Terms and Conditions

1. Entry in the 2023 Focus on Ability Short Film Festival (the Festival) run by NOVA Employment Ltd. (NOVA) is FREE.

2. Video entries (Films) are to be maximum 5.00 minute duration, excluding credits. Any Films longer than 5.00 minutes will not be considered. Captions are encouraged to assist hearing impaired audiences, but not compulsory.

3. NOVA reserves the right to exclude any entry they consider inappropriate. This may include any video that, in NOVA Employment Ltd's opinion, contains racist, sexist, violent, discriminatory material or is otherwise likely to offend community standards.

4. The entry form must be correctly completed, accompany your Films and be received/sent by closing date 21st July, 2023. (Films may be placed in the post on 21st July, 2023. They will be time stamped)

5. All films must have an ability/disability theme or have people with disability as the main actor/actresses in the entry.

6. Each entrant is responsible for their own transit insurance, postage and production costs*. *Please do not post USBs in regular envelopes as they are at risk of being ripped during the mailing process.

7. Confirmation of receipt of entry will be sent via email within a week of receipt.

8. Films meeting the entry requirements will be uploaded to NOVA's website and identified as entrants to the 2023 Focus on Ability short film festival

9. Online voting dates will run for 1 week. International Voting week is August 8-14. Australian and School Voting week is August 16-22.

10. We would prefer entries to be submitted electronically. It is preferable that they be submitted in high resolution, ideally an MP4. NOVA will still accept files not in this format. Please try and keep electronic submissions under 700mb. Please email your submission along with the completed entry form and additional material to [email protected]. We recommend using www.wetransfer.com

11. It is the responsibility of the entrants to inform NOVA of any changes to contact details. Please include a valid email address as most correspondence is via email. Please do not use school email addresses.

12. Entries will become the property of NOVA Employment Ltd

13. All entrants retain copyright to their films and can submit their films into other festivals.

14. The entrants grant NOVA a non-exclusive, non-transferable, world-wide, royalty free licence for 10 years commencing from the date of announcement of the winners, to use, publish and communicate their Films including online and as part of NOVA's training resources for the sole purpose of promoting the Competition and/or NOVA and its programs, including NOVA's advocacy for people with disability (Permitted Purpose). Any use beyond the Permitted Purpose requires the prior written consent of the winner

15. NOVA will attribute all Films wherever it uses the Films, in the following format:
Name of Film:
Year of Production:
Name of Entrant:

16. Entrants are solely responsible for ensuring that all necessary copyright and other relevant rights and authorisations for their Films have been obtained prior to submitting their entry. NOVA takes no responsibility for any failure by an Entrant to obtain the necessary authorisations.

17. A Film must not have been submitted to this festival in previous years.

18. NOVA's and the judging panels decision as to the winners in each category and other prize winners is final and conclusive and no correspondence regarding this will be entered into following the competition.