The 2018 Digital Film Festival showcased the digital media projects across Digital Film, TV and Digital Media Production, and Illustration for Screen Art.

Comprising work of various genres, styles and themes across the programme the festival reflected the eclectic, in-depth and relevant interests of the students.

Projects ranged from genre filmmaking in horror, comedy and tragedy; drama productions dealing with the themes of identity, student life and grief; off-beat and experimental entries showing incredible creativity; and documentary work which tackles prescient political and social issues.

Staff members, who judged the film, were joined by special guest actress and filmmaker Alice Lowe (shown below with Digital Film course leader and co founder of The Cinematologists Dario Llinares) for a screening and discussion of her directorial debut Prevenge giving students a unique insight into the process behind getting a first feature made, along with the writing and shooting processes, and working with actors.

The festival was coordinated by Digital Film student Abbie Jarvis and Hugh Brown, who also ran the Digital Film Society in Hastings, and they presented awards to the winning films at the end of the evening. The winning films and filmmakers were as follows:

Most Promising Film: One Eyed Piano – Harry Warren –  Digital Film

Best Editing: Serenade No3 – Rowan Bailey – Illustration for Screen Arts (now Design for Digital Media)

Best Sound: Sensory – Aaron Gillingham – TV and Digital Media Production (now Media Production)

Best Cinematography:  Servitude – Daisy Papworth – Digital Film

Best Screenplay: Three Years by the Sea – Connor Gaffney –  Digital Film

Best Production: Ambivert – Abbie Jones – Digital Film

Best Doc/Factual Film: Min Wen? – Jean Mark Bou Mansour – Digital Film

Best Fiction Film: Three years by the Sea – Connor Gaffney – Digital Film

The event showed how the standard for filmmaking continues to rise to new heights across the creative courses in the School of Media.