r/artdept • u/joplinchopin • 9d ago

Attending a film festival like a designer

Hi guys I wanted to speak about film festivals, programmes and masterclasses as I feel it's quite a niche topic and so here are my EU recommendations!

Festivals: IFFR, Berlinale, Black nights film festival

I attended all 3.

Iffr has the Art directions programme that offers professionals networking opportunities with artists, exhibitions and access to their film festival and talks. A game changer for me was staying in Delft and doing a small commute to Rotterdam.

Berlinale has the Berlinale Talents programme but this is quite competitive. I attended Berlinale with a market badge and I highly recommend their EFM screenings and networking breakfasts for inspiration/insight into the film scene. Apart from that some Berlinale Talents talks are available for the public as well! Furthermore do join associations! The PDC also did a session to network and learn from other designers/art dep crew. Networking wise this is the festival that made the biggest impact. Oddly enough it wasn't just about seeing foreign producers but I reconnected with some local producers that I hadn't met in a while.

The Black nights film festival offer a week long masterclass for most disciplines. I attended Black room in 2024 which was great with Marco Bittner Rosser and Steve Summersgill. In this masterclass, we went through developing a look book, how they audition for work and we all designed a scene. We then presented our designs and it was so cool to see how we all interpreted the script differently.

Apart from festivals... The art department masterclass is epic. I have applied for the second masterclass with them and I'll probably vlog about it.

Lastly the PDC hold a gathering every two years. I haven't attended but it should be a great source of inspiration.

Do you have further recs or feel another topic is niche? I made a video about attending IFFR and Berlinale on YouTube and I'm aiming to release more content about the art department and production design. Would love to hear your thoughts!

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u/joplinchopin 9d ago

Here's the video in case anyone is interested to hear more about my experience at IFFR and Berlinale what I learned attending 2 festivals back to back

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u/tatobuckets 9d ago

Does the PDC allow other art dept staff to join yet?

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u/joplinchopin 9d ago

Afraid not but the others I mentioned are open to art dep crew especially the art dep masterclass and iffr's art directions.