Local film contest for youth features $5k in cash prizes

By: Chelsea Humphreys

Thousands of dollars are up for grabs as the Windsor Centre for Film, Digital Media & the Creative Arts partners with The Film Camp for Kids and Youth to hold a contest for youth in the tri-county area.

Anyone aged 11 to 25 from Windsor-Essex, Chatham-Kent and Sarnia-Lambton can submit films that either celebrate something or someone from their area or celebrate Canada.

“The sort of larger idea of it is to start building a film industry in Windsor which will be, I think, important for this sort of art culture in the area and helping local businesses,” said Aaron Fauteux, youth program coordinator at the Film Camp. “The idea is to start young and get them interested. It’s not just supporting the camp, it’s also supporting the media arts centre, which I think is important and good for the community.”

The contest will include $5,000 in cash prizes available for each age group. Submissions are due Oct. 20.

The Windsor Centre for Film, Digital Media & the Creative Arts is a non-profit organization that operates the Film Camp for Kids and Youth every summer. It started as a project five years ago with 25 kids in a two-week camp and has grown into nine weeks of summer camp, featuring a young authors camp for creative writing, a photography camp for high school students and an overnight camp out in Harrow. At the end of each film camp session, the kids screen the films they created over that week to their parents.

“Everyone really likes it,” said Fauteux. “I think local businesses like it too because we go to them for sponsorships … at the end of every summer.”

Fauteux said one of the events many local businesses help sponsor is their annual Open Air Cinema held right in the downtown core where they showcase selected films made by the kids throughout the summer before screening a family film. In return for their sponsorship, local businesses get their logo displayed on the big screen.

The camp is also funded by various grants and sponsorships from local businesses and is located downtown at 586 Ouellette Ave., Another building on Ouellette is currently undergoing renovations and in the next three years will be the home of the Windsor Centre for Film, Digital Media & the Creative Arts.