City Gateway Media’s Skyscraper Festival

Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief

City Gateway Media today launched their 2008 Skyscraper Festival Competition with a total prize value of up to UK PDS 400,000 in media value!

This is a great idea, truly innovative and will help find and showcase new (and existing) creative talent. It can only be a good thing for the digital industry to do ‘festivals’ etc. such as this. I hope a lot of folks will be entering and we look forward to seeing some of the entries.

HYPtv has more details on how to enter and submit material and already shows a few of the entries already submitted – http://www.hyptv.com/skyscraper

What is the 2008 Skyscraper Festival?

A Festival of video and animation creativity on the tallest outdoor screen in Europe, situated in the heart of Manchester. It’s a unique opportunity to show off your creative work in a big way. See what D-Fuse did.

The festival will be of particular interest to digital designers, flash animators, video and motion artists and experimental film makers. You are invited to submit up to 3 pieces of work for potential screening on the skyscraper screen.

The Skyscraper is 19m high x 3.6 m wide – similar proportions to a standard web skyscraper. It operates 24/7 with a daily audience of around 200,000.

The Festival, in conjunction with City Gateway Media, will run for 6 months.

What’s the brief?

It’s very simple. Have some fun. We want a piece of video / animation from you (see Tech Spec for details) that’s really going to show off the gargantuan proportions of the screen. Anything goes – but keep it clean as a lot of people will see your work. All we ask is that your submission is 25 seconds duration with no audio – it’s a ‘silent’ screen – and you have the rights to use any images or video in your submission.

Bear in mind the very tall, narrow proportions – so make sure the content you produce is particularly suitable for that shape (no landscapes!) and distance viewing. You could create a new piece of work especially for the Festival or perhaps repurpose an existing piece. Feel free to include your own URL / logo so everyone knows who created that work of genius. The only brand we want to see on any submission is yours…so no work produced for clients please.

How do I enter?

Simple. Just register, check the Tech Specs and upload your work. You must be over 18. NOTE: existing HYPtv members do not need to register and should sign in as normal.

Prizes

The 25 most highly-rated entries (the shortlist), as voted for by the HYPtv.com community, will be showcased on the Skyscraper screen. 24 of them will get a week’s showcase each on the screen. That’s over 2000 screenings of your work and worth over £8000.

The overall winner from the shortlist, voted by the judges, will be entitled to a showcase / new upload every week for 25 weeks…65,000 screenings worth over £200,000. That’s a lot of free marketing!

Judges

  • Manchester’s finest, designer Peter Saville
  • M&C Saatchi creative director Graham Fink
  • HYPtv Creative Director Bob Palmer

They’ll be looking for the best creative use of the skyscraper space.

Timings for your diary

22.06: Closing date for submissions
27.06: Judging
07.07: Winners announced
21.07: Winners’ work on the skyscraper screen


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