Vote for ITVS with the SXSW Panel Picker!

Public voting for SXSW Interactive 2014 is well underway. Check out ITVS's two panel proposals and vote for your favorites - hurry, voting closes September 6th! 

ITVS is proud to to be part of two proposed panel discussions for next year's SXSW festival in Austin. We may be biased but we think both our panels are very worthy of inclusion in SXSW programming, and we could use your vote. So sign up and give us a thumb’s up! First off is the “New Narratives: Building An Interactive Storyworld” panel that ITVS and some of our partners (Storycode, San Francisco Film Society) are doing around interactive fiction film (e.g. the new Futurestates, some upcoming hackathons, etc.), its emergence as a new and untapped genre, and why it's important for feature makers. 

"This is such an exciting time to be working in digital content - interactive documentaries are everywhere, changing people's notions of how to tell a story,” says Karim Ahmad, Senior Programming Manager at ITVS. “But when you think about the implications of these new platforms for fictional storyworlds, the possibilities are literally limitless. What does an interactive fictional film or web series look like? How do you build one? Why would you even want to build one? These are all the things we're going to explore in our panel.”

ITVS is proudly at the forefront of this emerging genre, creating new opportunities for narrative filmmakers to tell vital, urgent stories in a collaborative and interactive way. “We've established some really exciting partnerships to help us,” adds Ahmad. “Talented folks like Murmur, StoryCode, and our good friends at the SFFS are just as invested as we are in this new genre and the opportunities it provides for independent content makers in today's crowded digital landscape.” 

Our second panel, “Show Me the Money: How to Get Your Film Funded,” will provide filmmakers with a plan of action to help get their passion projects funded. Expert panelists – featuring Independent Lens Series Producer Lois Vossen and Jim Sommers, ITVS Senior Vice President of Content – who make up some of the industry’s top cultivators of original content will present best practices when trying to get your project off the ground, review funding options, and shed light on what makes a funding proposal really stand out.