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Notes from Festivals Seminar at Filmbase
Hitting the Festival Circuit: How to Get Your Short Film into Film Festivals
2pm Wed 3rd Dec 2008
Close to fifty filmmakers showed up on Wednesday 3rd December for a free information session on how to get your short film into festivals at home and abroad. Filmbase brought together a panel of Irish film professionals to discuss the topic. Thanks to our panel for giving their time and advice, they were Mick Hannigan (Corona Cork Film Festival), Nicky Gogan (Darklight Film Festival, Still Films), Ronan Burke (Black Sheep Productions) and Nerea Aymerich (Film Ireland magazine). Alan Fitzpatrick, MD of Filmbase, chaired the discussion. Below are some brief notes for those who were unable to make it along. NB these notes are meant as a useful guide when applying to festivals with your film, whilst we cannot guarantee that this information will ensure your film is selected, we hope that it will be of use to anyone planning to send their film out to the thousands festivals around the world!
The session kicked off with advice from Mick Hannigan, who has been the director of the Cork Film Festival since 1986. The festival has a particular focus on short films, in 2008 they screened some 46 programmes of shorts, out of thousands received from filmmakers all over the world. Mick compiled a handout of useful websites that would be worth consulting when planning to apply to film festivals. The handout can be downloaded HERE. (Please note, the information on the handout is offered as a guideline only.)
Next to speak was Nicky Gogan who used her own experiences as a filmmaker exhibiting on the festival circuit (with feature doc Seaview) as well as having been the festival director of the Darklight Festival for many years. Both Nicky and Mick stressed the importance of making sure to send in the correct documentation with your application (seems like an obvious one but it’s amazing how many people forget to send in details like a CV with the application). Also, the better presented your application, the more professional it looks and the easier it is to process which all makes the life of the programmer easier. Don’t forget, the chances of the festival programmer contacting you to look for more information(eg DVDs/CVs etc) is fairly slim considering the amount of applications they will have received. So, make sure you include the right information the first time round. Another handy tip was to make sure to test your DVD before sending it. Just because it works on your computer does not mean it will work on the programmers DVD player and if it doesn’t work for them they will undoubtedly have thousands more DVDs to choose from that will!
Ronan Burke, talked about his own experience of applying to festivals with his short film Jellybaby, which he co-directed with his brother Rob. Ronan and Rob used their experience with previous films when deciding how to approach the festival circuit with Jellybaby. They sat down and planned their festival strategy rather than just sending the film out and hoping for the best. During the session there was some debate about whether you should hold off sending your film to a range of festivals before sending it to the major international festivals that require premiere screenings (Certain high profile festivals, eg. Cannes require a premiere screening). This can cause problems since, depending on the time of year that your film is completed, you may have to hold out for the big festivals and in this way it can mean missing a whole host of other international ones. Some advice given was to consider how the festival will work for you and whether it’s worth waiting for anything from weeks up to months to see if your film has been selected. In the case of Jellybaby, Ronan and Rob chose to target a specific number of high profile festivals that were looking for submissions around the time that suited them. Then after they had been accepted for their premiere screening at one of these, they then went on to apply to as many festivals as possible on the international circuit. For their application, they used the online service www.withoutabox.com. In their case they paid a subscription rate to access a great deal of information on types of festivals, deadlines etc. As well as information you can also apply directly through withoutabox for a number of festivals. (NB using a service like this is not a prerequisite, however, they found the site to be particularly useful in this case. Other similar sites include www.reelport.com and www.shortfilmdepot.com).
Finally, the session finished up with advice from Nerea Aymerich regarding the importance of a properly photographed production still. Festivals require an image from the film to use for promotion (eg in the programme catalogue or on the website). Since a production still has to be taken during the shoot it’s vital that filmmakers plan for this in advance of the shoot date. Screen grabs are usually extremely pixilated and are therefore unsuitable for publication. Nerea offered a handout with useful tips in terms of what the image should include in terms of content. For instance, a shot of the cast and crew behind the scenes, whilst good practice to have and important in terms of archiving the shoot, is not necessarily saying anything specific about the film in question; a picture of someone holding a boom or behind the camera could be taken on any film set. So, make sure that the still taken really represents or captures the film. Also, make sure that the person taking the photo is not only able to take a compositionally appealing image but that they also know what format it needs to be (again there are notes regarding this on the handout). This handout is available to download HERE.
Finally, try and make sure to budget for additional materials should you be accepted for any festivals and try to go along if you can. Festivals are great for networking and if you can give other filmmakers, distributors, agents and festival programmers your work (business cards, DVDs, flyers etc) you never know what opportunities this may open up for you. Information can be put online as well in the form of an electronic press kit (EPK). For an example of one check out Still Film’s EPK for Seaview (link below).
Remember, there are no hard and fast rules to ensuring your film is selected so this information is meant as a guideline and cannot be guaranteed as a surefire way to success. Best of luck with any applications and remember, if at first you don’t succeed, try and try again!
Thanks to everyone who showed up. If you have any comments about the session feel free to send them to Clare Creely at Filmbase on admin[AT]filmbase.ie.
Filmbase will be hosting more information sessions in the new year. Keep an eye on the Newsletter for updates!
Some additional useful links:
www.stillfilms.org/pages/ff_seaview.html (EPK for Still Film’s feature doc Seaview)
