the vortex, but we've already looked at slamdance, so I guess we're stuck.

http://www.filmmakers.com/contests/index.htm is probably the mother of all screenwriting contest pages, though I've seen some other good ones.

www.withoutabox.com (http://www.withoutabox.com/) has just started having a writing section to cover all the various pre-production festivals like www.projectgreenlight.com (http://www.projectgreenlight.com/) www.slamdance.com (http://www.slamdance.com/) and others, some of which are at an old thread of mine that I clean plunk forgot about. The BEST thing about the withoutabox.com list is that if you open the list of all script contests, it's very shoert, so you can get a good look at the "Call for Scripts" requester box.

http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?p=1930055 which is ostensibly about finding buyers of short films but meanders into that territory.

http://www.fadeinonline.com (http://www.fadeinonline.com/) a $325 "Fade in Online" PITCHFEST deadline is fast approaching, as they seem to sell-out every year.I've heard about it, though I've never been, from a visitor to another big pitching event --

www.scriptwritersnetwork.com (http://www.scriptwritersnetwork.com/) . Scriptwriters' Network is not affordable as a contest, or at least didn't used to be, but thy have some excelent events, whether or no they get you closer to the execution of your project as either script or finished film. The visitor said she liked this event and "Eva Peel," and said that since there is a pre-screening process, you more or less know who you're going to pitch to ahead of time and so you just give your log line and take the names of those who want you to mail a script afterward. There's even a little fitting extra folks in since once you've got your "yes," or "not our thing," it's time to move on. I'm not going to comment on the $325. No, I can't afford it, but it's because I am in a fairly unique circumstance in an area pricier to live in than the Riviera.

www.hollywoodlitsales.com (http://www.hollywoodlitsales.com) is a fairly unique site. though there are others like it to be found.

www.surfview.com (http://www.surfview.com/) I've listed already, is a list of companies willing to look at cover letters for projects. I figure if a $25 check will smooth things out, why not; though these contest events don't seem to actually give the money to the producers, who in some cases must pay to attend.





And in other big news, the delay of the Animation Magazine Pitch Directory:Due the positive response for the forthcoming “Pitch Guide,” we are extending the deadline for companies to submit information to Feb. 23, 2005. The guide will be a list of various studios from around the world that engage in development and how artists can get in touch with them to pitch their projects.The goal of the article is to help producers and artists get in contact with each other easier. It will also include lists of places where artists will be able to gain representation, help with their pitches and any other general help with their projects.
We thank you ahead of time for your participation and hope that this guide will help lead the next great project to you
As you may know, Animation Magazine had a sort of pitching issue where six posters were fit on each page of an issue of Animation Magazine, something like 20 pages of posters. I knew a couple of artists in the magazine, and fitting everything into one panel was dicey.




www.wga.org (http://www.wga.org/) has a listing of all of the agents out there who are willing to look over unsigned work. Precious few actually. From what I have been told, one can poke around, and sooner or later, find a producer who will look at one's script for nothing, and then ask them to pass it along to an agent. Getting to the agent, from where I stand now, is not as important as getting completely solid with what you've been writing. Having confidence in yourself and what you've done, which is abstractly kind of hard -- this isn't rocket science -- is more important; I learned that I knew a literary agent personally.

http://www.businessfilm.com/businessfilmelan.html is looking for a way to buy a script for $1,000 instead of the $35,000 WGA minimum; to get plumber's wages, you're going to have to be typing about ten minutes a page, after you figure out the plot, or about 20 per page sort of faking it as you go along... Some very close deadlines though, like February 2005. Best of all though, the entry is FREE FREE FREE,...

I would go with the first link, which inlcudes a bunch of the above, plus other classics like scriptalooza, though most have obscene deadlines.

[jmBoekestein]

Well I've spotted a cg film at Rotterdam! And an oriental sci-fi which illegedely(how do you spell that?) had a lot of animation. There's animo for it, remember for next year please, I think entries open pretty early but the standard is pretty high too. It will have to compete with other filmmakers so a funny cartoon might not cut it straight away.

