The four mentors who will guide the finalists for this year's Yarns - Stitch and Homespun's prestigious annual short film competition - have been announced.The mentors are Meji Alabi, director at RSA/Black Dog Films; Marta Bobic, executive producer and MD at CANADA London; Ninian Doff, director at Pulse Films; and Keith McCarthy, director at Stink Films. As with previous years, each of the mentors will partner with the four finalists of this year's competition - Tom Gentle and Sam Brain, Holly Hunter, Juliet Klottrup, Doug Redfern and Joe Roberts - to help them navigate the process from script development to post-production, and create the best possible short film.The scripts of the four short films have all been written inspired by the brief for this year's competition, titled The Ends. After they have been shot, each film will be cut by one of four editors on the Homespun roster: Luke Anderson, Chris Hutchings, Laura Reyes and Laura Zvarikova.A former Senior Creative and Director at Channel 4’s award-winning 4Creative, Keith McCarthy is a masterful visual storyteller, with a distinctive style that combines stunning cinematography and a wry sense of humour. His work for C4’s The Grand National struck a chord globally, and recent collaborations have brought wins and nominations at BAFTA, D&AD, British Arrows, Cannes Lions and Creative Circle.McCarthy returns to the Yarns process having been a mentor on last year’s winning Yarns film, Emma Parkinson’s Dishes, Dishes, Dishes. This year, he will be working alongside director Holly Hunter on her film Banana Boat, cut by Homespun editor Laura Zvarikova.“Mentoring a Yarns finalist is always a brilliant experience, and I feel very lucky that I’ve been asked back for another year," says McCarthy. "Getting the chance to be involved with one of the best independent short film competitions in the UK is a special thing, but it’s also great to learn a few things from the amazing talent that has made it through to the final. I can’t wait to get started and hopefully continue the winning streak!”Marta Bobic is also returning for a second stint as mentor at Yarns. Having joined CANADA in 2015, she has helped to bring an expanding roster of directors to British shores as EP and MD of CANADA London. She will be working alongside Juliet Klottrup on her film ‘Travelling Home’. The short will be edited by Luke Anderson, who cut last year’s winning film.“I’m so excited to be returning as a Yarns mentor for a second time," she says. "It’s a real honour to help support talented filmmakers and I can’t wait to see Juliet’s vision come to life. I've always admired Yarns and its mission to support new talent, not to mention watching the great films that are produced each year. It's such an important project for bringing new voices and ideas to our industry, so I can’t wait to see what gets produced this year."Meji Alabi is a director and photographer who bridges the gap between African and Western markets. Creating everything from music videos to advertising campaigns, he is also a co-founder of Lagos-based creative production company JM Films. Signed in the UK to Ridley Scott's RSA Films, Meji’s recent work includes music videos for Stormzy, Wizkid ft Burna Boy, and Leigh-Anne ft Ayra Starr as well as campaigns for Disney, Fanta, Guinness and KFC.He will be working alongside Tom Gentle and Sam Brain on their film Do You Have Kids, to be cut by Homespun editor Chris Hutchings. He is also another returnee as a Yarns mentor."It's my pleasure to be working with Yarns again, especially when the filmmakers are as talented as Tom and Sam," he says. "Yarns is a unique opportunity for young directors to get their start, and their short has both an amazing idea and script. To be collaborating with a writer and director has been an awesome experience, and hopefully we’ll see more of these competitions that help filmmakers of all types get their ideas out there!”Ninian Doff is an award-winning director whose body of work spans music videos, commercials, and feature film. Previously winning Best Director at the UKMVAs, and several awards for his Run the Jewels promo Love Again, he has since created a string of blockbuster commercials for brands such as Apple, McDonald’s, Three, Ikea and Sainsbury’s.Doff is celebrated for his cinematic approach, intertwining comedy with the surreal, his debut feature Get Duked earned the SXSW Audience Prize. He is also returning as a Yarns mentor, and he will be lending his vast experience to Doug Redfern and Joe Roberts on their film Mr. Biscuit. The film will be cut by Homespun editor Laura Reyes.Each of the mentors is an industry powerhouse.