/bfm-online/prize-regulations.php

15th Big Cartoon Festival
October 28 — November 8, 2021

The Big Cartoon Festival (BCF) — the largest international animation film festival in Russia — will take place in Moscow for the 15th time from October 28 to November 8, 2021 The Festival is planned to be held in the traditional in-person format; however, if necessary, the Festival team will be ready to transfer some of the events or all festival sessions to a dedicated online platform. In 2020, for the first time in its history, BCF organized competitions of Russian and international animated films, which were judged by professional juries. We received over 1,500 applications from 89 countries; 185 animation works were selected for competition.

In 2021, the Big Cartoon Festival will include competition programs for the second time. In addition to independent short films from Russia and countries around the world, the Festival juries will separately evaluate episodes of animated series and films for children. Three juries will work at the next edition of the Festival: the first jury will judge the international competition, the second one — the Russian competition, while the tasks of the third jury will include choosing the best episode of a series and the best children’s cartoon from the international competition.

Maria Tereschenko, BFC Program Director:

“For many years we had remained an out-of- competition festival, and only last year for the first time we put together an official competition program with an international jury on the BCF platform. It was a very encouraging experience that allowed us to see and to show to our viewers very new and very different films, part of which had not had an extended festival history behind them. This year we are expanding the competition program to include children’s films and series, as well as adding a separate prize for non-narrative films

Based on the results of the work of the juries, the following prizes will be awarded at the Festival’s closing ceremony:
      In the International Competition of animated films
    • GRAND PRIХ for Best Short Animated Film
    • AWARD for Best Student Animated Film
    • AWARD for Best Non-narrative Animated Film
    • Special Jury Prize


      In the Russian Competition of animated films
    • AWARD for Best Russian Short Animated Film
    • AWARD for Best Russian Student Animated Film
    • AWARD for Best Russian Animated Film for Children
      • Special Jurys Prize


      In the International Children’s Films Competition
    • AWARD for Best Animated Film for Children


      In the International TV Shows Competition
    • AWARD for Best Episode of TV Show (under 12 y.o.)
    • AWARD for Best Episode of TV Show (over 12 y.o.)


    In addition, journalists and critics working at the Festival will award the Critics Choice Award, and the BCF Management will give out their own prize. And, of course, the Festival cannot do without the Audience Choice Award, one of the main awards for our festival and one highly valued by the directors.

    It will be possible to submit an application for the Festival from May 1 to June 30, 2021 Films are accepted through the FilmFreeWay platform: https://filmfreeway.com/BigCartoonFestival-2021. The results of the selection will be announced no later than August 10 (for international competitions) and August 24 (for the Russian competition). The full program of the BCF-2021 will appear on the Festival’s official website at the end of September 2021

    Program Directors of the Big Cartoon Festival are Dina Goder and Maria Tereschenko.

    Strategic Partner of the Festival is the Mikhail Prokhorov Foundation.

    The Festival is held with the support from the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.

    REGULATIONS

    About Festival

    The Big Cartoon Festival is the largest annual animation festival in Russia. Since 2007, it has been introducing Russian audience to the best examples of Russian and foreign animation. The Festival program includes screenings of full-length films, thematic programs of short animation for adults and children, meetings with leading artists and directors, and master classes on various animation techniques. During recent years, the Festival has been held in Moscow, Voronezh, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Khabarovsk, Norilsk, Togliatti and Lipetsk, and in July 2020 it is held online for the first time.

    15th Big Cartoon Festival (BCF) will take place in Moscow (Russia) between the dates of October 28 – November 8, 2021 The festival assumes offline screenings of all films of the competition programs, but reserves the right to transfer the event completely to the online format if it is impossible or unsafe for the participants to hold screenings in cinemas.

    Competition Programs

    The Festival competitive program includes:
    • a) International Competition of Animated Short Films
    • b) Russian National Competition of Animated Short Films
    • c) International Competition of Animated films for Children
    • d) International competition of Animated Series

    Awards & Prizes

    Jury of the International Competition presents the following prizes:

    GRAND PRIХ for Best Short Animated Film
    AWARD for Best Student Animated Film
    AWARD for Best Non-narrative Animated Film

    Special Jury Prize

    Jury of the Russian Competition presents the following prizes:
    AWARD for Best Russian Short Animated Film
    AWARD for Best Russian Student Animated Film
    AWARD for Best Russian Animated Film for Children

    Special Jury Prize

    Jury of the International Children Competition presents the following prizes:
    AWARD for Best Episode of TV Show (under 12 y.o.)
    AWARD for Best Episode of TV Show (over 12 y.o.)
    AWARD for Best Foreign Animated Film for Children

    Other Prizes

    AUDIENCE CHOICE AWARD
    CRITICS CHOICE AWARD
    PRIZE of the BCF Management


    The Festival has three juries:
    - International jury of the International Competition
    - Russian Jury of the Russian National Competition
    - International jury of the international competition of animated films for children and the international competition of TV shows


    Each jury consists of three persons closely associated with the art of animation.

