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About our Short Film Schemes
BSÉ/IFB provides funding for short films through a series of schemes, each of which is open for applications once a year and each of which provides full funding for production.

If you are considering applying you should first contact the Schemes & Applications Co-ordinator at BSÉ/IFB to check the status of the scheme that interests you, and to verify specific guidelines and deadlines.

About Short Shorts
Short Shorts is an established and successful short film scheme that BSÉ/IFB will maintain in a slightly modified form. Films made under the scheme can be live-action or animated; they should ‘tell a story' but need not use conventional narrative methods.

The scheme aims to encourage the making of films which, in their content or style or both, are innovative, provocative, idiosyncratic, audacious, or in some other way risky and rule-breaking. Projects selected for support are likely to be considered capable of playing in commercial cinemas as effective, if unconventional, adjuncts to the main programme.

Films may be made in Irish or English.

Each year projects submitted for the SHORT SHORTS scheme will be required to conform to a genre chosen for that year by BSÉ/IFB, e.g. love story, thriller, musical, horror, etc.

The deadline for the next round of applications will be announced mid 2010.

Parameters of the Scheme
   -  Number of films: up to 7 per year (see also SHORT 
      SHORTS EXTRA below)

   -  Duration: between 3 and 5 minutes

   -  Budget per film: maximum €15,000

   -  Format: 
             -  Origination on any digital format
             -  Delivery on digi-beta and HD Cam
             -  Further funding to cover costs of 35mm prints may
                be provided where a film obtains a bona fide theatrical 
                release in Ireland or is invited to a major international
                film festival, subject to BSÉ/IFB regulations in force at
                the time.

*Please note that this scheme is delivered on HD Cam, as well as Digi-beta, and the application budget should reflect the costs required to deliver on these formats

Who Can Apply
Applications are invited from both up-and-coming and experienced producer/director/writer teams, subject to eligibility guidelines as follows:

Producers - must have previously produced at least one short film#
Directors - must have previously directed at least one short film#
Writers - need not have previously written for the screen

Producers, Directors and Writers - there is no limit to the number of SHORT SHORTS an individual may apply to make

The scheme is not open to full-time students

*SHORT SHORTS is a relatively open scheme in terms of the new talent that may apply. Any completed short film, including college work, is likely to be regarded as adequate qualification, but BSÉ/IFB reserves the right to exclude an application where previous work is of a particularly poor standard.

Procedure 
Application deadline for SHORT SHORTS to be produced in 2009 is Friday, 8th May.

Application forms should be downloaded from BSÉ/IFB's website, completed in full, and sent - together with all the additional materials requested - to BSÉ/IFB's head office in Galway. (It is not possible to apply for BSÉ/IFB funding by fax or online.) Incomplete applications will not be processed.

Submissions will be examined, with consideration given to the screenplay and the creative team, by a group of assessors put together by BSÉ/IFB from in-house and externally. A shortlist of around 10 teams will be drawn up, who will be invited to attend an interview.

Awards will be made to up to seven teams, the number of SHORT SHORTS to be funded being dependent upon the overall standard of submissions. Teams selected must attend an information day in order to be entitled to claim their funding.

Rights
Copyright in films made under the SHORT SHORTS scheme will remain with the filmmaking team. However BSÉ/IFB will be assigned all distribution rights in Ireland in perpetuity and will appoint a sales agent for the scheme to handle distribution rights in the rest of the world for a period of five (5) years. After that five (5) year period, all rights in the rest of world will revert to the filmmaking team.

Important Features of the Scheme
• As a general rule SHORT SHORTS films should be originated and creatively led by Irish talent or talent resident in Ireland, and their production should be practically managed from Ireland.

• The following rates will apply to the production budgets of all films made under the scheme:
- Daily rate for all cast and crew (as agreed annually with the
Film Group of Unions) June 2008-June 2009: €120

• BSÉ/IFB will have approval rights over the following elements of all films made under the scheme:
     -  Shooting script (and BSÉ/IFB may appoint a script editor in 
        certain cases)
     -  Casting
     -  Key technical crew


SHORT SHORTS EXTRA

BSÉ/IFB's budget allocation for this scheme also includes resources for the funding of three further films of 3-5 minutes in length, which will be awarded on an ad hoc basis throughout the year to new filmmakers in order to enable them to make a ‘pilot' film before embarking on their first feature. This will occur where the BSÉ/IFB's Project Group has made an in-principle commitment of production funding to a feature project, but feels that the director (together with the producer and/or writer in some cases) needs to gain experience and provide proof of ability before BSÉ/IFB greenlights its contribution to a full-length film budget.

SHORT SHORTS EXTRA films will be subject to the same budget and duration constraints as regular SHORT SHORTS but will not be required to conform to the year's chosen genre.

 

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