Image caption: Winners of last year’s Easterseals Disability Film Challenge
Nic Novicki is an actor who happens to have a disability. In 2014 he launched the Disability Film Challenge to address the under-representation of people with disabilities both in front and behind the camera. In 2017, he teamed us with Easterseals Southern California to expand the challenge. Now known as the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge, Easterseals is the leading nonprofit supporting people with disabilities.
This year, Adobe returns as a sponsor of the challenge, which aims at recognizing the creative output of young filmmakers and showcases their films. In this way, the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge hopes to help change the way the world views and defines disability.
Margot Nack, Adobe’s Senior Manager of Strategic Programs for Professional Film & Video, states “One of the reasons why Adobe loves to be a part of this competition is it gives the next generation of filmmakers a platform to tell stories about disabilities that may not otherwise be told.”
Registration has already opened and runs through April 3rd. The competition itself takes place between April 5th-7th; participants will have 55 hours to write, put together a crew, shoot and edit a three to five minute short film. Each team must include a person with a disability either in front or behind the camera.
Finalists will be announced at the Newport Beach Film Festival on April 27th and will be followed up by a red carpet award ceremony on May 9th at Sony Pictures Studios.
Winners will receive a variety of prizes including a full, one year subscription to the Adobe Creative Cloud. Other prizes include a $2000 production grant by Universal Filmed Entertainment, a Sony mirrorless camera, mentor meetings by important people in the industry and subscriptions to trade publications such as Variety and Film Independent.
There are several different categories including Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Awareness Campaign.
The winning film will be screened at the HollyShorts Film Festival, an Academy Award-qualifying competition and the Newport Beach Film Festival.
More information about the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge can be found at their website, http://www.disabilityfilmchallenge.com.
