Press Release for Tsuki
DigiSPAA, Australia and New Zealand’s platform for the celebration and acknowledgment of independent digital filmmaking, has announced the launch of its seventh annual competition. Entries for the 2011 DigiSPAA digital feature film competition open today, Tuesday 8th March and filmmakers from Australia and New Zealand are invited to enter. As well as offering one of the most lucrative film prizes in Australasia, the winner receives a recognised career boost with the support of the Screen Producers Association of Australia (SPAA), the MOVIE EXTRA Channel and CineMart International Film Festival Rotterdam.
DigiSPAA is a creative project of SPAA that encourages filmmakers to enter their independently-funded digital feature films and aims to support filmmaking that is affordable, creative and appealing to audiences. The competition embraces the importance and growing prevalence of digital filmmaking in the industry. DigiSPAA 2011 will look to emulate the success of last year’s competition, which received a record 28 entries.
For this year’s winner, the 2011 DigiSPAA competition boasts a prize pool of $15,000 cash and $20,000 worth of post-production, a guaranteed screening of the winning film on the Movie Extra channel, plus a return airfare and free registration to the prestigious CineMart International Film Festival Rotterdam, in The Netherlands.
“Year on year, DigiSPAA has been unearthing some great talent amongst aspiring filmmakers and giving them the platform and exposure required to break into the industry. We had a record number of entries last year, which demonstrates the increasing scale of the independent digital filmmaking industry in this region. We look forward to building on this success with more great films this year,” said Antony I. Ginnane, SPAA President and co-curator of DigiSPAA.
Previous winners have enjoyed exceptional success since winning the grand prize of the ‘SPAArtan Award’. 2010 winner Little Sparrows from Writer/Director/Producer Yu-Hsiu Camille Chen, Producer Eva Di Blasio and Executive Producer Peter Thomas, had its international premiere at the International Rome Film Festival in November and received a standing ovation. It has also been picked up by Paris-based sales agent International Urban Media and Film Movement for US distribution rights.
2009 winner Mother Fish (previously Missing Water) from Writer/Director/Producer Khoa Do had its national theatrical release in 2010 through Titan View. The 2007 winner Men’s Group went on to win Best Feature at the 2008 Inside Film Awards, and had a national theatrical release in November 2008, to much acclaim. Producer John L. Simpson won the 2nd AFI Fellowship award worth $25,000, and Men’s Group was subsequently released on DVD through Madman Entertainment.
This year’s four finalists will be announced in mid-October and the winner will be awarded at the 2011 SPAA Conference taking place at the Hilton Sydney from 13 – 16 November 2011. An expert panel of industry judges will choose the winner based on the quality of the film and the filmmaker’s ability to demonstrate a clear marketing plan across a range of digital platforms.
Judges for 2011 DigiSPAA include President of SPAA and President of IFM World Releasing Inc., Antony I. Ginnane; Executive Director of SPAA, Geoff Brown; Producer and Creative Agent, Daniel Scharf and a guest judge to be announced later in the year.
Previous DigiSPAA guest judges have included Melanie Coombs, Producer of the award winning clay-mated feature film Mary and Max and Oscar winning Harvie Krumpet; Colleen Meldrum, Program Director, Movie Network Channels; Stacey Edmonds, Producer/Director I Know How Many Runs Your Scored Last Summer; Kate Woods, Director of Looking for Alibrandi and Without A Trace and Leon Cunningham, former MD of distributor, Magna Pacific.
Applications close at 5pm on Friday 16th September 2011. Eligible films are feature length, with a running time of at least 70mins, digitally produced and completed to advanced post-production stage no earlier than 30 August 2010, and independently funded.
DigiSPAA is a creative project of the Screen Producers Association of Australia (SPAA), an industry body that represents Australian independent film and television producers on all issues affecting the business and creative aspects of screen production.
For full details, application form and guidelines go to www.digispaa.org.au
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