Gear Focus Short Film Contest Winners!

A few months back, we teamed up with Gerald Undone, Patrick Tomasso, and Lee Zavitz and gave our community a little challenge. Check out the short film contest winners announced. With a budget of only $2,500 USD we wanted to see what our talented users could conjure up armed with used gear they already owned. Prove that you can create a compelling short film using less-than-ideal gear and we'll send you a Kinefinity MAVO Edge 6K to up your game. Admittedly, the four of us had no idea what to expect. Was the budget too low? Were the limitations too much of a burden that a quality narrative wouldn't be able to shine through? In our hearts of hearts we all know it isn't the gear that makes the filmmaker, but putting that ethos to the test with 14k on the line is another story. As the submissions rolled in throughout the months our crew became stunned with the results. Not only was our community proving creativity and ingenuity could outweigh the technical limitations of gear, but they exceeded our expectations in every way possible. Of course, after basking in the afterglow of viewing over 200 mind-blowing creations, we were tasked with the most difficult challenge - choosing a winner. Gerald, Patrick and Lee took weeks to make their final decision. Without further ado here are the top three films from our contest:

First Prize - ABYSS

Equipment Used: Camera: Nikon D7100 Lenses: Sigma 18-35mm / Nikon 40mm Macro Lights: Aputure MC / Amaran 100X Mic: Rode NTG USB Mini Budget: $1,560

Second Prize - Hide And Seek

Equipment Used: Camera - Panasonic GH5 - 1400 Lens - Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8 / Helios 58mm Sound - Zoom H5 / Rode NTG2 Budget: $2,470  

Third Prize - Office Space

Equipment Used: - Canon 5D Mk3 - Canon 24-70 Ultrasonic 1 - Original Rhode Video Mic Pro - Dracast LED 500 - Aperture B7c bulb - Aperture MC

Honorable Mentions and Final Thoughts

We wanted to once again thank our community once for their hard work, time, and effort in making this contest a success. As fellow creators, we're so happy to see a network of like-minded individuals striving to showcase their own art in such a unique way. Though we couldn't provide 200 unique prizes, we all know the unspoken prize in this contest is you taking another step in what we hope will be a long and fruitful life of filmmaking. To quote The War On Art  “The most important thing about art is to work. Nothing else matters except sitting down every day and trying.” With that said, we want to leave you with a little inspiration! Be sure to checkout 200 hundreds submission by clicking HERE.Thanks again to everyone for their hard work. Onwards!