Project Twenty1: Philadelphia Film & Animation Festival, 21-Day Filmmaking Competition

We’re posting this online for our Teams in case anyone’s e-mail is bouncing!

It’s been an exciting few weeks thus far on the 21-Day Filmmaking Competition, and though it isn’t quite at an end yet, we thought we’d bring you all up to date on the highlights, and let you know what to do before this Saturday’s due date and Drop Event!

Hopefully most of you are winding down production and working hard on post. Rendering is always a killer for a couple of Teams each year, so make sure you have an edit you can be happy with exported to tape or disc EARLY that you can deliver in the event of the unspeakable!!

WHAT WE NEED FROM YOU

FAQ: Rules Recap

Before you send us your films, keep in mind the following:

1) The Secret Element, “Between the Lines,” MUST be somewhere in the film, even if it’s only implied or referred to offhandedly. BUT the better it is incorporated into the theme, story, or feel of the film, the better chance you have of winning it all!

2) The films MUST be, at their longest, 10:00 minutes EVEN, including credits. We’ve had several calls about this now, and we cannot make exceptions.  You’ve got most of a week left, use it and edit, edit, edit until it works! We guarantee you can tell a successful story in under 10 minutes. If you need to expand it later for our Film Library & Festival Partners, that is acceptable, but to be eligible for a Screening, Awards, and Prizes, you MUST meet the time requirements.

3) You must submit to us copies of ALL your Forms, Waivers and Releases needed to ensure you have the rights to everything that appears in your film. We recommend retaining copies for your own reference as well! Ours go into a giant, Raiders-of-the-Lost-Ark-style vault, never to be seen again unless legal issues arise.

4) The film must be on a physical tape or disc medium and in our hands by the deadline in order to qualify for Awards, no exceptions! Do NOT show up at 7:00pm with a laptop displaying a “final edit” on a timeline or a “rendering” progress bar. This is not a completed film!! This happens at least once every year.

The official categories are: Best Film, Best Directing, Best Writing, Best Acting, Best Cinematography, Best Animation, Best Editing, Best Music, Best Sound Design, Best Effects, Best Use of Element, Best Marketing, and the much-sought-after Audience Award. Our independent panel of judges will be judging your films in all of these categories save two: the Audience Award, which as you might imagine, rests with those in the audience, and the award for Best Marketing, which will be chosen by us, the Project Twenty1 Staff, for two reasons. 1) We have sort of the catch-all perspective on how well you are connecting with people, and 2) we also have the best view of how many people come to us asking about your film pre-festival. So, even AFTER the Drop Event, you are allowed to work on Marketing, and we’ll be watching for your trailers, websites, posters, newspaper articles, and innovative guerrilla marketing techniques. Just don’t do anything that can get you arrested. And if you have any photos of your Team in action, trailers, podcasts, posters, etc. send them to us so we can put them up on our site or add them to your Press materials when promoting your film!

Thank You All!

Thanks again to all of you who are brave enough to be not only participating, but STILL participating. As you’ve probably realized by now, making a film you can be proud of in 21-Days is not easy! And it is because we know how hard you all work that we work hard for you afterward to make sure the world sees your films.

So good luck!! You have 4 days left.  Make them count!