White Deer International Film Festival is a bi-monthly and annual celebration of exciting cinematic experiences, not always featured in the mainstream media. Nestled in the heart of Britain, White Deer welcomes all filmmakers to enter their projects into a variety of award categories, to be judged by industry award-winners & film-loving audiences from across the global community. With the aspiration of growing names and talents, White Deer also offers winning entrants the opportunity to share their filmmaking experiences on its podcast and blog channels, through interviews and discussions about their projects. If you’re curious to know more, please email info@whitedeerfest.co.uk or message us on our social media.

At White Deer we believe it is essential to foster the potential of filmmakers who are outside the typical “hotspots” within the UK film industry. Our ethos is that filmmakers can, and should, have opportunities in locations across the world, and not only in big cities. In particular, we are committed to promoting the talents of individuals and groups within a region very close to our heart, the East Midlands, UK. It is here where White Deer was formed, and is based, but also where not enough filmmakers are given the exposure that they deserve. Therefore, we have decided to host separate award categories solely for East Midlands-based applicants, so that many more films from this area can be brought to the attention of global audiences. These categories will be discounted; however, all approved applicants will have the option to “top-up” to our main categories, to be judged alongside global competition at a fair and equal cost to all. It is our hope that this will increase the exposure of East Midlands’ production talent. After all, this beautiful part of the UK has many stories to tell, and we will do our best to see them told.

For further details please see our Rules & Terms section.

Awards & Prizes

Films will be judged in the following categories -

East Midlands Categories:
Best East Midlands Feature
Best East Midlands Short
Best East Midlands Micro Short

Main Categories:
Best Feature
Best Short
Best Micro Short

Winners of the East Midlands and Main categories will be invited to attend our annual screening and presentation ceremony where certificates will be presented.

Genre Categories:
Best Drama
Best Documentary
Best Action
Best Sci Fi
Best Thriller
Best Comedy
Best Horror
Best Romance
Best Experimental
Best Music Video
Best Animation

Technical Categories:
Best Director
Best Acting
Best Ensemble Cast
Best Art Direction
Best Cinematography
Best Editing
Best Visual Effects
Best Hair & Makeup
Best Sound Design
Best Soundtrack
Best Trailer

All winners will receive award certificates and laurels. All nominated films will receive official laurels.

Rules & Terms

To submit a film, you must have created the project yourself, own the
rights or have permission from the owner of the content to submit the
film to us.

We accept short films, feature films, micro shorts, documentaries, music
videos and animation.

Non-English films must have English subtitles.

You must submit to a primary category to be able to then submit to
additional categories.

Feature films: This category is for films above 45 minutes in length.
Short Films: this category is for films between 5 and 45 minutes in length
Micro Shorts: this category is for films 5 minutes and below in length.

To qualify for the East Midlands film categories your principle production crew must be based in an East Midlands, UK location.

Applicants to the East Midlands Categories will have the option to "top-up" their entry by paying the remaining fee to qualify for the Main Categories.

Technical and Genre categories are open to all applicants and do not feature a separate East Midlands category. However, this may change if demand is seen to be high.

WE DO NOT ACCEPT:
1. Amateur videos.
2. Extremist or propaganda content from religious or political
organisations.
3. Films involving politics / films promoting political agenda.
4. Pornography.
5. Films with a poor production standard (bad sound, lack of subtitles/
captions for non-English films, video resolution less than 720p HD).
6. We don’t accept scripts.

If you win at our monthly awards, you will be invited to our annual event.
This will be a time to network with other creatives and have your film
screened.

PLEASE TAKE NOTE OF THE TIME FRAMES OF EACH CATEGORY.
FILMS MUST BE ENTERED INTO THE CORRECT CATEGORY, ELSE BE
AUTOMATICALLY DISQUALIFIED FROM SELECTION.

All films must be submitted in a digital format.