Category Archives: Training and Personal Development

Homespun Yarns Kicks Off 2017 Film Competition

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Talent-nurturing competition opens for its fourth and biggest year yet

Film competition, Homespun Yarns, returns for its fourth successive year, the talent-nurturing competition seeks to support up-and-coming filmmakers and young editors by giving them a space to work on creative projects and form important relationships. Open to anyone from school students right through to fully fledged producers and directors, Homespun Yarn’s will fund four short films this summer.

Since entering the competition as budding filmmakers, Homespun Yarns’ previous winners have all gone on to become fully-fledged directors. 2014 winner Zak Razvi was a music video producer when he submitted his film Jordanne to Homespun Yarns.  Blowing the crowd away with his directorial debut, Zak went on to win an impressive number of awards and accolades at film festivals globally, including Best Documentary at Kinsale Sharks and the Shots Best New Director Award. He is now represented by a major London production company. 2015’s winning entry, the heart-warming comedy, ‘Vanya’, was Caroline Hicks’ second short film. She’s now in the midst of directing a feature. 2015 also saw the youngest ever entrant, sixth-former Florence Winter-Hill, shortlisted and funded in 2015.

Commenting on the experience Florence says: “I absolutely loved doing the Homespun Yarns competition – it was so wonderful to work with everyone at Stitch and the experience was incredible. For a 17 year-old it was a huge opportunity! I learnt an invaluable amount and loved every second. Since Homespun Yarns I’ve been signed as a director at Sugarcane Media for music videos, commercials and shorts. I’m currently 18 and only recently left studying A-levels, so this was a huge deal for me. I’ve been working full time as a VFX Production Assistant at Industrial Light & Magic on the VFX of Star Wars VIII for 5 months now too. I’m also shooting a 20 minute short film that I have been working on for over a year now, starring Les Miserable’s ‘Young Cossette’, Isabelle Allen!”

Last year, a record number of filmmakers submitted their ideas for a short film inspired by Lyves’ haunting track, ‘Darkest Hour’, for which the editing collective partnered with Wave Music. The four shortlisted films were screened at the Ministry of Sound to an audience of over 350 people, including industry professionals and press, who voted Thomas Ralph’s topical post-Brexit documentary on Britain’s youth as the winning film.

Homespun Yarns is a competition run by editing collective Homespun. The collective was created to shine a light on the creative projects – music videos and short films – that can sometimes be overlooked in favour of commercial budgets. It crucially enables the younger editors at mother-company, STITCH, to start all-important director-editor relationships, without which, it can be difficult to kick-start a career.

This year’s theme will be announced along with the call for entries on March 22nd

For more information about Homespun and how to enter please contact Alice Clarke, e: alice@stitchediting.tv t: +44 (0)20 3056 5000

Opportunities at the Canterbury Festival

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Canterbury Festival are looking for submissions for works of Dance and Performance for their Made in Kent Competition, offering dance companies and artists the opportunity to perform in the popular Festival venue of St Mary’s Studio Theatre as part of the 2017 Canterbury Festival.

More information on the dance competition can be found here.

More information on the performance competition can be found here.

The Canterbury Festival Poet of the Year Competition 2017 has also just launched so now is the time to release that inner poet and put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and send in your poems, limericks, ballads, odes, haikus, whatever! More information.

Finally, the Festival are also currently looking for volunteers! 

By volunteering with the Festival, individuals will

  • gain experience of customer care and events management
  • meet new people and be part of a friendly team
  • feel a sense of achievement
  • be supporting the arts in Canterbury
  • enjoy high quality performances (although often it is not possible to see the whole show)

As the public face of the Canterbury Festival, volunteers provide a customer friendly service for the audience.  Volunteers have the chance to experience different roles within the festival.  The Festival will seek to give you the support you require, and training where appropriate and in return ask for 100% attendance and involvement.  It is a mutual commitment.

For enquiries please contact Mark Burford, Business Manager at mark@canterburyfestival.co.uk.

Humanities for Hire

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The School of Arts is committed to preparing students for the world of work, and our Arts degrees open up a broad and diverse range of career paths. We have teamed up with Schools across the Faculty of Humanities to create ‘Humanities for Hire’: a series of events to offer you advice, support, and to spark ideas about where your future might lead you.

