As you may have noticed I talk a lot about film festivals. The reason I do this is because I think there are a lot of artists, especially filmmakers, who aren't aware of all the opportunities that we have here in the city of Chicago as well as opportunities elsewhere that offer a chance for them to get started. Today I've decided to let you know about three events, two festivals whose deadlines are actually this Friday February 15. That means that you need to get off your butt and get your material in by tomorrow! The other has a deadline on March 1.
The first event is the
Social Impact Media Award (SIMA) 2013. I chose this one because, one it's educationally driven and two, it's connected with the global humanitarian industry which a lot of my filmmaker friends are passionate about. It deals with grassroots campaigning for change, organizations that offer aid to communities and combines it with independent filmmaking. The deadline for this one is February 15, 2013 and the winner will be announced on April 15, 2013.
The next event is the
Indie Boots Film Festival, a Chicago film festival, which looks 'for films that are a little unruly'. Along with being unruly they are looking for films that show the perspective of someone who may be disabled, someone who's an activists, queer perspective, a woman's perspective, those on a micro budget, like they said a little unruly and maybe voices that aren't always in the forefront. The deadline here is March 1, 2013. I love this festival because there are so many opportunities to learn and discover potential outside of the mainstream.
The last festival is called
Autodesk 2013 Best of the Best Show Reel. Here you can submit short animation, music videos, feature films, digital media, interactive projects , broadcasts, commercials, game cinematic, all created using
Autodesk software. The deadline for this is also February 15, 2013.
These festivals are no entry fee festivals and it's a great way to get your foot in the door or just to get that courage up to put your work that's been sitting in that shoebox or on your computer that you want people to see. Yes this is a form of tough love, you only have one day for a couple and you have until March 1 for one. So are you going to challenge yourself? We here at
The Local Tourist hope you will.
