Regular submissions open on 1st March 2024!

2023 Event Trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-7hHNoU8do

Nightpiece Film Festival 2024 will be the 11th consecutive season since the event's Edinburgh Festival Fringe debut in 2014. We are champions of independent filmmaking. Our ethos and output reflects this.

We've now screened over 335+ multi-genre short films by filmmakers from over 70 countries across the World. We're a simple event focused on showcasing films in one of EdFringe's most comfortable venue spaces; the 152 capacity amphitheatre theSpace @ Symposium Hall (v43) on Hill Square off Nicolson Street.

As ever, we are looking for short form content from across the globe and are open to anything that might work across all categories except features. We are a long established event within the Edinburgh Festival Fringe (the World's Largest Arts Festival) and Nightpiece is a great focal point to launch your film, get networking and see what else Edinburgh has to offer during festival time..

Organised and hosted by filmmaker Al Carretta, we are particularly interested in filmmakers who achieve exceptional output on limited resources. Al has delivered 22 indie feature films since 2010 and is exceptionally well versed in the difficulties faced by filmmakers at all stages of the production process.

The event dateline is expected to be Week 3 (Mon 19 - Sat 24 August 2024). This will be fully confirmed by Fringe programme launch in April.

https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/nightpiece-film-festival

Nightpiece Film Festival Social Media Links

Since 2014 we've now showcased over 335+ films! Trailers and previous programmes can be found on YouTube, Vimeo and Issuu. There are many informative blogs written by Al Carretta in Stage32.com and Nightpiece output is available across streaming provides such as Apple TV, Amazon Prime, Tubi, Roku and many others. Check our IMDb for the full production list and note that the @nightpiece Film Festival page on X/Twitter or the @alcarretta filmmaker page are always the most up to date social media sources.

None.

GENERAL RULES & ETHOS - 2024

Please read carefully.

Entry to the Nightpiece Film Festival is considered as follows.

Section A.1
GUIDELINES FOR THE CURATED PROGRAMME (ALL SUBMISSIONS from 2021 onwards)

All Entry Categories

1. From 2021 your short film can be submitted with no restriction on screening status;
simply enter the right category UK or Europe/Rest of World to help us with programming.

2. Short Films must be between 0m10s and less than 15m00s in length.

3. Your film or production company is expected to run it's own respective Social Media campaign for the film. Acknowledgement of your film's inclusion in the programme is an essential process of our marketing campaign and should be a priority for your film too. We reserve the right to de-select your film if you do not make basic efforts to promote your work.

4. For general guidance, films should align with the following statements:

- Be of a rating that roughly aligns with ‘BBFC’ Classifications e.g. PG / 12A / 15 / 18
- Be of clear narrative construction.
- Be of a technically screenable quality.
- Be made after Summer 2023.

5. We reserve the right to de-select your film if it falls a basic Quality Control (QC) review. Poor quality audio - where dialogue is unintelligible or overly processed with noise-reduction - is usually the biggest reason for a rejection on this basis.

6. Our preferred specs for the screener are as follows:

Resolution: 1920x1080 16:9, HD (2k)
3840x2160 16:9, UHD (4k)
Audio: Stereo
Format: Quicktime ProRes 422 (HQ)
Frame rate: 23.98fps or 25fps

Try not to submit odd aspect ratios (e.g.1920x806). If the ratio is odd put your finished film in a 1920x1080 HD or 3840x2160 container.

If selected, please supply films as soon as possible via WeTransfer, Google Drive or set 'downloads enabled' on a private Vimeo link.

7. If picked as an early selection, we need an excerpt of your finished film for the trailer before 1st June 2023. (These dates subject to change year on year as per Festival requirements)

8. The early selection is usually announced early June to coincide with EdFringe Programme launch day, however additional selections are made beyond this point up until the latest deadline advertised. (These dates subject to change year on year as per Festival requirements) We leave room in our schedule to select late entry films.

9. We expect to see a direct acknowledgement of your acceptance of the film into the programme no more than 14 days after the selection notification from FilmFreeway. In the case of 'late' selections we need confirmation within 48hrs. If you DO NOT acknowledge your film's inclusion it is unlikely we will screen your film.

10. Please include a LOGLINE and or SYNOPSIS in your FilmFreeway application.

11. We reserve the right to reject short films that do not meet the key criteria as detailed above.

Section B
OVERVIEW GUIDANCE

By submitting to the festival the contributor declares that he/she has obtained all necessary rights and permissions to present the film at Nightpiece Film Festival.
The filmmaker must own or have cleared copyright of all aspects of the submitted film. This includes all music and images used. Nightpiece Film Festival accepts no responsibility, financial or otherwise, in regards to clearing copyrighted material.

By submitting a film for consideration to Nightpiece Film Festival the filmmaker/production company grant NFF the right to screen the film throughout the duration of the festival in any capacity and to use the material submitted for promotional purposes prior to the festival.

Section C
FILMMAKER ATTENDANCE

1. As EdFringe has returned to normality post-Covid we do encourage Filmmaker attendance as the Edinburgh Fringe is a massive creative event of which are one event
out of thousands. Pre-Covid, we endeavoured to provide complimentary filmmaker tickets for each selected entry, however, rising event costs that are out of proportion to our submission fee structure, alongside the EdFringe switch to full digital ticketing mean we can no longer offer comps. If the situation changes, selected Filmmakers will be updated closer to the event.

Section D
PRIZES & INCENTIVES

1.Unless specifically announced, no travel or accommodation expenses, incentives
or prizes of any form are offered to Filmmakers participating in the Nightpiece
Film Festival.

Section E
COVID-19 CONSIDERATION

1.We expect the Covid-19 Pandemic to influence our daily lives for the forseeable future.
Should the 2022 Edinburgh Festival Fringe be cancelled contingencies/change of venues etc. will be announced as the situation unfolds, however, we still managed to run the 2020 event and the 2021 event so our efforts will always be on focused on presenting a live event. As per our experiences of recent years, we will inform filmmakers of difficulties as we face them.

SECTION F
DATELINES

1.The 2023 datelines indicated are subject to change or revision.

NIghtpiece Film Festival (Revised October 2022)
Festival Director, Al Carretta

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Kevin R. Thompson

    Had a great time showing our film at the 2023 edition of Nightpiece Film Festival! Al was very communicative and easy to work with. Made it an all around great experience!

    September 2023
  • This was a fantastic festival and I'm thrilled to have had my debut film screened as part of the program. Communication was great and the organiser's passion for film and supporting other filmmakers shone through everything. Proud to have been part of Nightpiece!

    August 2023
  • Jay Sullivan

    I appreciated being selected for the festival. I was not able to attend, but all the communication and requests were very clear and timely.

    October 2022
  • Rob Tode

    So happy we were selected to screen our 2 films, Funny You Should Say That (2022) & The Glass (2022), at your festival this year!

    September 2022
  • Jonathan Hughes

    Great festival. Great communication throughout. Thanks for including us!

    September 2021