Entering competitions..

[Roger Fowles]

Hi all,

Both SERIAC and BIAFF are accepting entries at the moment.

I was wondering if you had any views on the upside/downside of entering the same film(s) into both competitions? ( apart from the possible double-whammy of failing to impress judges twice in quick succession!)

Thanks

[Howard-Smith]

Roger,
It’s definitely a good idea to send films to multiple festivals. Frequently you’ll find that while a film is poorly received at one festival it will be acclaimed at another.
My film Conrad won a Diamond award at BIAFF 2021 yet it was the only one of 6 films that I sent to the Birmingham Film Festival last year that wasn’t selected.
In 2014 my film ‘Deleted’ (aka ‘Dawn’) was awarded 3 stars at BIAFF yet it swept the board at the CEMRIAC Spring Movie Festival the following year: Best Film, Best Editing, Best Sound. In the same CEMRIAC festival I won second place for ‘Too Bad’, another 3 star film at BIAFF.
Last year my selfie film Why Remember? got 3 stars at BIAFF but when it was shown as part of a Zoom presentation a certain well-known FACI(M) said that this film rather than Conrad should have won me the Diamond. The same film was nominated for Best Editing in the Birmingham FF.
Judging can never be an exact science and judgements and opinions are bound to vary. It’s the luck of the draw which judge(s) your films are seen by.

[Dave Watterson]

A Slovenian friend, Franc Kopič, has been putting his films into as many festivals as he can around the world. (I am guessing they are festivals with free entry) and has scores of awards, certificates and so on. A Polish amateur - I think the name was Henryk Lehnert - claimed to have more awards than any other film maker. That was in the days before video and electronic entries!

[Albert Noble]

A far as I am concerned it's not getting an award or trophy that is important
but bums on seats......an audience.
I've had my fair share of silverware but I've always said,
"I prefer an audience to a bit of silver as an audience cleans itself,
trophies don't."

[Roger Fowles]

Thank you all for your replies.

I'll give both competitions a go!

I have to say that one of the reasons I think the BIAFF competition stands out from all the rest is the written feedback. At least it shows the films have actually been watched all the way through! I'm not sure any of the other competitions offer this?

[Howard-Smith]

Most film competitions and festivals on Film Freeway are not free to enter, and entry fees can be pretty expensive especially when approaching the final deadline. I’ve just entered a new film Distraction into NINE festivals and the only one that was free to enter was BIAFF. The entry fees for the other eight festivals added up to around £140… very kindly funded by the main actress’s father!

[Michael Slowe]

You are quite right about the expense of entering (most) Festivals, but we have to remember that this is mainly to re coup the considerable costs of running the event. I imagine that professional judges would be rewarded in some way and there may well be paid staff to deal with the admin.

I don't see the point of entering films into festivals and competitions if one is not able to attend a screening of the film. That's why we make them, not to fill drawers and shelves with trophies. My edit room, apart from the required kit, is full of these, satisfying they may be to me but a darn nuisance to those clearing up when I go, possibly fairly soon! Albert Noble and I are on the same page with this I rather fancy. I make a point now to festivals trying to attract an entry that I need to be able to attend. I have had considerable recent success with two of my productions and this seems to have alerted festival organisers who have written to me from as far away as Tokyo! I carefully explain my criteria now to these people. Howard, where did you find on FilmFreeway, nine festivals that you could attend? Maybe on line, but that doesn't really satisfy as far as screenings are concerned. As far as the 'amateur' scene is concerned, there only seems to be BIAFF, unless someone could enlighten me. My IAC region (NT) is folding after their final event next month. UNICA does not accept individual entries (do they Dave?) and even the wonderful Malta festival is no more.

This is a very interesting and valid topic, I hope the thread continues to make enjoyable reading.

[Dave Watterson]

Hi Michael,
No, UNICA does not accept individual entries - it's competition is for national organisations, thus IAC chooses the films sent from UK.

So far as I am aware Malta's GOLDEN KNIGHT is still going.
Closing : 30 September, 25 October 2022
Festival: 27 November 2022

website: https://www.facebook.com/GKMALTA

check: https://filmfreeway.com/GoldenKnightMal ... lmFestival

It is "One of the longest running film festivals of its kind worldwide. It is a short film festival open to non-professional productions, film school students as well as commercial productions. It is held annually during the last week of November."

Dave

[Howard-Smith]

Michael,
I rather enjoy receiving and displaying trophies!
I certainly agree with you about live screenings of films to audiences being GREATLY preferable to online showings. I couldn't agree more. Someone this year tried to persuade me that having one of my films shown online on the Tuesday evening during BIAFF week was just as good as having a film included during the live BIAFF weekend, which I absolutely disagree with.
The main festivals I've entered which I can definitely attend in person are:
Wolverhampton Film Festival
Birmingham Film Festival
BIAFF (obviously)
The Stafford Fiim Festival (which I haven't entered before)
Some of the festivals I've entered are too far away for me (eg. Romford and Glasgow).
Some are just online including two based in London.
Anyway, I'm very much indebted to Jason, father of actress Madison Swallow, for paying all the entry fees totalling around £150! In my earlier calculation I forgot about the £10 entry fee for the Wolverhampton Film Festival.

[Roger Fowles]

Well I've successfully negotiated the "Film Freeway" site and submitted a film for the BIAFF competition...but just in case this helps anyone there is more than one BIAFF festival on there, so when searching I put in the whole title ( British International Amateur Film Festival) and found it that way...

[Dave Watterson]

Glad you chose us and not Batumi IAFF !!

The shortage of distinct acronyms. It happens to "UNICA" as well ... there are many organisations called that.

Even "IAC" has possible confusion with organisations for adoption, aeronautics, film agents and more.

[Albert Noble]

The best way to get a huge and free audience is to somehow get your film on You Tube and it go
viral (what a horrible word).
Most viral items seem to be trivial rubbish to me so one can only hope
that the World will recognize your quality, if and when they see it.

But how to go viral? "Ay, that's the rub."
Maybe make a film entitled, 'Viral'

[Roger Fowles]

Gaining YouTube views is a bit of a dark art..The best I've done is around 900 views ( and all of 18 "likes") for a short animation - and that's mainly because it's to do with the James Bond theme.

The film managed a meagre 2 stars in this year's BIAFF so you're probably right about the reverse correlation between quality and views!

[Howard-Smith]

One of my new films ‘Distraction’ was uploaded to my Vimeo page exactly 3 weeks ago and incredibly it’s already had 1829 views. This is a far higher viewing figure than for many of my films that were uploaded years ago. I have no idea how this has come about!

[Michael Slowe]

How much did you pay them Howard?

No, I'm joking, that is amazing. I've got stuff on You Tube, Vimeo and my own web site and never have figures approaching those. Even my 'Tits & More' didn't attract the hopeful ones!