2011 ATOM Award Winners Announced... Congratulations All!

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2011 ATOM Award Winners Announced... Congratulations All!

MELBOURNE – Monday 24 October, 2011 – ATOM (the Australian Teachers of Media) is pleased to announce the winners of the 2011 ATOM Awards. The ATOM Awards program is designed to recognise and celebrate the excellence displayed by Australian and New Zealand productions made for the screen – be it for the TV screen, theatre screen, computer screen or mobile phone.

The competition was open to anyone who had produced a short film, documentary, animation, electronic game, educational resource, television program or innovative new media work in the past twelve months.

This year’s ATOM Awards program comprised 31 awards in the categories of Film, Television, Documentary, Animation and Multimedia / Video Games).

“This is the 29th year of the ATOM Awards and we were pleased to have yet another fantastic display of the creativity and innovation of our media industry,” commented ATOM Awards Executive Officer, Simon Wilmot.

"We were also delighted to be joined by our hosts Kayne Tremills and Amberley Lobo and our celebrity guest presenters Lisa McCune, James Frecheville, Blair McDonough, Tommy Little, Deniz Akdeniz, Nicole Gulasekharam and Christopher Pang - all of whom were most enthusiastic in their support and encouragement for the future of Australian Screen,” he added.

“To be selected as a finalist is an exceptional achievement, particularly as the judging panel follow a strict selection criteria. The overall quality of the entries to the ATOM Awards and the criteria we set in the judging means that this year’s winners are really standout works in their category. So I congratulate all our finalists and commend the work of all our winners.”

“ATOM is committed to developing the quality of film and video work in education and our 2011 winners set higher standards again this year,” commented Mr Wilmot.

The 2011 ATOM Awards was presented at a gala ceremony, held at the Melbourne Recital Centre, Southbank on Friday 21 October.

And the winners are:

STUDENT - SCHOOL

Best Primary Film Production

The Groundsman
Mayfield State School

Best Middle School Film Production

Shagua De Huangjin
Lithgow High School Film Makers
Lithgow High School

Best Middle School Animation

Whiteboard
Noa Levin
Carmel High School

Best Senior Secondary Documentary

Rally
Ashley Davies
Huntingtower School

Best Senior Secondary Experimental

The Belly of the Machine
Lali Sherwell & Bridget Griffiths
Queensland Academy for Creative Industries

Best Senior Secondary Fiction

The Locket
Blake Borcich
Xavier College

Best Senior Secondary Fiction - Animation Winner

The Future of Consumerism
Ryan Walker
Footscray City College Media

Best Senior Secondary Music Video

Chocolates and Cigarettes
Patricia Rivera
Caroline Springs College – Lakeview

STUDENT - TERTIARY

Best Tertiary Short Fiction

Stripped
Writer: Andrew Hale
Producer: Ali Roberts
Directors: Geoff Kelso & Kelton Pell
ECU WA Screen Academy

Best Tertiary Animation

The Show
Rebecca Hayes
Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology

Best Tertiary Documentary

Paperback Rehab
Catherine Graue

Best Tertiary Multimedia & Games

A Forest in Orange
Andrew Formosa
Victoria University

EDUCATIONAL / VOCATIONAL

Best Indigenous Resource

Anija (alcohol)
Muriel Jaragba, David Hansen, Kylie Lee and Jenni Langrell

Best Instructional/Training Video Resource

Back to Basics
Mike Swinson - Corporate Image Matters
Pete Worland - Knowing Pictures

Best Primary Education Video Resource

Li'L Larikkins
Natural Hazards Children's Program Teacher's Resource

Best Secondary Education Video Resource

The Gathering
Heydon Films and City of Melville

Best Tertiary Education Video Resource

Donated to Science
Paul Trotman - PRN Films

GENERAL

Best Animation

The Missing Key
Jonathan Nix
Cartwheel Partners

Best Children’s Fiction Television

Dance Academy Series 1
Werner Film Productions

Best Children’s Factual Television

Stay Tuned
The Feds

Best Factual Television Series

Voyage to the Planets
Essential Media and Entertainment

Best Documentary General (presented in memory of Anna Kannava)