    The list of members of the jury is formed in the period from July 1 to September 15, 2021 The names of the jury members are announced no later than 4 weeks before the start of the Festival. Films created by members of the jury are not eligible to participate in any of the competition programs that they judge. The decisions of the jury are final. The jury announces the results at the closing ceremony of the Festival on November 8, 2021 The jury has the right to refuse to award a prize in any category, if none of the works, in the opinion of the jury members, meets its standards. The jury has the right to withhold an award in any category where no entries, in the jury’s view, meet its standards for recognition.

    The winners of the Festival will be notified of the receipt of the prize at the closing ceremony (if they are present at it) or after its completion. The Festival sends prizes to film authors via courier delivery at the Festival's expense. If a representative of the winning film is present at the closing ceremony, the prize is handed over to him or her for self-delivery to their destination.

    Rules & Terms

    Submission of applications for the competition is carried out through the form posted on the Festival’s page on the FilmFreeway website.

    Films selected for competitive sections will be screened without screening fees. The festival accepts films from 1 to 30 minutes.

    All films must not have participated in the previous editions of the Festival. All films must have been completed after January 1, 2020

    Films are eligible for the Russian Competition if they are made in Russia or with a substantial contribution of a Russian main crew member.

    Films are eligible for the Foreign Competition if submitted in English or with English subtitles. Each film selected for the Festival can be included in the program of only one competition. The final decision on the inclusion of a film in a particular competition is reserved by the selection committee.

    The Festival will not consider works-in-progress.

    The Festival will not consider advertisements.

    Filmmakers are responsible for sorting out the copyright on their own materials.

    The Festival places no restrictions on your work in terms of premiere status or whether your work has been made available online.

    The festival assumes offline screenings of all films of the competition programs, but reserves the right to transfer the event completely to the online format if it is impossible or unsafe for the participants to hold screenings in cinemas.

    Films selected for the competition can be shown within the framework of the competition programs no more than 4 times in any Moscow cinema or online on the festival platform for 3 days during the festival.

    Public online screenings will be geographically limited to the territory of the Russian Federation. In case of expansion of the screening area, the Festival will notify the representative of the film in a letter about the inclusion of the film in the Festival program.

    All participants of the competition programs, regardless of their location, are provided with free access to the online platform of the Festival to view the competition programs.

    The festival covers the cost of accommodation of nonresident participants of the competition programs of the festival in a Moscow hotel, no more than 2 nights during the festival. The Festival does not cover the cost of purchasing air tickets, train tickets to / from Moscow, taxi tickets to / from the airport to the city, or the cost of food over the duration of the Festival participant's stay in Moscow.

    The Festival can use a maximum 1-minute sequence from the selected films to promote the BCF 2021 in any media. During the Festival, teasers of selected films may be screened at Festival venues, in TV spots promoting the BCF, on the website of the Festival, and in multimedia presentations during the Festival.

    The Festival reserves the right to use film stills in promotional materials (Festival catalogue, Festival journal, leaflets, posters, billboards, website, and multimedia presentations), and provide them to the media for the purpose of disseminating information about the BCF.

    Submission

    Owners of the festival screening rights (hereinafter the “submitters”) may submit their films to the 15th BCF before June 30th, 2021 for all the competition programs. No registration fee is required.

    The sending of a completed entry form and film constitutes a submitter’s full acceptance of the Festival’s rules and regulations.

    Screening Formats & Supplementary Materials

    Submitters must provide a screening copy as a full HD video file (1920x1080) without black bars and/or cropping, encoded with H264 video codec, packed as *.mp4 / *.mov / *.m2ts / *.mkv. As for the audio, general stereo mix (2.0) is OK, encoded with AAC. If there is no h264 version of the film availible, either of the following will be acceptable: ProRes / DCP / BluRay (digital image).

    If the Festival does not receive the required presentation copy in the proper format on or before August 24th, 2021 for the international competition programs and before September 7th, 2021 for the Russian national competition program, the selected work will be withdrawn from the Festival program.

    The Festival also requires three (3) CMYK 300 dpi film stills, film description, dialogue lists (with time codes or an .srt file of English subtitles) and a link to the film trailer where applicable.

    Film description includes a synopsis, duration, country of production, studio of production, year of production, credit list, animation technique used and information about the film's prizes and its participation in competitions of other festivals.