
The Independent Mzansi Short Film Festival - Call for Applications
Short films, past and present, are true works of art, and deserve a festival dedicated to their exhibition. Short filmmaking is in the midst of a renaissance. Screening at a festival is a sure-fire way to start creating a buzz around your film and your career.
The second annual IMSFF is taking place from 2 - 5 July 2015, and short films will be screened over a four-day period at the Atterbury Theatre in the Lynnwood Bridge Complex, Pretoria (just off the N1). We'll screen up to 30 hours of short films from some of the most up-and-coming directors and producers in our country!
Our mission is to present quality short films from around South Africa as well as support, recognize and honour filmmakers creating a films under 30 minutes. This is a movement to exhibit and expand the art form of short filmmaking and support emerging filmmakers in reaching new audiences through the powerful language of film.
Serving as South Africa's only dedicated short film festival, the IMSFF was founded to showcase contemporary short filmmaking, and aims to exhibit the most captivating and innovative short content. In the process, IMSFF hopes to build an audience for short film and help giving aspiring filmmakers a foot in the door of a rapidly growing industry. The short films will be organized thematically, in hopes of representing the full range of the human experience as reflected by our chosen filmmakers.
This year, well have 20 award categories, or better known as the MZANSIs. Nominees and winners will be chosen by a distinguished jury of industry professionals. Awards will be given for the following achievements:
Best Short Film
Best Director
Best Student Film
Best Original Screenplay
Best Actor
Best Actress
Best Cameo by any Actor/Actress*
Best Use of Music
Best Original Score*
Best Cinematography
Best Editing
Best Sound Editing & Mixing
Best Visual Effects*
Best Production Design
Best Animated Short Film
Best Makeup & Hairstyling
Best Costume Design
Best Documentary Short Subject*
Best Trailer*
IMSFF Choice Award.
* New categories
Nominations in each category will be announced a week prior to the event, and published on the website and in Screen Africa.
Educational Program:
The INDEPENDENT MZANSI SHORT FILM FESTIVAL is designed to educate and inspire the next generation of filmmaker. We feature interviews with working industry professionals, live Q&A sessions with directors and producers in attendance, as well as workshops/ seminars for low-budget filmmakers. The festival will also give emerging filmmakers opportunity to network.
2015 Call For Entries
Please read the following submission requirements carefully before submitting your entry via email or online.
Submission Requirements
Films must have been completed after November 1st, 2013.
All non-English films must have English subtitles. (Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu, Sotho, etc.)
Films must be submitted on MP4 video and MOV video.
Film aspect ratio is preferably 16:9 (Since 2009, it has become the most common aspect ratio and is also the international standard format of HDTV and Full HD).
Audio is STEREO only.
Works-in-progress will be considered, provided they will be completed two weeks prior to the festival.
You may submit more than one film, but each submission must be a entry accompanied by its entry fee.
Please do NOT send stills or press kits. If your film is selected we will ask you to email us a still.
If your film is selected, you will be asked to provide: video trailer of 30 seconds in length and a poster A1 in size.
All films selected for the festival grant IMSFF the rights to use press materials from the film for promotional purposes.
All films selected for the festival grant IMSFF the rights to upload the submitted video trailer of 1 minutes in length on their YouTube Channel online for promotional purposes.
Submissions are accepted until June 5th, 2015. For more information visit:
www.imsff.co.za or contact info@imsff.co.za
If you know of a filmmaker who wants recognition for his work, this is the festival to join.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
07/10/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, today announced the latest Long-Term Supported (LTS) release of Dalet Flex. Build...
06/09/2026
June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...
24/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
24/08/2026
As the broadcast industry moves toward more flexible production platforms, Calrec will present its evolving audio ecosystem at IBC 2026, on Stand 8.C47. The dem...
24/08/2026
Stop Using Boring Static Highlights - Pro After Effects Workflow
Graham Quince August 24, 2026
0 Comments
Did you know you can use After Effects expre...
24/08/2026
Paledusk Performance Captured with URSA Cine Immersive
Brie Clayton August 24, 2026
0 Comments
Creative production company THINGS. brings the band'...
24/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, w...
