Launched by the Manchester Animation Festival, the initiative will select 6 projects for a 7-month, BFI-backed program built to get UK animated features to market; submissions open through August 16.
Manchester Animation Festival has launched Animation Featured, billed as the UK's first go-to-market accelerator for feature animation producers, supported by the BFI National Lottery Creative Challenge Fund with additional backing from Screen Scotland and Northern Ireland Screen.
The seven-month program runs from September 28 to March 25 and will select six feature-length animated projects. It comprises roughly 115 hours of taught sessions built around two residential weeks, attendance at Manchester Animation Festival in November and an international industry event in Europe in March, alongside online workshops and mentor meetings.
Participants are paid for all taught sessions, residencies and mentor meetings, with travel and accommodation covered. Submissions are now open and close August 16 at 11:59 p.m., with full details and the application on the festival's site.
The program is mentored by producer Ruth Fielding, joint managing director of Lupus Films, whose credits include Kensuke's Kingdom and Ethel & Ernest, and producer Richard Beek, whose credits include Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon and Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl.
Applicants must be UK residents aged 18 or over, not in full-time education, and emerging producers with a maximum of three features produced. Projects must be standalone animated features of 70 minutes or more, must be the producer's first, second or third feature, must be in early-to-mid development, and must be capable of British Film certification.
Source: Animation Featured
Dan Sarto is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network.