Together with the award-winning Careers and Employability Service and Kent Union, academic Schools from across the Faculty are offering a host of events.  Do you want to develop your key employability skills, like how to present your CV, manage your time, or find work?  Are you thinking about future training and study? Do you want to gain an insight into your potential future career? #HumsforHire aims to help you do all this and more

We have events running across the Canterbury campus between 6-17th March, including the University’s Postgraduate Study Open Evening (Tues 7th March) and the Jobshop annual recruitment fair (Tues 14th March).  Head to https://careers.kent.ac.uk/ to book your place at each event, and join the conversation on Twitter using #humsforhire

‘The Big Questions’ Work Experience Opportunity

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The Big Questions

Broadcasting from CANTERBURY

Saturday 11th & Sunday 12th March 2017

WORK EXPERIENCE OPPORTUNITY

The Big Questions will be in Canterbury on Saturday the 11th and Sunday the 12th of March and we would like to invite you to gain valuable work experience with us.

The Big Questions is the BBC’s flagship live religious, ethical and moral debate programme. It is hosted by the experienced television and radio presenter Nicky Campbell, and airs live on Sunday mornings from 10am-11am and from locations all around the country. The show addresses tricky moral questions facing the nation today, consulting front row experts and a select studio audience. Beliefs, informed opinions and personal stories are all aired during three lively debates.

If you’d like to apply for the chance to do work experience on this show, please send your CV to audiencetbq@mentorn.tv

Editors and Sound Recordist Needed

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A postgraduate Film with Practice student is looking for editors that would like to be involved in a short film project that will be filmed Late Apr/ Early May and potentially submitted to festivals.

The film is a drama that deals with the inner thoughts and trickery of its central protagonist as he tries to conquer his mental health. It is around 10-15 minutes and you will be working with content that is filmed in Paris and England. 

There is also potentially an opening for a sound recordist (for boom work only) which will be required to be on-set for filming.

For further details about these enquiries, please contact gk245@kent.ac.uk 

A CAREER IN FILM with Caroline Hewitt

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Date: Thursday 16th March

Time: 6.30pm

Title: A CAREER IN FILM

Caroline Hewitt will discuss her career in film and the changing face of independent film-making from the early ’80’s to the current time.

Wine in the foyer from 6pm. The talk will be followed by a Q&A.

Caroline Hewitt is an eminent Film Producer known for her work on, among many others, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Mr Bean’s Holiday and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. She has just co-produced The Mercy (directed by James Marsh featuring Colin Firth and Rachel Weisz) and Mary Magdalene (directed by Garth Davis featuring Joaquin Pheonix and Rooney Mara), both due to be released this year. Film students are strongly encouraged to attend, but any student with an interest in working in film production is welcome to attend. This talk is likely to be popular and places are limited; booking is strongly advised to avoid disappointment. To book visit Target Connect; https://careers.kent.ac.uk/home.html

JOIN RECOVERING FIRST WORLD WAR THEATRE

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An invitation to join Recovering First World War Theatre…
A nationwide community project researching war plays written and performed during the Great War.
 
Are you interested in the First World War?
Do you like learning about theatrical and cultural history?
Would you like to research long-lost plays?
Are you looking to develop new skills?
If so, then here is a chance to be part of an exciting research project run by Dr Helen Brooks, Gateways co-investigator and theatre historian.
Dr Brooks is looking for members of the public who would like to research theatre during the First World War. You can be based anywhere across the country, or indeed the world, as much of the work will be undertaken using online resources.
 
The project will examine long-lost war plays written between 1914 and 1918 using libraries, archives and online databases.
The results will be published in a public database and shared at a project festival.
 
The work will take place between March and November 2017 and you can work from home, at local libraries and archives or at the British Library.
 
Attendance at one of the training days in March or April is recommended (expenses covered by the project) but an online version will also be available for those who cannot attend in person.
‣ Anyone can apply
‣ No prior experience needed
‣ Travel expenses reimbursed for research
‣ Access to computer required
‣ Contact RFWWT@kent.ac.uk with any questions
 
RFWWT is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and Gateways to the First World War
 
To apply to take part please contact RFWWT@kent.ac.uk for an application form.

Arts Scholarships for Students 2017

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Applications are invited from Young People aged 14 – 25 years resident  or studying in the Canterbury District

The awards are designed to assist with the cost of a special course, a workshop or a project  involving any of the arts :

Music | Dance | Drama | Visual Arts | Multimedia

Auditions will be held on 24th March 2017

Closing date for applications is 12th March 2017

Awards will be announced in April 2017

Application forms available from www.canterburyartscouncil.org.uk  or by

emailing The Scholarship Administrator  scholarships@canterburyartscouncil.org.uk