“I'm super happy to be mentoring at Yarns again," he says. "It's such a great opportunity for new directors. Doug and Joe wrote a great script and can't wait to see how it turns out and hopefully I'm of some help along the way!"Homespun co-owner Tim Hardy has added that he is delighted to welcome back the four mentors for another year of Yarns. "Each of them is an industry powerhouse, with wins at BAFTA, Cannes Lions and British Arrows to name but a few," says Hardy. "Our young filmmakers are already working hard shooting their films, and getting to work alongside such a talented group of mentors is an experience I know they won’t forget!”Together with the support from their mentors, Yarns also sees the aspiring directors’ partner with some of the industry’s foremost talent to create their film. The finalists will benefit from experts across production and post, including sponsors Kodak and Slingshot Intergalactic, as well as post-production partners Freefolk, nineteentwenty, Absolute and Sine.“We’re delighted that our finalists will again have some of the best in the business working on their films," says Homespun co-owner Leo King. "From post to sound, our finalists have always worked with the best up-and-coming talent from across the industry."It’s long been a cornerstone of the Yarns mission, and we’re very proud to say that this will be the case again this year. We can’t wait to see Yarns give a platform to another cohort of talented people.”• More information about the Yarns finalists here; and about Homespun's editors here

The 2023 edition of Yarns, Stitch Editing's short film competition for unsigned directors, has now launched, with a brief titled The Ends, in a collaboration with acclaimed spoken word artist, poet and writer Miss Yankey.This year's Yarns asks entrants to think about the end of their short film first. Miss Yankey - one of the UK’s leading spoken word artists, known for her work on BBC Radio 1XTRA, BT Sport and BAFTA-winning show Life and Rhymes - has selected three excerpts of her poems for the brief, from which competitors will be asked to take their inspiration. Entrants will be asked to use the excerpts to create the ending of their film - in the form of dialogue, script direction or another creative idea. But how the story leads to that point is entirely up to them.On her involvement in this year's competition, Miss Yankey explains: "I paint pictures with words, and bring them to life with Spoken Word performance, with much of my work beginning as free writes written in response to prompts. Yarns have created a space for up-and-coming talent to do something remarkable, and to know that this year's prompts have been taken frommy work is an absolute honour."I am incredibly passionate about bringing Spoken Word into new spaces, so to have an opportunity to inspire filmmakers to create from the seeds of my poetry blows my mind. I cannot wait to see what comes from this year's talent!"Above: Spoken word artist Miss Yankey, who is collaborating with Stitch Editing's filmmaking competition Yarns this year To have an opportunity to inspire filmmakers to create from the seeds of my poetry blows my mind.Having returned with a bang last year after a two-year break due to the pandemic, Yarns will again look to uncover the country’s best unsigned directors - in association with Kodak and Sling Shot Intergalactic. The competition has regularly discovered new directing talent, by giving entrants the chance to create a professional short film - including last year's winner Emma Parkinson, who then signed with Blink Productions. “Without sounding super cheesy, Yarns quite literally changed my life," says Parkinson. "It enabled me to take some massive steps forward in my career as a director, and importantly, you get the means to actually make a film with some of the industrys best (and have fun in the process).”Owner of Stitch Editing, Leo King adds: “We’re so excited to launch our brief for Yarns this year and to be collaborating with Miss Yankey is a real privilege. We have long been fans of her work, so to be using her pieces as our brief is such an exciting new avenue for the competition. We had an amazing group of finalists last year, so we’re looking forward to continuing that momentum and uncovering the next generation of directing talent."Entrants have until 11:59pm on 5th May 2023 to submit their idea, in the form of a script, treatment and short video about themselves. Three finalists will be shortlisted, and Stitch will provide £2,000 funding, plus production and post-production support to make each film from concept to final edit. Finalists will be announced in June, following in-house judging from theentire Stitch team. An awards night will take place in November where the final three films will be screened and winner announced.The brief can be downloaded at ends.yarnsfilm.co.uk with further information about the competition available at yarnsfilm.co.uk.

