Can you make a 49Hr film?
If you happen to be just such a hardy soul and enrolled in your friendly neighborhood Big Ten university, then you have most likely signed up to partake in the third annual edition of the 49-Hour Film Competition, sponsored by the Illini Film & Video club at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Non-achievers will simply have to wait until Friday, November 13, 7 p.m. (location TBD) to see and help judge the results. Until then, keep your eye out for camcorder-toting underclassmen roaming the UIUC campus this weekend between 7 p.m. on Friday, November 6, and 8 p.m. on Sunday, November 8, as they attempt to completely plot, photograph, and put together a short film running less than five minutes in which they incorporate “a prop, a line of dialogue, and a shot” per the official Web site.
While 49HrFest follows the tradition of what we like to call “stunt filmmaking,” made as much for the thrill as the creative challenge, the resulting work will oftentimes impress given the restrictions placed on participants. Check out this page on IFV’s main Web site which features streaming video of all the projects from last year’s competition. We’ll let you know where the Competition Class of 2009 will make its debut, so keep the proverbial eye trained on C-U Blogfidential for the scoop!
~ Jason Pankoke