Valve announce 2021 Short Film Contest for TI10
- Valve has announced this year's Short Film Contest alongside TI10. Submissions are live until the deadline on the 25th of July, 2021.
- The Short Film Contest comes with a prize pool of $43,500 that is divided amongst the Top Three in $25,000 , $10,000 and $5000 respectively with the 4th to 10th place contestants winning $500 each.
- The winners will be voted by the community in the Dota 2 Workshop and the winning Short Films will premiere live at TI10 in August.
Valve has announced 2021’s iteration of the yearly Short Film Contest. The Short Film Contest was first announced back in 2015 with TI5 and since then has been a yearly source of good content and entertainment as well as competition for the players and creators. Valve has included a prize pool for the top 5 each year with varying amounts with the very first Short Film Contest having a $20,000 prize each for the top 5 submissions. The submissions are sent to the Dota 2 Workshop where the community votes for the winners.
Valve announces 2021 Short Film Contest
This year’s iteration of the Short Film Contest was announced on the 14th of May, 2021 and submissions are live until the deadline on the 25th of July, 2021. This year, the Short Film Contest has a prize pool of $43,500 that is divided amongst the Top Three in $25,000, $10,000 and $5000 respectively with the 4th to 10th place contestants winning $500 each. Following are the rules for this year's contest:
- Entries must be no longer than 90 seconds.
- Entries must pertain to Dota 2.
- Entries can use any form or combination of animation or live-action technique in their creation. Using Source Filmmaker is not a requirement.
- Each entry must be at least 1080p.
- The deadline for submission will be Sunday, July 25th 15:00:00 PST. The submission process must be completed, including uploading the video and filling out submission dialogs, before the submission period ends.
- Submissions will be reviewed by the Steam community on the Steam Workshop.
- The top entries will be selected by Valve in its sole discretion to be featured in-game for a final vote by the community, and the winners will be announced at The International 10.
- The video must be a new creation made specifically for the Dota 2 Film Contest.
- You are free to use any Valve IP.
- If you use any non-Valve IP, you must be the copyright owner or have explicit permission from the owner. You will be required to warrant to Valve that you have all necessary rights and permissions in order for the entry to be considered. Any submissions found to be infringing non-Valve IP will be disqualified. Note that for workshop items, you still need to provide a link to the items used, but you do not need explicit permission from the creator, since submission to the workshop automatically grants permission to use the item.
- Multiple submissions per person are allowed.
- Submissions must be free of advertisements.
There is a lot of excitement surrounding this announcement as well as the announcement of T10 later this year since both contests were canceled in 2020. Additionally, as with previous tournaments, the winners of the 2021 Short Film Contest will be premiered live at TI10 in August.
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We have seen incredible films and titles as a result of the Short Film Contest over the years. Here are the winners of the last three Dota 2 Short Film Contests.
1. 2019 - Path of Vengeance. Created by 4fun, Tommy Charge and Maria Anikina
2. 2018 - On The Cliff. Created by Keller Max and team.
3. 2017 - What does a hero truly fear?. Created by Max Lebled.
If you are proficient in 3D film-making and a Dota 2 fan, you can also participate and submit a short film via the Dota 2 Short Film Contest website.
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Daniel is an under-grad and has grown up with esports titles like Dota 2 cultivating a passion for esports. His current beats include in-depth coverage of Dota 2 and Mobile Legends.