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Need Your UK Festival advice

3 weeks, 1 day ago - Lynwood Shiva Sawyer

O Great Benevolent and Omniscient SP Hive,
I'm joining you all in the sorrow and mourning, but before they turn off the lights:
Students at the University have lensed a brilliant version of my verrrrrry dark comedy short, The Country Gentlewoman (A Jane Austen / Nigella Lawson Cooking show / Saw [yes, that Saw!]) mash-up.
They are about to embark on the festival trail. Which of the following would you consider the most prestigious?
Aesthetica Film Festival / Beeston Film Festival / Bolton Film Festival / Crystal Palace International Film Festival / Cambridge International Film Festival / Cornwall International Film Festival / Kino Film Festival / Manchester Film Festival / Norwich Film Festival / Oxford International Film Festival / Ramsgate International Film Festival / Short Com International Comedy Film and Animation Festival / Watersprite Student Film Festival
Many, many thanks.

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3 weeks ago - Tina Walker

To be honest, all these festivals are great. I'm a big believer in the main thing being get as wide an audience for your work, rather than what's necessarily considered by others to be prestigious. Festivals that are also really well organised are a plus and Bolton Intnal Film Festival and Exit 6 from personal experience are formidable. Good luck with it!

2 weeks, 6 days ago - Lynwood Shiva Sawyer

Hi, Tina,
Thanks for your response. "Prestigious" is a bad choice of words, I should have said, "Most appropriate for the TCG logline."
Mainly because everybody's watching their pennies these days, and there's no way to enter all the festivals out there.
That said, I will submit to the ones you recommend.

2 weeks, 2 days ago - Ray Brady

Hi Lynwood,
Join Filmfreeway which personally I would recommend or similar (there are several alternatives), upload your short film poster cast and crew information stills, posters etc. Once done you will not need to send them to any of the festivals listed on there since the festivals can download them from there directly. Now check out all the festivals that interst you and importantly when they are happening, form a scedule of which festivals you want to submit and when their deadlines are, early bird submissions are much cheaper. Note which festivals require a world premier, part of the world premier, country premier, and also note the festivals that do not demand any premier status. Some festivals like Sundance would take you a whole day to fill out their submission questionaire, kind of ironic since you have the smallest chance of getting into the festival. Back to Filmfreeway more anon

2 weeks, 2 days ago - Ray Brady

Sorry my laptop battery died. ON Filmfreeway when you selected most of the festivals that you would like to submit to, pay for a month of Gold Monthly Membership, submit to all the festivals at a reduced Gold members fee, at the end of the month cancel your gold membership approx £11.99 a month, and revert back to your free membership. In your settings you can do a search for free festivals festival and bookmark your search, if you then check in regularily you can see what film festival are accepting free submissions and you can enter into them if they seem worth while. Also, once a free member, you will be emailed discounted or free "offers" to submit your film too. If you're quick you can take advantage of these free offers though they often limit them to the first twenty five or so submissions. Some film festivals are clearly more prestigous than others, but when I teach screen acting students I would often enter their films into dozens of free festivlas, the logic being. If when they graduated and were out in the real world and auditioning for roles, maybe having several awards as being in the best film or even best actor/actress might make the difference between getting called in for a casting over other actors that didn't have any award winning mentions. Some shorts did surprisingly well a couple winning more than thirty festivals awards, one over fifty. All minor film festivals but still they looked a little impressive on their C.V.'s. So in all, it's well worth the time and effort to submit to lots of festivals, making an effort to promote your students work and get their work seen on screens all over the planet. Bon chance

2 weeks ago - Lynwood Shiva Sawyer

Thank you, Ray,
This is all fabulous advice of which all aspiring filmmakers should be aware.
Et merci pour le bon chance!

1 week, 3 days ago - Ray Brady

Many thanks Lynwood. It's such a shame that this forum will be lost after shooting people shuts down next month. Hopefully SP will keep their webite live for sometime, even if no new additions are added it would still be an invaluable resource for new film makers to use for research and reference, so many times the same questions are asked, it would be great for members to still be able to access and search through past postings once Shooting People is gone.

1 week, 3 days ago - Lynwood Shiva Sawyer

Amen! Amen! Amen!

1 week, 2 days ago - cath le couteur

Yes we will Ray - totally agree it will be helpful for us to do this.
It'll just be a slimmed down read only version (ie no posting/bulletins etc) and it will also include the funding databases, resources, top Shooter films from New Shoots that can be watched etc.
Chrs
Cath
SP