48 Hour Film Competition



Welcome to the 48 Hour Film Competition!

Friday, November 9th through Sunday, November 11th

The clock starts on Friday night at 8:00. After that, it is up to your team of filmmakers to write, shoot, and edit a movie before 8:00 on Sunday!

The time constraint of 48 hours energizes the filmmaking process and challenges students to put their visions into action. The result is a whirlwind weekend of filmmaking and the satisfaction of a finished product at the end. Our goal is to promote creativity and filmmaking, and to light the spark under hopeful filmmakers across the country.

Here's how it works:
  • Register your team (up to 10 undergraduate students from any school) by emailing iffprogramming@gmail.com before November 8th at 11:59pm with your group name, leader, members, and school.
  • At exactly 8:00pm on November 9th, prompts will go out via email. Filmmakers will be asked to include these prompts in their film: a specific line of dialogue, prop, character, action, and setting.
  • All material must be original (no stock footage filmed outside the 48 hours allowed!) and submitted online (a link to YouTube will be fine).
Prizes:
  • $200 for 1st place
  • $100 for 2nd place
Official Rules: To be eligible to participate in the 48-Hour Film Competition, the filmmaker or team must adhere to the following rules:
  1. The Film submitted to the Contest shall be created in whole within the 48-hour time slot allotted. Works that are submitted after the deadline shall not be considered in the judging or audience voting. All creative processes must be done within this time period, including scripting, shooting, costuming, set design, editing, rehearsing, sound design, etc. The only work that is allowed to have taken place is the organization of cast/crew, and securing equipment and shooting locations.
  2. All footage used in the film must be created within the 48-hour time slot. No stock footage or previously shot footage allowed. Animation is allowed, as long as it was created within the 48-hour time slot.
  3. All music used in the soundtrack of the film, must be original music created and recorded within the 48-hour time slot. Pre-recorded music is allowed as long as you have the rights to this music. Sound effects must be created and recorded during the allotted 48-hours unless you own the rights to pre-recorded sound effects.
  4. The film must be at least 5 minutes and no more than 7 minutes in length (excluding the credits, which may be an additional 30 seconds).
  5. Teams must have no more than 10 members.
  6. The director must currently be attending an accredited high school, college, or university. The submission must be emailed from the director's school e-mail address. The competition is limited to high school students and undergraduate college students.
  7. Film submissions must include at least one prompt from each prompt category provided and should be appropriate material.
  8. The competition will begin on November 9th at 8:00pm, when prompts will be sent to all teams. Everything must be submitted digitally online by 8:00pm on Sunday, November 11th at 8:00pm.

Staff Login