As an alternative to the usual premiere of winners at the Cannes Film Festival, renowned Super 8mm competition Straight 8 is presenting the eight winners of their 2020 competition in a free global live stream on Wednesday June 24th.Announced last Friday, June 19th, the winners were chosen from the second highest number of entries - more than 200 - in the 21-year history of Straight 8, where entrants shoot a film on a single cartridge of Super 8mm film, and then submit their unprocessed cartridge to the competition.With entries coming from 26 countries this year, the eight winners were chosen by a panel including Katie Metcalfe​, shorts programmer, Sundance Film Festival and video commissioner, NOWNESS; J​oanna Duncombe,​ film programme manager, British Council; award-winning film editor J​ustine Wright​ (L​ast King of Scotland, Locke, Yardie​); Academy-Award nominated DoP ​Robbie Ryan​ (A​merican Honey, The Favourite, Marriage Story)​; and BAFTA, Grammy and Academy-Award winning director A​sif Kapadia​ (S​enna, Amy, Diego Maradona)​.The 45 minute show will showcase the 8 winning films and is packed with bonus content, including commentary from the judges and special guests, plus behind-the-scenes footage and interviews from the filmmakers. The show takes place at 8pm BST on June 24th at www.straight8.net. The straight 8 2020 selection is as follows:● “​Crumbs​” (stop-frame animation) by Robot Chocolate / Gabriela Plačková & Robert Hloz. Prague, Czech Republic.● “​A Portrait”​ (documentary) by Carlotta Beck Peccoz. London, UK.● “​Moving Forward​” (satirical comedy) by Ben Slotover. London, UK.● “​OK Commuter”​ (hand-drawn animation) by Ben Walden. Hove, UK.● “​Fly Home​” (comedy-drama) by Joshua Kerr. Newcastle, UK.● “​Daily Life​” (stop-frame animation) by Eugen Stemmle. Aumhüle, Germany.● “​Total Control”​ (comedy) by David Ross. Fort St John, Canada.● “​Oasis”​ (drama) by Kyle Camerer and Greg Hatton. Santa Monica, USA. (Filmed on location in Hawaii)Straight 8 Founder​,​ Ed Sayers comments:​ “Making a short film in the straight 8 way is an incredible challenge for filmmakers. Being allowed one roll of Super 8mm film, with only in-camera editing, and no post-production, means that directors need to be smart: to plan amazingly well and then adapt on the spot when things inevitably change. This year’s selection is superb and because of everything going on in the world, we’ve also adapted and we now have the joy of sharing the films to the whole world at once.”All the Straight 8 2020 films were made before the Covid-19 crisis. By contrast, the more recent Straight 8 Shootout competition - where creative companies compete by straight 8 rules for charity - were made under strict lockdown conditions. Those films will now also be revealed live online at www.straight8.net on June 25th at 2pm. And the Top 25 films from the Straight 8 2020 competition will be shown at 8pm on June 26th.

