Rush Process celebrates DIY, handcrafted animation as a vehicle for self-expression. We screen highly personal animation made with physical media, spanning a wide variety of genres, including narrative, documentary, essay, and experimental.

We are the only full-scale animation festival in the state of Texas, and the only animation festival in the US explicitly dedicated to handcrafted animation, a materials-focused practice at the intersection of DIY, auteur-driven cinema and analog animation art.

We welcome submissions made using any non-digital technique, including stop motion, paper cut-out, multiplane, ink & paint on paper, charcoal, chalk, paint- and sand-on-glass, analog rotoscoping, and direct animation on celluloid.

A parallel goal of the festival is to provide our audiences with the opportunity to create animation themselves, via popup animation stations, workshops and collaborative, time-based production challenges.

Our 2018 festival is co-presented and hosted by Aurora Picture Show, a non-profit media arts center that presents artist-made, non-commercial film and video, currently celebrating 20 years of radical film programming in Houston, TX.

Awards & Prizes

RP has juried awards in the Documentary and Narrative categories, and an Audience Award decided upon by festival attendees.

Rules & Terms

-- Narrative submissions must be at least 75% animation
-- Documentary submissions must be at least 50% animation
-- All animation source artwork must be analog (digital assembly, e.g. via scanning or Dragonframe, is okay)
-- Competition films must have been produced in 2015, 2016, 2017, or 2018.
-- Link to a secure Vimeo or YouTube screener greatly preferred over FilmFreeway's native player
-- We are far less interested in screening films that are freely available on the web
-- For films originally not in English, please submit a screener with English captions or burnt-in subtitles
1 Review
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  • John Morena

    Though I wasn't able to attend, it was an honor to be included as a selection at Rush Process 2018. The festival staff was extremely responsive and informative and, from afar, it seemed like a thoughtful festival put together by folks who genuinely care about animation and take pride in running a festival with class. It's difficult to throw a festival that is filmmaker-centric without a submission fee. I encourage anyone who makes handmade animation to submit to this fest because they show quality work and they champion the art form.

    September 2018
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