murundak – songs of freedom
Natasha Gadd and Rhys Graham
Daybreak Films

Best Documentary Biography

Jandamarra's War
Electric Pictures & Wawili Pitjas

Best Documentary Science, Technology & the Environment

The Silent Epidemic
Beyond Screen Production

Best Documentary History, Social & Political Issues

Leaky Boat
The Indian Pacific Picture Company

Best Documentary Arts

Life in Movement
Bryan Mason & Sophie Hyde
Closer Productions

Best Docudrama

Jandamarra's War
Electric Pictures & Wawili Pitjas

Best Documentary Short Form

Something To Tell You
Pete Gleeson: Producer / Director
Melissa Hayward: Co-producer
Kate Neylon: Associate Producer
Raw And Cooked Media

Best Experimental

Rip, Drip, Tear
Janette Goodey

Best Music Video

Sometimes the Stars
The Audreys
Produced by Luke Jurevicius
Directed by Ari Gibson & Jason Pamment

Best Short Fiction

Tethered
Craig Irvin and Ash Harris

2011 ATOM Teacher’s Award

John Rapsey
ECU, WA Screen Academy

About the ATOM Awards
The ATOM Awards were established in 1982 by the Australian Teachers of Media (ATOM) - an independent, non-profit association promoting media education and screen literacy in primary, secondary and tertiary education and the broader community.

The ATOM Awards annually recognise excellence in over thirty categories of Film, Television, Animation and Multimedia and celebrate the very best of Australian and New Zealand production.

The ATOM Awards program is designed to acknowledge the work that our current and future talent is contributing to the big screen, across a wide range of media. As such, the ATOM Awards program aims to ‘capture’ and highlight the development of all facets of media produced for ‘screen’, be it the movie, television, PC, games console or even mobile phone screen.

This major screen culture event annually attracts a large number of students, production companies, independent filmmakers, educational bodies and educational producers all of whom are keen to submit their best work and have it judged alongside their peers.

Using the 2011 ATOM Awards, ATOM publications and ATOM Professional Development Victoria, ATOM is actively engaged in the promotion of Australian product into the education and industry market. As such, the ATOM Awards are unique in their incorporation of the educational market with the broader industry.

The combination of student and professional awards not only allows the 2011 ATOM Awards to provide all-important early career exposure and experience for emerging professionals, but also provides promotional opportunities for winners and finalists.

About the ATOM Awards Patron – Nadia Tass
After pursuing an academic career in arts and education, Nadia Tass began acting and later directing classical and contemporary theatre in Melbourne. She directed her first feature film, Malcolm, in 1986. Since then Nadia has directed the Australian features Rikky and Pete (1987), The Big Steal (1989), Mr Reliable (1997), Amy (1998).

Amy received 23 international awards including Best Film at the Paris Film Festival (99), Grand Prix de Cinecole at Cannes Film Festival (1999), Grand Prix Cannes Junior (1999) and the Humanitarian Award at Asia Pacific Film Festival.

Nadia’s work in the USA includes Pure Luck (1991) for Universal Studios, The Miracle Worker (2000) for Disney, Child Star: The Shirley Temple Story (2001) for Disney, Undercover Christmas (2003) for CBS Network, Samantha: An American Girl Holiday’(2004), and Felicity: An American Girl Adventure (2005) for Warner Bros, and Custody for Jaffe Braunstein Films. She also directed Stark (1993), a miniseries for The BBC/ABC television.

She has continued her relationship with commercial theatre by directing for the Melbourne Theatre Company, and in 2002/2003 she directed the musical theatre production of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, which toured Australia and New Zealand. Nadia's work was rewarded with a nomination for Best Direction of a Musical 2003 at the prestigious Sir Robert Helpmann Awards.

In 2010, Tass launched a feature film called Matching Jack, which was distributed by 20th Century Fox in Australia. The film has been screened in Cannes, Milan, Paris, London and Athens. She also has a number of feature films in development with American studios, in addition to the slate of projects being developed through her production company Cascade Films. Projects in development include The Journey to be shot in Greece, Paris and New York, and Bottle This! - Nadia’s first documentary venture.

To find out more about Nadia and her production company, Cascade Films visit www.cascadefilms.com.au

ENDS

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