2010 INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION RESULTS

[Dave Watterson]

THE ERICS - Morecambe Bay International Video Competition - are already contacting people whose work has been short-listed for awards. The awards themselves will be announced at the festival screening on Saturday 10th April from noon in the attractive Duke's Theatre, Moor Lane, Lancaster. Competitors get two free tickets, everyone else pays just £3 for a great show of movies.

BIAFF - the IAC International Film & Video Competition - letters should be going out to competitors next week. We hope to have the full results on the main website by the end of next week. The screenings of winners and runners-up takes place at the Park Inn, Bedford 16-18th April. Places still available for residential or day visitors.


FESTIVAL OF NATIONS - nearly a thousand entries are currently being evaluated by the pre-selection teams in Austria. Those selected for possible festival screening - and thus deserving at least a diploma - should be announced by the end of May. Many of those selected will be screened at the festival in Ebensee, Austria over the week 13-19th June. (The festival chooses which of the "selected" films to show by giving absolute priority to films the pre-selectors think worthwhile for one reason or another and those whose maker is present ... which guarantees more interesting discussions and a chance for the festival audience to meet the authors. After that they fit in as many films as there is time for.) A jury considers and discusses each film screened and awards the final prizes.

- Dave

[Dave Watterson]

BIAFF Results should be on their way from tomorrow (Monday 29th March) so most people should know their results in the next few days.

The plan is to put all the results onto the website at the end of the week.

Feel free to share your happiness, chagrin etc in this forum.

-Dave

[Dave Watterson]

I gather that some entrants may not yet have received their BIAFF results. The full results will appear on the IAC main website some time on Saturday 3rd April ...

[stuart taylor]

It is such a shame about the delay in getting results.

I entered 7 films made by primary school children and have just got the comments and stars.

All the films bar one got 3 stars and the other got 2 stars. These are great results especially as four are being shown on 17th April ,

....but.... every school finished today and is now on Easter holiday until 19th April.... so no chance of involving the children and staff in any way....

Such a shame

Stuart

[Dave Watterson]

That IS a shame ... though if the youngsters had attended they might find some of the session tried their patience with a few long films and some heavyweight topics.

The fact is that organising the judging, coaxing judges into completing their critiques, assembling and checking the results (including chasing up judges who forgot to write a crit!), scheduling the festival timetable, preparing letters and emails for the entrants all takes time. Our Competition Manager has a full-time job so all the IAC work has to fit into his evenings and weekends. Let's not mention the computer crash !

The Erics - the Morecamble Bay International Festival - managed a very fast turn round in this, their opening year. Closing date 1st February and though they will not announce the main prizes until Saturday 10th April I believe some competitors have been told that they are in the running for awards.

The Guernsey Lily closes 31st May, has final judging in July and it will be August before people begin to hear results.

Neither of those events has to cope with anything like the number of entries IAC does.

Hey-ho, that does not help you. I am sorry.

To see how everyone else did with their films ... watch the main website this evening!

Dave

[Pqtrick]

There appears to be a hush! of silence on the forum in recently. Where is the wild excitement of anticipation of coming to BIAFF? The awaited envelopes have plopped through the letter boxes. No elation or dismay of the results?

Dave has been burning the midnight oil getting the results and now the the programme is up on the website.

Perhaps everyone is still stunned in wonder by seeing the 3D version of 'Alice in Wonderland'. Fitting in seeing yesterday, it was most impressionable. Distant muttering of 3D is a gimmick maybe heard and grumblings of 'it won't last' is heard.

Now we are presented with making the choice of which films to see at BIAFF on the Saturday. By its star rating, by film maker, by size of the room or even the title?

Life is not easy is it? We are off tomorrow - Bonne BIAFF!

[Michael Slowe]

Alright, here's a reaction. Not terribly surprised at a poor result personally a 4, but that's all I judged it and I've never been wrong in 40 years! I'm looking forward to seeing the best ones though. As for Alice in Wonderland 3D, I saw that and although the film is good the 3D is, in my opinion, awful. No, it won't last.

[Dave Watterson]

I reckon "you wus robbed, mate" ... I doubt if the majority of the judges were connoisseurs of "Making of" movies which are among the extras on almost every commercial and many amateur DVDs these days. As in any other genre, films of this type can be made in a variety of ways, some are pretty run-of-the-mill, others amazingly good and exciting.

Anyone heading for BIAFF should consider visiting the Abbey Room at 11.15 on Saturday to watch Michael's "Shooting on a Shoestring" among other interesting movies. There are scenes in Michael's piece which should have any film maker wincing and thinking "I've been there too!"

