Video Contests, Film Festivals, and Awards

(Culver City, CA) The WestDoc PitchFest 2012 competition was won by budding Ridgewood, N.Y. filmmaker Erinnisse Heuer for her pitch of the feature-length documentary "Spirit/Will/Loss," it was announced today by Chuck Braverman and Richard Propper, co-founders of WestDoc: The West Coast Documentary and Reality Conference held Sunday-Wednesday, Sept. 9-12 in Culver City, Calif.  The PitchFest winner, judged by the conference audience, claimed the largest prize package in competition's three-year history, valued at a WestDoc record of more than $25,000.

PitchFest was WestDoc 2012's climactic all-day event on Wednesday, Sept. 12, where 12 finalists of documentary and reality producers pitched new works directly to funders and network development executives in front of a live audience for potential acquisition, licensing or co-production funding.  The pitches include at least three minutes each of video and verbal pitching, not exceeding eight total minutes.

Heuer's "Spirit/Will/Loss," about six artists who are overcoming personal tragedies to find a new artistic voice, won best-pitch honors to capture the third annual "WestDoc Pitcher Award," as well as a dramatically increased prize package.  The winning prize money was been raised from $7,500 (2010) to $10,000, thanks to the generous support of competition sponsor The Gilbert Group at Merrill Lynch Wealth Management-Bank of America.  In addition to prize money, the total PitchFest 2012 prize package included a one-year All Media Music License from FirstCom Music, source of over 170,000 tracks of easy to license, high-quality music for film and television; a $5000 Post/Edit Package from Hollywood post facility Chainsaw; a Z-FINDER PRO 2.5X DSLR optical viewfinder from Zacuto; and a 1HD HERO2 camera from GoPro Cameras. 

"I am so happy and honored for the support WestDoc has shown me on my first documentary effort, and I really appreciate everyone's encouragement for me to go forward and make this film," says Heuer.  "I was extremely surprised that I put this up in front of the people at WestDoc and, I guess because of the verbal pitch, they got it..  I think they really understood the heart and the integrity of what this film is going to be, and that was extremely exciting."

The pitches of the 12finalists were publicly critiqued and evaluated by a 15-member panel of entertainment executives, including.  Elizabeth Jane Browde, Veria Living; Dave Davis, PBS-Oregon; Laura Fleury, A&E; John Judalena, TLC; JT Ladt, National Geographic; Megan Lawrence, WeTV; Melanie Moreau, CMT; David Padrusch, Travel Channel; David Sherman, Agent, Kris Slava, Ovation; Adam Steinman, Warner Bros. International Television; Joe Weinstock, Discovery; Lee White, William Morris Agency; Brent Zacky, Logo; and Sean Zeid, Agent, Kaplan Stahler. 

"PitchFest is really my favorite part of WestDoc, and I thought the 12 finalists were really quite good," says co-founder and PitchFest committee chair Braverman, Academy Award®-nominated producer/director.  "The quality just keeps getting better and better each year, and in watching the pitches, I definitely would not have been able to pick the winner because I think there were half a dozen of them that each could have won.  The first and second place finishers were both great and deserved recognition, and I think it's astonishing that the difference was only one vote."

Also for the first time at WestDoc 2012, PitchFest prizes were presented to more than the winner.  The PitchFest runner-up, Donald Bowman (Carmel, Calif.) with his pitch of "Heart: Flatline to Finish Line" about heart patients running a triathlon, received a one-year All Media Music License for his project from FirstCom Music.  Several additional prizes were be awarded by random drawing to members of the voting PitchFest audience, including the same Z-FINDER PRO 2.5X optical viewfinder (Zacuto) and 1HD HERO2 camera (GoPro) provided to the winner, and $1,500 worth of training from Moviola in Hollywood.

If the success of its first two winners is any indication, WestDoc's PitchFest competition is building a solid track record.  The first two champions released their feature-length documentaries with critical acclaim to film festivals and theaters throughout North America during this past spring and summer. Bi-costal first-time filmmaker Bess Kargman won the PitchFest 2009 with "First Position," about the world of competitive ballet, and the first-time filmmaking duo of Lisanne Pajot and James Swirsky, of Winnipeg, Manitoba, were victorious in PitchFest 2010 with "Indie Game: The Movie," a feature-length documentary about video games and their creators. 

"Our first two PitchFest winners have now set the bar very high, with both turning out to be very successful," adds Braverman, "so this year's winner Erinnisse (Heuer) has a very high standard to fulfill by this time next year.  I hope she does, and I'm sure she will."

PitchFest 2012 was made possible by the support of the following sponsors: The Gilbert Group at Merrill Lynch Wealth Management-Bank of America, Chainsaw, First Com Film/TV Music, Cynopsis Media, GoPro, Gratlin, Moviola and Zaguto USA.

"Our PitchFest 2012 competition was the best we've had yet, and serves as a fitting climax to our third conference," concludes Propper, distribution executive and managing partner of WestDoc.  "Culver City is an ideal open environment, and having the conference here has been fantastic.  We had a record number of attendees this year, who enjoyed the new location and ultimately gave us the biggest voting pool we've ever had to determine our PitchFest champion."

Resources:

http://www.thewestdoc.com/