December18th
Ignite is Australia’s premier Christian Short Film Festival
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Ignite is Australia’s premier Christian Short Film Festival.
Started in 2004, its major aims are to develop young Christian film makers and to encourage people to be creative about communicating the truths of the Bible.
The rules are simple:
- Films must be based on a verse or passage from the Bible that contains a keyword
- Films must be no longer than 5 minutes
Entries close on the last Friday in July each year, with the Festival Screening and Awards Ceremony on the first Saturday in September. The following year’s theme is announced at the Award Ceremony.
Previous themes have been:
- 2004 – Parables
- 2005 – Water
- 2006 – Fire
- 2007 – Light
- 2008 – Rock (or Stone)
- 2009 – Animal(s)
Ignite is based in Sydney, but receives entries from all over the world. In recent years films have come from countries as diverse as the UK, Argentina, India and Cambodia.
Competition Format
The Festival Director views all films to assess their suitability for competition – that is, does each film meet the entry criteria noted above.
The films that make it through (which is normally all but one or two) then get sent to a panel of preliminary judges, who collectively select the best 20 films.
The ‘Top 20′ films are all eligible for the People’s Choice award. From 2009, these films will be uploaded onto this website, with the People’s Choice award voting happening online.
The judges then individually choose winners in various categories, as well as one or two ‘honourable mentions’. These decisions are then collated by the Festival Director to come up with the category winners, and four ‘wild cards’ – films that didn’t take out a category but rated highly among the judges.
The category winners, the People’s Choice winner, and the four wild cards are screened at the Awards Ceremony, and all of them are eligible for the major award – the Gold Sparky for the Best Film.
The Gold Sparky is decided on the night by a separate judging panel. Although it hasn’t happened yet, it is possible for a wild card entry to win the major prize.
Ignite Awards
Awards are given for the following categories:
- Best Script
- Best Performance by a Male Actor
- Best Performance by a Female Actor
- Best Cinematography
- Best Sound
- Best Editing/Effects
- Best Director
- Best Entry by a School
- Best Entry by a First-time Film Maker (Bright Spark)
- People’s Choice
- Best Film (Gold Sparky)
An award for Best Animation has also been given in some years.
A range of cash and other prizes are also attached to the various awards.
In 2009, the Gold Sparky and People’s Choice winners will receive a cash prize from our major sponsor, the Mary Bladon Christian Fellowship, while the Bright Spark and Schools category winners will receive a data projector from Christian Multimedia