- Dave

[Dave Watterson]

Has anyone any news from "The Erics"? Their website has not yet been updated.

Their big show should have taken place yesterday (10th April) and I know some of you planned to attend.

Dave

[tom hardwick]

I'll see you all on the Saturday morning in Bedford. I trust we'll all be wearing our name badges, now won't we?

[Michael Slowe]

Tom, we'll certainly know you, the man carrying two cameras, spare mic, two tripods and still looking calm and collected!

[Dave Watterson]

At last someone has slipped me some news from "The Erics" - shame their website is not yet updated.

It seems the event ran like clockwork with very precise timing. All 24 short-listed films were shown.

Among notable winners was the South African film My Name is Crystal Meth, which some may recall from The Cotswold Festival when it was entitled "Tick".
The winner of the funniest film and Best Overall Video was Bob Lorrimer's The Drill and his film Rock Bottom came third in the amateur section.
Daphne Barbieri won Silver with A Year in Our Garden and also received a special Natural History Trophy donated by Lee Prescott.

A generous buffet was laid on. Ron Prosser passed on congratulations and good wishes to the festival from the IAC.

More news as I get it!

- Dave

[Dave Watterson]

We now have a report on the Morecambe Bay Festival winners at
http://www.theiac.org.uk/central/moreca ... sults.html
and their own website has the start of their report at
http://www.morecambebayinternationalvid ... nners.html

Hearty congratulations to Bob Lorrimer, who walked away with two of the wonderful trophies.

I now have accounts from several people, who all agree the event was beautifully organised and run, the buffet was great, the presenter warm and friendly ... the only hitch was a small audience. I can understand Oskar Siebert not coming over from Germany, or Pete Smith from Protea Video Club not journeying from South Africa ... but local clubs and film-makers were notable by their absence. Shame.

Let's hope the festival goes on to become a regular feature of movie life here, especially if it can be at a slightly different time of year.

-Dave

[Howard-Smith]

So, there we have it. Another excellent, highly enjoyable BIAFF has come and gone. Congratulations to all concerned, especially the organisers and film-makers.

Just two small niggles about the event. Firstly, I do regret that on the Friday evening the only event available is the AV Winners Show. I know I'm not the only person who has no particular interest in AV presentations and frankly find them somewhat tedious compared with the film shows. I still regret the passing of the one-minute film knockout competition which I would love to see resurrected. Failing that, I hope that some consideration is given to providing an alternative to the AV show on the Friday evening at BIAFF 2011, maybe a mini cinema showing one or two of the longer 'feature-length' films which only get a very small audience if shown on a Saturday.

The other niggle was the fact that the film 'My Point of View - A Diabetic Journey' was projected on Sunday morning in the wrong aspect ratio. Clearly it had been made in non-anamorphic widescreen but was projected anamorphically so that the picture was 'squashed' vertically. I can't understand why the projectionist didn't spot this early on and correct it.

Apart from these points, I loved the whole event, meeting old friends and making new ones, and being inspired by the top films and film-makers to make improvements in my own future films. I look forward very much to BIAFF 2011 in Harrogate.

Howard-Smith

[Dave Watterson]

NERIAC (North East Region of IAC) is hosting BIAFF 2011 8-10th April at Harrogate.
Scotland is hosting the IAC AGM weekend 20th-23rd October 2011 at Stirling.

It was good to see Howard and part of his team - all enjoying the festival this year. The lady who stars in Howard's recent production as a BNP candidate must have taken a lot of ribbing since Britain is in the midst of the build-up to an election. Ironically she is a politically active person ... but not for that party!

On Saturday, many of the movies I saw - in a range of different mini-cinemas - were shown in the wrong aspect ratio or zoomed in so that the edges of the image were missing. In the case of at least one winner that meant the loss of text which played an important part in his film.

The bright, clear images that were projected were great. The sound systems were often superb. But it does need projectionists to use their eyes - and to stop if they make a mistake. Aspect ratios were the bane of this otherwise successful festival. All the projection teams were given the films they had to show a week beforehand. Even if it is not obvious immediately it is usually easy to check as a film is played and if you experiment with different ratios (at home!)

This is the second year that the problem has been very, very obvious. Such mistakes upset the film makers, who feel too embarrassed to complain loudly - especially if they are getting a prize. It annoys audiences intensely. It makes IAC look incompetent in an area at which we should excel.

To repeat one of my mantras ... you cannot trust to any automatic system to get this right. If at all possible use a 16x9 screen, set the projector to fill the full height of that screen, then use only the 4X3 or 16X9 settings on the projector.

- Dave