Good luck, hope to see your work next year!:)

[scotttygett]

http://www.cartoon-media.be/

Deadlines in December and February this past year, so a little tricky to keep track of. This is the CARTOON festival where European folks send their trailers to get money to make them into features. AWN.com has had a number of articles about them.

[FloydBishop]

How about making this thread a sticky? I'm sure everyone could benifit from an updated list of festivals and their contact info.

[scotttygett]

So, withoutabox.com just sent me a note about another festival the Canadian Film Centre's Worldwide Shorts Frestival:

http://www.worldwideshortfilmfest.com/

If this list ever gets properly edited, it'll have to rank this one high for affordability, at $15.

Deadline is February 28, so, wait a minute! NOOOOOOOOOO!

[kennez]

For animated films, you forgot Animex, the UK's biggest animation event, held every year at the University of Teesside.

I think it is only available for students to enter, but I could be wrong here.

http://www.animex.net

If you are an animator, you also get a chance to speak to the pros, from the likes of Pixar, ILM, etc.

I cannot believe that I have been going to that University for 3 years as a student, and I haven't been to Animex yet!

[scotttygett]

I should definitely have a link here to the thread on selling short films that is from the Collaborative Projects forum that preceded CG Filmmaking.

http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?t=83779

The two have more than a few overlaps I hear.

And then there are areas where you never know, however unlikely a lead may be; like

http://www.imdb.com/Sections/Distributors/types_all

[igorsandman]

Anima, Festival du dessin animé et du film d'animation
(Anima, cartoon and animation festival)
February/March
Brussels Belgium

Folioscope
Philippe Moins
Françoise Catala
52, avenue de Stalingrad
1000 Bruxelles
Phone : 32.2.534.41.25
Fax: 32.2.534.22.79
e-mail: info@folioscope.be (info@folioscope.be)
Website : http://www.folioscope.be (http://www.folioscope.be/)

Cheers.
-IS-

[maddogmike]

I've updated the format of The Horror Fests & Cons Database, making it easier to search and update.

There's no other source like it for horror filmmakers and fans!

Check it out via this direct link:
http://maddogmovies.com/blog/horror.php

[maddogmike]

More updates to the database! I've added the Google Maps function to each page. (Check to see how far you have to drive for the next event!)

I've added info on the following events:

Eyescream Short Film Festival - Australia's only (?) horror fest
Carnivale of Horror 2006
MiskatoniCON - Sweden's Lovecraft Festival
Haunted Newport
Horror Host Palooza!

Visit http://maddogmovies.com/blog/horror.php

[scotttygett]

Thanks maddog.

The Writer's Digest people have just come out with a special movie guide called SCRIPTWRITING BASICS (www.writersdigest.com (http://www.writersdigest.com)) including a list of 22 Film Festivals. I cannot reproduce their list, but it's a nice idea.


CANNES -- biggest

SUNDANCE -- if nothing else, they buy for their channel



Of the 20 other film festivals listed by Writer's Digest, six are already on the list but I didn't appreciate them hardly enough apparently, and 14 I never heard of, so I have to apologize for not really having this festival thing down, sorry.

Festivals that were oddly not in the list: AFM, MIFED, ...

One other thing I can share about this SCRIPTWRITING BASICS special issue was some excerpting from the "Writers Guide" they publish of agents and producers. Man, there must be a lot of names listed in there. It's probably worth buying a copy and foregoing scribbling them all down in the public library.

[maddogmike]

Well, if you're looking for books about festivals, Chris Gore's Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1580650570/maddogmovies-20/103-9144532-3249435?creative=327641&camp=14573&link_code=as1) is the best resource out there.

Yes, the top prestigious fests are Cannes and Sundance. Also Toronto, Telluride, South by Southwest, and Venice. You've really got to have a fantastic product to get into any of those. It helps to know people, too.

AFM and MIFED probably weren't mentioned in your book because they are technically film markets, not festivals. There's some info about them in Gore's book anyway -- these events are more for buying and selling films, which is important to know how to do.

If you're just looking for a good time, here's Film Threat's 10 Fantastic Film Festival Vacations (http://www.filmthreat.com/GoreyDetails.asp?Id=233)

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