REGULATIONS

KIDS FOR KIDS

Nordic and Baltic Kids for Kids video competition for young people
March 2009
In connection with the international children’s and youngsters’ Videotivoli festival
Deadline for the films: 15.11.2009

Videotivoli joins its forces with the international young people’s organization, CIFEJ. For the third time there is competition in connection with Videotivoli: the Nordic and Baltic Kids for Kids.

Read the rules carefully. If you still have something to ask, please contact the festival office.

REGULATIONS for Kids for Kids
Under 16-year old children and young people
  Less than 10 minutes
Three categories: Animation, live action & documentaries, one minute films

1. Basic information about the Nordic and Baltic Kids for Kids video competition
The Nordic and Baltic Kids for Kids is part of the international children’s Videotivoli festival. It also belongs to the larger international KFK network organised by CIFEJ. The Nordic and Baltic Kids for Kids is a competition for films that kids and young people have made themselves. In connection with Videotivoli, it is also a meeting place for young video makers, professionals and people interested in media education. This international event has been organised by the Pirkanmaa Film Centre in cooperation with CIFEJ.

2. Selection process

If more films are sent that can be performed, the selection committee will choose which works are shown in the competition categories. We do hope that there will no copyright problems (for example with the music used in the videos). All the films must made by under 16 year olds.

It is important that we get a sufficient amount of films no longer than 10 minutes long, dealing with different subjects and made with varying techniques.

There are three competition categories: 

1) Animation
2) Live action, art films, documentaries
3) One minute films (lasting 1 minute or less)

The films are divided into age groups:
□ under 12 year olds
□ 12- 16 year olds

If your works is included in the competition, the Videotivoli staff will inform you about it by e-mail. The names of any films chosen for the competition later will appear on the Videotivoli web pages.

3. The style and subject are free

4. Prizes
The Kids for Kids jury consists of professionals, at least one them being a CIFEJ representative. The jury will pick the best film of each age group and category, and they will also select one film that stands out above the rest. The winners will be announced at the festival and they will be also notified by e-mail and named in the Videotivoli web pages.

5. Deadline
All the films and their entry forms will have to sent by the 15th November 2009. A stamped date on the envelope suffices as proof.

6. Filling the entry form
The form must be carefully filled in. According to the information on the form we can contact you later. We need the information also in order to make the festival catalogue. Other people are also interested on the films shown at the festival, so please help us by giving us all the information.

You are the expert of your own movie, and since you know all the makers, their contact addresses, the synopsis etc., please make our job easier and give all this information to us.

Fill in the entry form on the internet and sent it to us via e-mail at videotivoli@videotivoli.fi . It is easier to handle and understand text written with a computer than hand-written text. Please send a copy of the entry form with your signature with your film.

7. Photographs and press material
We hope that you could send us a photo of your film and its makers to us via e-mail for press use. Please send the pictures as large as possible to videotivoli@videotivoli.fi . Check the quality of the pictures before sending them.

8. English subtitles / dialogue list
It would be of great help if it’s possible for you to subtitle the film, even for films that are spoken in English. If that is impossible, it would help us a lot if you can send us the dialogue list in English. If this is not possible, even it helps if you can write the dialogue and all spoken words in your own language and send them to us.

Foreign films will be screened with Finnish subtitles. Foreign viewers and possible jury members will need English dialogue / subtitles to understand the films. Also, if the films are seen in other countries, foreign festival organisers will find it useful if you have managed to have translated all the dialogue in your film.

9. The screening format
We would prefer to receive the films on Mini DVD or DV Cam cassettes or high quality DVD formats. If you send your work on DVD, please send all films on separate DVDs or at least code the DVD so that each work has its own menu and index number. We cannot accept works that are put on a tape or disc without clear breaks between films.
All professional formats like BetaSP are of course welcome.

We will make screening compilations of all the films and the afore-mentioned formats are the easiest to deal with and transferred back to a computer.

All video material sent as densely packed CDs are problematic, since they cannot be read by all equipment and their resolution is often poor. VHS is easy to show and to transfer when making a compilation, the quality of image and sound is often not good. Films packed into an internet format are not acceptable, as they come out so tiny that the image would be pinhead size on the screen.

When sending a good quality and as unpacked a copy of your work as possible, you guarantee a high quality performance of your film.

10. Screening the films at the festival
Our selection committee selects the films that are shown at the festival.

We might seem a bit illogical in wishing to receive as many films as possible from near and afar, since we cannot unfortunately show them all on the big screen. This is because our screening times are limited.

The selected works will be compiled into screenings shown at times announced in advance. If your work is not included in the screenings, please do not feel bad – all the films will be shown on a video screen at the festival centre. The area is meant mainly for various festival representatives, buyers for television and the press, but anyone interested in the films may come and have a look. Perhaps your film will be picked out from amongst the rest – so do remember to write an interesting description of it in your entry form.

11. Distribution of the winning works | The Best of …
The best of the festival films, the winners, will be chosen for an international Kids for Kids compilation that will be distributed around the world and offered to various festivals and events. The compilation distributor is the Kids for Kids committee of CIFEJ.

We hope that you will allow the films to be shown outside the festival and their distribution at various events and festivals around the world. We will make no money out of this, quite the contrary. This is a strictly non-profit making activity. We simply would like as many people both in Finland and elsewhere to see the films. Some of the works would make wonderful internationality education material, some would inspire other children just starting to plan their own films, and so on… In each of these situations you will have the complete rights to your films.

12. Public screenings
We would appreciate if you also allowed us to use part of your work during the festival as promotional material for both the Finnish and foreign media. When the festival approaches, several radio and TV channels contact us hoping to receive short fragments of films so they can use them in connection with the news broadcasts they make about the festival.

13. Learning material
We hope that you will allow us to use your work after the festival as learning material. The films that Videotivoli receives are made using different methods and techniques, and we would like to record some of the methods. We hope to utilise the works as examples e.g. in seminars for teachers, or even build a teaching package around them.

14. Label your work carefully
We receive several hundreds of cassettes and DVDs for the festival. The films are numbered and handled with their entry forms. It is vitally important for you to label both your cassettes / DVDs and their covers carefully. Write everything clearly and with care. Cassettes with blank covers and unlabelled DVDs only create confusion.

15. No commercial value
When you send us your work, please write clearly on the envelope:
“For temporary, cultural purposes only. No commercial value”
With this marking we will not have trouble with the customs, and the film will come straight to us.

16. Address
Send the entry form at:  videotivoli@videotivoli.fi.
Video cassette / DVD and entry form with signature has to sent by 15.11. at:

VIDEOTIVOLI
Kehräsaari B – talo, PL BOX 432
33101 Tampere
Finland

17. Returning the films
Mini DV cassettes and DVDs will not be returned to the sender. They are stored in the Videotivoli and Kids for Kids archives.

18. International KFK
You can find out more about the international Kids for Kids and the competitions held all around the world at the web pages of CIFEJ:

http://www.cifej.com/en/index.htm

More information at videotivoli@videotivoli.fi or maikki@videotivli.fi