Homespun Yarns has just launched for 2020, with a new, one-off format necessitated by the pandemic crisis: G.O.A.T. Rather than commissioning new films to be made in the coming months, as normal, the filmmaking competition run by editing company Stitch has been reimagined to look back through its back catalogue of entries to find the G.O.A.T. - Greatest Of All Time.During June, people can view the films made under the Homespun Yarns scheme in the past six years, and vote for their favourites. The Yarns films in the back catalogue have have been split into four categories: documentary, comedy, fantasy and drama. These categories will be released weekly for voting on the Homespun Yarns website.Voting will be open until July 3rd. The winner of each category will be announced and out of those four winners, the one with the most votes will be the G.O.A.T. Set up in 2014, the entirely not-for-profit initiative conceived and funded by Stitch has consistently identified the next wave of directing talent and given 22 finalists a unique platform to turn their treatments into fully formed short films.“When we realised that Homespun Yarns wouldn’t be possible this year we were thinking of how we could keep the initiative going in a pandemic safe way," says Stitch owner Tim Hardy. "We liked the idea of a retrospective as an interesting way to celebrate the achievements of everyone who has been involved in the films since we started. From this we came up with G.O.A.T., the perfect way to keep the competition element alive as well as the initiative itself.”Yarns has also had support from other companies within the industry who collaborate with, and help the filmmakers with their time, expertise and sponsorship. Kodak, The Panavision Group, Wave Music, Universal Music, Globe, Decca Records, Slingshot, Nineteen Twenty, Freefolk and Big Buoy have all been crucial in the success of the competition as well as the individual films.“We are incredibly lucky to have the very best in the business on board with Yarns," says Stitch owner Leo King. "Our partners are all involved from the pre-production stages to advise our directors and guide them through their areas of excellence. This has also allowed everyone involved to to establish contacts at the beginning of their careers that they have been able to build on for their future filmmaking.”• For more information follow @homespunyarns.tv on instagram. Regular content will be posted during the voting period. Watch the trailer, watch the films, and vote for the G.O.A.T., at www.homespunyarns.tv.

Homespun, the music video and content arm of Stitch Editing, have announced the three finalists for their sixth annual film competition, Homespun Yarns, and, for the first time, mentor pairings with an established director for each finalist, to guide them through the whole filmmaking process.Amelia Dimoldenberg, best known as the host of YouTube hit Chicken Shop Date, will make her directing debut in the Yarns competition, being mentored by six-time BAFTA nominee and two-time BAFTA winner Declan Lowney (Another Film Company); Jamie Gyngell, who recently directed the zom-com themed video for Beach Baby's Human Remains, is mentored by Keith McCarthy (Stink Films), who’s string of awards include BAFTA, D&AD, British Arrows and Cannes Lions; and Catherine Humble and Claire Norowzian, an academic and in-house creative respectively, will be making their first film for the Yarns competition, being mentored by Georgi Banks-Davies (Skunk), whose film, Garfield, played at the 2018 Sundance film festival and most recent short, The Fight, premiered at Palm Springs Film Festival. This year’s brief, in association with Kodak, titled “1000 words”, invited entrants to work up a story idea based on a single image that had to be central to their concept. The image was provided to Homespun Yarns by photographer Josh Kern through Kodak, and as a result, the competitoin attracted a record number of entries to the competition - more than double on previous years. A shortlist of nine met the Homespun panel and impressed them with their interpretation of the brief as well as their pitches. Homespun, EP Alice Clarke says the overall standard of entries was extremely high, making the job of choosing the three finalists even more difficult than previously. "As usual we had our work cut out but even more so this year given the staggering amount of entries," she commented. "We have three very special finalists and we’re looking forward to seeing how their films develop – especially with this year’s added bonus of three outstanding director mentors for them to work with.” The Homespun Yarns finalists for 2019 are:Amelia Dimoldenberg - director mentor: Declan Lowney (Another Film Company)Over the past five years, since debuting Chicken Shop Date, as a student side-project, Amelia has fronted shows for Channel 4, ITV, VICE and Copa 90. Throughout her entirely self-funded video series (26 million streams spanning 30+ episodes), she’s shared chicken nuggets and chips with some of entertainment’s heaviest hitters including Santan Dave, Wiley and Big