San Francisco Festivals

Submissions Now Open for 2012 Independent Games Festival

The Independent Games Festival (IGF) is the longest-running and highest-profile independent video game festival, summit, and showcase, and is now accepting entries to its 14th annual edition, with deadlines in the Main and Student Showcase categories by October 17 and October 31  respectively, and finalists to be announced in January 2012.

All games selected as finalists will be available in playable form at the IGF Pavilion on the GDC show floor from March 7 – 9, 2012, and will compete for nearly $60,000 in prizes, a significant increase from last year. This includes the high-profile $5,000 Nuovo Award, honoring abstract, short-form, and unconventional video game development.

In addition, awards for Excellence in Visual Art, Audio, and Design, Technical Excellence, Best Mobile Game, the Best Student Game, and the Audience Award each now receive a $3,000 prize, and the signature Seumas McNally Grand Prize for the independent game of the year has been increased by 50% to a record $30,000.

Winners will be announced on stage at the high-profile Independent Games Festival Awards on Wednesday, March 7, 2012, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. The Independent Games Festival Awards are held immediately before the wider Game Developers Choice Awards ( http://www.gamechoiceawards.com ).

Both multi-thousand person attendee award shows are part of the 2012 Game Developers Conference, taking place March 5th - March 9th, 2012. GDC 2012 also includes the 2012 Independent Games Summit ( http://www.indiegamessummit.com ), which is entering its sixth year and offers two days (March 5 – 7) of inspiration, practical lectures, and rants from the top minds in the independent games world.

The Independent Game Festival continues to sit at a place of global importance as the largest, most prestigious and all-encompassing showcase of independent game talent across the wide spectrum of artistically- and commercially-aimed development.

San Francisco Silent Film Festival: Musicians at the Silent Film ...

Alloy Orchestra is a three man musical ensemble, writing and performing live accompaniment to classic silent films. Working with an outrageous assemblage of peculiar objects, they thrash and grind soulful music from unlikely sources. Founded 20 years ago, Alloy scored 23 feature length silent films and more than 30 shorts. The group has helped revive some of the great masterpieces of the silent era by touring extensively, commissioning new prints, and collaborating with archives, collectors and curators. Stephen Horne has long been considered one of the leading silent film accompanists. He is based at London's BFI Southbank, but plays at all the major UK venues and numerous international festivals in Europe and North America. Although principally a pianist, he often incorporates flute, accordion and keyboards into his performances, sometimes simultaneously. In the past year, Stephen has recorded several scores for the forthcoming Treasures From American Archives 5. For over forty years Dennis James has performed historically authentic silent film score accompaniments utilizing the actual published musical source materials from the silent film era while incorporating the actual period performance practices with unwavering professional commitment to stylistic integrity. He tours internationally with his Silent Film Concerts production company performing to silent films with solo organ, piano, and chamber ensemble accompaniments in addition to presentations with major symphony orchestras throughout the world. Matti Bye has been a music score composer and live silent movie piano performer at the Swedish Film Institute since 1989. He is also a regular performer at European film festivals, including the Pordenone Silent Film Festival, the Bologna Film Festival, the Berlin International Film Festival, and the Midnight Sun Film Festival in Sodankylä, Finland. The Ensemble includes Bye, Lotta Johansson, Kristian Holmgren. Guest performers include Sarah Jo Zaharako, Alex Kelly, and Lisa Mezzacappa. The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra is a quintet based in Colorado that revives the sound of the silent film orchestra. Using an extensive library of “photoplay music” that once belonged to movie theater orchestra leaders, Mont Alto compiles film scores by carefully selecting music to suit each scene in the film.

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