Editor

DepicT! 2004, the short film competition which challenges budding filmmakers from around the world to make their own micro-movie of under 90 seconds, is now inviting entries for this year's competition.
DepicT! offers the chance to win a cash prize of £3000, have films promoted online, published on a DVD, and screened at Brief Encounters 10th Bristol International Short Film Festival, taking place from
Wednesday 17 - Sunday 21 November 2004.

"Winning the competition was fantastic as was the response following it. We have got a distribution deal with Dazzle films, the film has been broadcast on BBC3 and we appeared at Aspen shorts fest. There was something wonderfully surreal about being flown to America to show our 90-second short alongside the cream of the short film world, bizarre."
Stephen Scott Hayward & Alex Kirkland, Directors, 'Le Cheval: 2.1', Winners of DepicT! 2003

TV commercials and channel idents are examples of tiny movies that we see every day. Short shorts can deliver many of the qualities and strengths of longer forms and add some of their own. Last year's
competition was hugely successful with over 200 entries and an impressive 3 million hits to the DepicT! website from over 92 countries. In four months, 426 Gigabytes - the equivalent of approximately 60 feature-length DVDs - were downloaded from the website.

The website recently went live for this year's competition. Visitors to http://www.depict.org will be able to find out more about the competition and download an entry form. They will also have the opportunity to view all of last year's shortlisted films for inspiration, as well as looking at top tips on constructing a successful 90 second short from previous years' winners.

The winner will be selected by a judging panel of distinguished industry professionals, the panel's brief is to uncover distinctive voices; originality, style, clarity of idea and impact are key. Last year's judges included multi-Oscar® winning director Peter Jackson, Jeremy Howe (Executive Producer, BBC Talent) and David Sproxton (Executive Chairman, Aardman Animations Ltd).

DepicT! 2004 offers more prizes than ever before - not only does the winner receive a cash prize of £3000, the fifteen shortlisted films will be included on a promotional DVD, sponsored by Orange, which aims to heighten the profile of DepicT! and the filmmakers involved. Each shortlisted filmmaker will receive five copies of this DVD, as well as a ticket to the Brief Encounters Awards Ceremony.

This year, there will also be a chance for the public to vote via text for their favourite DepicT! films with the introduction of the Orange DepicT! 2004 Audience Award. The shortlisted films will be posted
online for voting from Fri 1 Oct 2004, whilst Orange users will also be able to take advantage of new video streaming technology to view the shortlisted films (on compatible phones) on Orange World.
The winner of the Orange DepicT! 2004 Audience Award will be announced at Brief Encounters International Short Film Festival 2004 alongside the main award, and will take home a top of the range mobile phone and other Orange prizes.

Jonathan Rose, Senior Regional PR Manager for Orange UK says: "Since Orange launched ten years ago we have been strong supporters of film. DepicT! enables up and coming directors to experiment with scripts, film techniques and enjoy the medium of film. We're delighted to be able to support DepicT! and promote film talent from around the world."

DepicT! is a Watershed project as part of Brief Encounters 10th Bristol International Short Film Festival, supported by Orange, Aardman and Films@59