The purpose of this guide is to give you the best tools and advice to make a great entry.

You have from 6pm Friday to 6am Sunday morning to make and submit your film. 

Making a successful film is fuelled by good planning, a great team and enjoying the process! 

• WE recommend you read EVERYTHING on this page.

Key Recommendations

🎥 Work on your film story NOW and write it down. Have a script ready on Friday! It will keep you focussed. Here’s a useful Google Docs template, though in the end you just need a document that covers the story and the dialogue plan from start to finish. It really helps!

🎥 Come to the Ritz at 6pm on Friday to pick up your Festival Brief and Film Pack. It is the BEST way to begin the challenge.

🎥 Aim to make a 3 minute film. Short and sharp always beats long and flabby.

🎥 Plan to complete all filming by 6pm Saturday (or by sunset!)  and to finish editing by midnight, submission complete by 1am. DON’T leave anything until 6am! 

🎥 If you plan on using a voiceover, that might well be worth recording on the Friday night, ready to use the next day. You have all of Friday evening to also film if that fits the film.

🎥 The equipment you use is less important than what you actually film with it! Most entries will use mobile phone footage.

🎥 PERFECT is the enemy of GREAT. Nothing’s perfect!

Story Development

Everything revolves around your film idea. If you haven’t thought of anything yet, this is the time to start. Any genre is welcomed. It doesn’t have to be a traditional short film, though that is fine. It could be a documentary, a mockumentary, a silent film, a love letter to the Eastern Suburbs, a comic workout spoof, even something inspired by the local Randwick council election (this is happening on Saturday!!)

Remember, the Festival Brief is not going to dictate anything big on your story, it’s purpose is just to make sure you make the film over the weekend and entrants don’t recycle some old work. The point of the festival is to make something new!

Here are examples of films to get you going:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkZMLzKhwg4 Made for Stinkwater07, the story is great!

https://www.take48.com.au/winners Have a look at the winners in this competition over the years, they had 48 hours to make the films which is comparable to your challenge. See what stories they tried making. Comedies are popular but not necessarily winners.

Here are two excellent story idea starters – have a read!

https://nofilmschool.com/short-film-ideas

https://www.indieshortsmag.com/tutorials/pre-production/2023/08/short-film-script-ideas-for-your-next-short-film/

Finding Cast & Crew 

The best place to find your keys actors is friends and family. Beyond that there are filmmaking groups online or even contacting actors on StarNow (www.starnow.com). 

Actors you don’t know of course need persuading (pitch your story!) but will often work for no fee as long as it’s convenient and they’re getting exposure on screen. 

Here are some Facebook groups to start you off:

• NAFA [Networking Action for Filmmakers & Actors] | Facebook 
• Sydney Filmmakers Networking Pool | Facebook
• https://www.facebook.com/groups/sydney.film.and.actor.notice.board 
• https://www.facebook.com/groups/328688500612611
• https://www.facebook.com/groups/602590723219302

As for crew, it’s probably going to be you and a couple of friends max. Bring snacks, have food break plans. A hungry cast and crew is not a happy thing.

Filming

Be creative! Watch some videos on our website, practice filming this week and copying techniques. You might plan to handhold the whole film so practice walking and film at the same time. Imagine what you want to capture and then try to achieve it. Equally, if you’re going to use a tripod or other gear, make sure it all works beforehand. Plus someone to carrry it.

Make sure you have enough space on the phones or cameras.

Make sure your batteries are all charged up before you start and you have a charger pack if you can.

There’s no harm in doing multiple takes – just in case. 3 is a good number. There will always be moments when you thought you pressed record.. but you actually didn’t. Don’t find that out when you’re editing!

Sound & Music

First off, you can create all the copyright free music you could want with these sites:

• https://www.udio.com/
• https://suno.com/

There’s plenty more websites but these two are great.

Sound is important. If you have dialogue, try and record it well. 

This means keeping the microphone close to the speaker, making sure you’re not in a very noisy place, even using a clip on mic if you have one. You can also get the actors to watch teh footage and re-record their dialogue so you can put the better quality recording on top of the original video. Just plan for the time to do this, either out and about or at the end of the day before editing.

You may also opt to just use music/subtitles or primarily use a voiceover. 

You can record voiceovers with an actor or use an AI website. Here’s a couple of options:

• https://speechify.com/ 
• https://elevenlabs.io/

Editing

We recommend using software you are familiar with, or get a friend who knows what they’re doing and edit with them. 

Alternatively, get familiar now with the free software available on your computers – Clip Champ for Windows or iMovie for Macs. Make sure you have enough space on your hard drive. Attempt an edit and render before the weekend to feel confident the editing will be fine.

Just don’t be too ambitious. If you want to do some clever VFX after shooting, make sure you’re already done it before so it won’t be big problem during the Festival. If there’s a shot of the Death Star over Randwick needed, you could make that beforehand!

Entering Your Submission

The submission form will be sent to all teams along with the Festival Brief on Friday at 6pm.

You will need to upload your finished film entry to YouTube as unlisted or public (we must be able to access it), in an HD format. We recommend a 25 or 30 framerate and 1080P resolution.

Once you have uploaded the film to YouTube, you must include the film URL, the Team name, information about the Brief elements included and final information about cast and crew.

You should receive an automatic acknowledgement email when you submit. You’re welcome to also include any other funny memories or overcome challenges of the weekend in the email. We like that kind of stuff!