Narstie. Amelia is now looking to explore the other side of the camera with her Yarn’s film as her directing debut.Jamie Gyngell - director mentor: Keith McCarthy (Stink Films)Jamie began his directing life making club promos and comedy sketches, which are probably still lurking somewhere on the internet. His film Big Dog, a grounded supernatural horror, was funded by Film London’s 'London Calling’ scheme, while Behind The Filter, a bleak view into the lonely lives of instagram influencers - made with Phoebe Walsh - is in development with Big Talk. His latest short, a contained horror called Listen To Your Mother, is shooting this Autumn.Catherine Humble & Claire Norowzian - director mentor: Georgi Banks-Davies (Skunk)Catherine Humble is a visiting lecturer in English and Creative Writing at Kingston University, and has a PhD on Raymond Carver. She has published numerous essays on American literature, film, and psychoanalysis, and is a longstanding arts journalist for several publications, including the TLS, the Telegraph, Prospect, and the Independent. As well as editing fiction and non-fiction, she has published poetry and short stories, and is keen to make the move into filmmaking. Claire Norowzian is an in house creative who started her career in broadcasting at MTV followed by Nickelodeon, where she began writing and directing promos and went on to win two children’s BAFTAs.The entirely not for profit initiative has consistently identified the next wave of directing talent, providing finalists with a unique platform to turn their treatments into fully formed short films with the support of the industry’s foremost talent.As well as the support from the mentors, the Yarns finalists will also benefit from a whole host of experts, including; Kodak, The Panavision Group, Wave, Performance Film & Media Insurance, Freefolk, Big Buoy and 1920.The awards night will take place on November 21st where the final three films will be screened and winner announced.

One super 8 cartridge no editing film challenge straight 8 has opened its doors to the straight 8 shootout challenge - a 2019 charity ​shootout​ format for all creative companies around the globe, where the accepted entries and resulting films will be screened for the first time ever at an event at the Cannes Film Festival in June.A maximum of 20 companies can register for the event to make a film and registration is open now, with entry of films open from April 1st 2019. More info can be found at www.straight8.net/shootout. The straight 8 shootout challenge is to make a 2.5 minute short film created entirely in-camera on just one cartridge of Super 8mm film. Every shot is taken in story order, with no opportunity for re-takes or editing. Any visual effects, colouring and titling must be done the old-fashioned way: as part of the shoot, with the camera. Super 8 doesn’t record sound, so soundtracks are made ‘blind’ and must be original.Entrants send their exposed but un-developed film cartridges to straight 8 partners Cinelab London who process and scan the films. straight 8 then lines up each soundtrack with the first frame of each film. It’s that ‘simple’.And then the first time anyone sees even their own work - no matter how or if it came out - is at the premiere in a huge cinema in Cannes in June, packed with an audience of their peers and competitors. A live vote at the cinema immediately follows the screening and winning companies donate prize money to the charities of their choice, as well as taking home a recycled camera trophy made by shootout sponsors, Machine Shop.Because every film is shown at the premiere, 20 is the maximum number of companies that may enter. To have a chance to enter, interested companies must register on the straight 8 site ASAP. This year a special 21st entry is being donated by straight 8 to British Arrows Doorways, which finds and engages with young people from all backgrounds and connects them with the advertising industry. So be careful who you’re up against.straight 8 is celebrating its 20th birthday this year. Since launching shootout in 2016 with APA London, its success has been proven at Cannes, Ciclope and Adfest and most recently the first straight 8 shootout online with a live online premiere broadcast where entering companies in USA, Canada, Argentina, London, Cape Town, Johannesburg and Tokyo saw their work at 2pm GMT, which was 6am PST and 11pm in Tokyo.Many top companies from around the world have now risen to straight 8’s shootout challenge. See some of the companies who’ve entered and some of the charities who’ve benefited to date, at straight8.net/shootoutThe 2019 competition will premiere at 11am on June 20th at the Arcades Cinema, Cannes. Tickets are already available at straight8.net/shootout. A welcome breakfast for entering teams and ticket-holders will be held from 10am at the cinema - hosted by Madam Films, a long time supporter and first time sponsor of straight 8 shootout. And in partnership with charity cycle ride The FireFlies Tour, £5 from every ticket sold for the premiere will go towards their fundraising for Bloodwise.