Nursing home, lobster films draw
top honors at CellFlix Film Festival
Following a blind judging process masking school affiliation and biographical information, professional filmmakers and editors have selected the winners of the second annual CellFlix Film Festival at Ithaca College that challenges aspiring filmmakers to create a 30-second film shot on a cellphone.
“Assisted Living” by Zach Wilson took the top honor with a $5,000 prize that Wilson plans to use toward international travel after he graduates. Wilson’s film takes places in a nursing home contrasting an elderly patient’s zest for life with that of her young nurse. “Get out and live your life, is the moral of this story,” Wilson said.
“Shellfish” by Billy Feldman won the Texas Instruments Audience award as the highest rated film by Web site viewers. Featuring a life-sized lobster, and based on a joke comic strip he had drawn, the film is about a “man apologizing to his girlfriend for being selfish, it’s a romantic comedy,” Feldman said.
“I’m amazed by the energy, diversity and hilarity of this year’s entries. From a six-foot lobster to a tender tale of human relationships, CellFlix once again brought in a range of small-screen stories that are both compelling and entertaining. There are a thousand similar film festivals out there now, but CellFlix was first, and it’s still motivating students to take storytelling to new levels of creativity and craziness,” said Dianne Lynch, dean of the Roy H. Park School of Communications at the college.
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Census Bureau to
use Harris devices
in paperless census
The U.S. Census Bureau will use new mobile handheld devices and database management technology from Harris Corp. when it conducts a dress rehearsal for the country’s 2010 Census in May and June. The census is expected to be the first virtually paperless census, and Harris said the technology could save taxpayers $1 billion. Census enumerators will use the devices, which include GPS technology, to directly capture address canvassing information in Fayetteville, N.C., and Stockton, Calif. Enumerators will then use the devices to transmit the information wirelessly to the Census Bureau databases designed by Harris.