AFDA Annual Film Festival showcases students' films

The festival will be held at Ster-Kinekor Cinema Nouveau in Rosebank, Johannesburg and Cavendish Square, Cape Town on 23 and 24 November respectively, and for the first time in Durban at the Gateway's Cinema Nouveau on 25 November.

"Although it's a fun and exciting event for everyone concerned, the festival is unique as it uses a audience response rubric directly aligned to the learning inputs and modelling process that AFDA utilises." says AFDA chairman Garth Holmes. "This gives students the experience of the visceral emotional response of the audience - a key learning moment in terms of learning to identify and develop audiences for the future."

Festival is online

This year will also see the festival go online for the first time - a pilot process driven by the AFDA digital innovation laboratory and two of its key participants, Wicus Labuschagne and Jeffrey Rusch. "We are constantly sharing and tweeting about experiences, pinning videos for our friends and some might argue that our digital footprint is becoming as much of an identity as the brands we wear on our clothes," says Labuschagne.

The AFDA Online Festival website www.afdafestival.com allows people to interact with the films they see at the cinema festivals. The AFDA Online Festival website will also showcase films that will not be screened at the Cinema Festival. Second year films, fourth year documentaries and even a few first year films will be included online.

The online festival will run for a week after the Ster-Kinekor festival and there will be activities prior and during the festival from 25 to 30 November. For more information go to www.afdafestival.com.