The British Arrows has opened its call for entries and revealed its co-chairs. Nils Leonard, co – founder of Uncommon Creative Studios, is chair of the Arrows jury and Jani Guest, managing director of Independent Films, is chairwoman of the Craft Arrows jury.

Leonard will head a 23-person jury. He stated that he feels, “a constant sense of pride being in the same room as some of my heroes and a constant reminder that if we just award tweaking and twiddling using the excuse of the word craft we will all die in our own indulgent soup.” 

His jury will be looking for “work we wish we’d made. Work that liberates us from the landfill of skipped mpegs. Work that could start a riot. The right film will make someone pick up a chair.”

See Leonard’s Arrows jury here.

Guest will lead a jury of 32. This year, the Craft Arrows jury is being split across the four disciplines of agency, production, post and sound, so experts and artists from each discipline will be judging their own area of expertise.

Guest commented, “Amid a vastly changing media landscape, I take great comfort knowing that the spine of our business is supported by the purity of craft and skill. The collective dedication, passion, and relentless seeking of perfection, by everyone on a creative production team are what make beautiful and wonderful things for our viewers…

“The British Arrows sets that bar continuously high with a disciplined and discerning judging process, and it is the one night of the year when the best of Britain is honoured.”

See Guest’s Craft Arrows juries here.

Charlie Crompton, chairman of the board, added, “The British Arrows has a tremendous legacy of being the best awards night of the year. Yet every year we have to put the bar up again…Nils and Jani’s juries have been very carefully curated to ensure that we have the perfect mix of the most capable , talented and informed people you’d want to be judging your work – evenly split between clients, agencies, production companies and crafts.

“These are really smart, engaged, talented – and busy – people and I’m always humbled when in every case, they say how thrilled they are to be asked, how they’ll drop everything to be involved in The Arrows – and that they want to keep these awards as being as difficult to win as they’ve always been. That’s what we want. If you win an Arrow, it’s a big deal – and that’s why we celebrate it in such great company in May… If you’re only going to one awards ceremony in 2018, put May 16 in the diary… And perhaps best not to wear a green hat and a quiver.”

The British Arrows have also developed a new entry system for 2018, designed to remove the headache of entering awards. The new system relies predominantly on clock numbers to make an entry, meaning entrants will have fewer credits to input and less content to upload.

For commercials that were not aired on UK TV, entrants can still submit content with manual uploads, but the simplified, user interface for all entries means a smoother and less stressful process for all involved.

Entrants will now be able to deliver content to the British Arrows library via their distributor at the same time as delivering the commercial to broadcasters, giving a much – needed overhaul to the very manual process of submitting content for awards consideration.

Everything you need to know to enter is here. Download entry pack here.

Tickets for the show are also on sale now. The ceremony will take place on Wednesday May 16 2018 at Battersea Evolution.

Key Dates 2018:

Tuesday January 2:  Standard Entry opens

Monday February 19: Late Entry opens

Friday February 16: VR Entry closes

Friday February 23: Entry site shuts down (No extensions are possible)

Monday March 19: Arrows judging day 1

Tuesday March 20: Arrows judging day 2

Thursday March 22: Arrows judging final day

Monday March 26: Craft Arrows judging day 1

(am Agency categories | pm Audio categories)

Tuesday March 27: Craft Arrows judging day 2 (Production categories)

Wednesday March 28: Craft Arrows judging day 3 (Post Production categories)

w/c April 9: Shortlists announced

Wednesday May 16: 2018 Show