24/08/2026
Arvato Systems Becomes a Service Partner of HANDELSVERBAND.swiss
Zurich - Arvato Systems Switzerland has been a service partner of HANDELSVERBAND.swiss since ...
24/08/2026
According to OpenRouter data, agentic AI workloads consume 15x more tokens than ...
24/08/2026
The next era of AI inference won't be defined by a single breakthrough chip,...
24/08/2026
To generate intelligence at scale, AI factories run continuously, and their economics are defined by delivered output: tokens per second, tokens per watt, cost ...
24/08/2026
We Only Want the Earth: The Life & Ideas of James Connolly airs
Wednesday 26 August on RT One and RT Player at 9.35pm
RT is to air the compelling documenta...
23/08/2026
Offers up to 10 bands of compression
Parish Audio's latest release allows users to place individual compressors anywhere in the frequency range, but tak...
22/08/2026
O'Shea Jackson Jr., Dave Franco, and Mason Thames appear in Idiots by Macon Blair, an official selection of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. (Courtesy of ...
22/08/2026
By the time Hacks reached its fifth and final season, Adam Bricker ASC had spent six years shaping one of television's most distinctive visual identities. T...
22/08/2026
Polsat reclaims second place, ByteDance climbs to eighth, and live football miti...
22/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
22/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
22/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
22/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
22/08/2026
Avid brings agentic media production to IBC2026
Brie Clayton August 21, 2026
0 Comments
After launching Avid Content Core at NAB 2026, Avid expands it...
22/08/2026
Making of Lord of the Flies Shot with Pocket Cinema Camera 6K Pro
Brie Clayton August 21, 2026
0 Comments
Filmmaker Lisa Marie Russo shoots on the bea...
22/08/2026
Homecoming Artist Spotlight: Dogs in a Pile The rising jam band talks about where it all started on the Berklee campus ahead of their Homecoming performance o...
22/08/2026
Berklee Alumna Lexi Vollero MA '22 Receives Fulbright Award to Brazil Vollero, a Berklee NYC graduate, has been selected for a Fulbright Open Research Awa...
21/08/2026
A massive deployment of specialty cameras, graphics, and AR will showcase the na...
21/08/2026
The West Coast Conference unveiled its new 30-second public service announcement, the latest expression of the Conference's We Rise in the West brand iden...
21/08/2026
New look will serve as the foundation for ESPN's upcoming NFL season and Sup...
21/08/2026
ESPN will air the ninth annual MLB Little League Classic presented by New York Life on Sunday, August 23, at 7 p.m. ET from Historic Bowman Field in Williamspor...
21/08/2026
In an emotional acceptance speech in Canton, Grossman celebrated the pioneering ...
21/08/2026
Hardware-style timing shifts for software instruments
Following on from the release of Omniclock, Rapid Flow have launched a new sequencer plug-in that can ...
21/08/2026
Highly anticipated synthesizer ships in October 2026
Iceland-based Love Synthesizers have announced that their highly anticipated synthesizer is now availab...
21/08/2026
Masterpiece PBS The Forsytes has expanded its cast as its begins production in ...
21/08/2026
The BBC has unveiled first-look pictures from The Witch Farm, a new ghost story and mystery set in the Welsh countryside, coming soon to BBC iPlayer and BBC One...
21/08/2026
The BBC and BritBox have revealed the first look of Edward Bluemel as Hercule Poirot in the forthcoming six-part series Hercule from Mammoth Screen and Agatha C...
21/08/2026
Our priority was making the best, most powerful, most meaningful story possible,...
21/08/2026
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({ content_source:......
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Avid will unveil how it is transforming production to help media organizations unite content, agentic workflows, and business insights at IBC2026 (RAI Amsterda...
21/08/2026
New routing, modular processing, orchestration and monitoring capabilities bridge dedicated hardware and software-based processing as part of the Dynamic Media ...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/08/2026
When hundreds of thousands of people gather to hear a single voice, there is no room for compromise. Every word must be delivered clearly, every wireless transm...
21/08/2026
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, today announced a strategic partnership with ScorePlay, the AI-powered media infrastructure that spo...