Futures

Futures 48 Film Challenge 2021

Receiving details for your film at 7.00pm on Friday 20 August, during the launch event starting at 6.30pm, you then have 48 hours to submit and enter your short film 7.00pm on Sunday 22 August. 

Who?

Open to aspiring filmmakers with no broadcast credits from across the United Kingdom. This competition is your chance to show off your creativity and innovation, create a short film that will be judged by the television industry and showcased on the RTS YouTube Channel. The winning film will also receive a prestigious Royal Television Society Award. 

Futures 48 Film Challenge

Who?

Open to aspiring filmmakers with no broadcast credits from across the United Kingdom. This competition is your chance to show off your creativity and innovation, create a short film that will be judged by the television industry and showcased on the RTS YouTube Channel. The winning film will also receive a prestigious Royal Television Society Award. 

You can either enter as an individual or as a team. There is no fee to enter this competition. 

Commissioners explain how to get an idea on TV

Anna Cronin (Chair), Damian Kavanagh, Catherine Lynch and Kate Stannard (Credit: Paul Hampartsoumian)

“If you are defensive and precious about your idea, and you won’t let it evolve, whether that’s in your brainstorm or when you’re pitching to the commissioner, it’s just never going to go anywhere,” explained Catherine Lynch, creative director at Initial TV, which makes ITV gameshow Tenable

Initial’s head of development Kate Stannard agreed: “What you end up seeing on telly is often quite different to the thing you first said in the room.”

Does YouTube need TV?

“YouTube is an amazing platform – you can build an audience and you know that they’re there to see you,” said football freestyler Daniel Cutting. “I don’t think my audience – kids between 8 and 13 or 14 – watch TV.”
He has more than 250,000 YouTube subscribers and more than half a million Instagram followers watching his football tricks. “On TV you don’t get to know the person; they’re kind of distant. [Online, viewers] can engage, comment and like, and potentially get a response from someone. YouTubers are becoming the new celebrities,” he said.

Event report: VFX and Animation

The latest visual effects and animation techniques were on show at the Curzon Soho when the central London cinema hosted an RTS Futures event at the end of May.

A panel of VFX and animation industry experts – quizzed by Luke Franks, the presenter of weekend CITV show Scrambled! – were on hand to screen and talk about their work. They also offered advice on how to break into and progress in the industry.

“As creatives, we’re all striving to come up with original, brilliant ideas and then realise them in animation,” explained UKTV head of design Peter Allinson.

How to Survive as a TV Freelancer

Join us on Wednesday 24th May for some top tips...

Speakers include:

Barny Revill, Series Director (Life at the Extreme with Davina McCall, Secret Life of Dogs)

Angela Oakhill, Head of Production, RDF West

Glenn Rainton, Editor (The Great British Bake Off)

Other speakers to be announced...

Hosted by Lynn Barlow, Chair, RTS Bristol and Director of Creative Industries, UWE​

 

RTS Members free

£5.50 for non RTS members

Drinks and networking in the BBC bar after the session

Face to Face with talent agent Vivienne Clore

Vivienne forbade us from using her picture on pain of death, so here is a picture of her friend and client Jo Brand in the BBC's Extra Slice (Credit BBC/Love Productions)

“I never set out to be an agent,” explains Clore. She found herself at Richard Stone’s agency after replying to an advert in a newspaper. 

Success, she says, has everything to do with your personality. “You don’t have to have gone to university to learn how to deal with people,” Clore insists. A successful agent must have the ability to listen to people, an ability to communicate with clients and producers, and an ability to negotiate deals on behalf of clients.