ADFEST is looking Five Fabulous New Directors to take the stage at ADFEST 2025. As ADFEST is committed to nurturing and championing new talent, the Short Films by the Fabulous Five is ADFEST’s unique initiative to promote up-and-coming new directors in the region.

The competition is open to any assistant director or director based in Asia and the Pacific, including Australia, New Zealand, and the Middle East, who has started their directorial debut in the past 2 years (after March 2023). It is designed to catapult directorial careers and show off talent on a regional stage.

For the chance to become a Fabulous Five New Director, eligible directors need to submit a script for a 5-minute short film inspired by ADFEST 2025 theme, COLLiDE. If the script is one of the top five scripts voted by ADFEST’s Film Craft Lotus & New Director Lotus jury, the director will be asked to direct the short film of the submitted script and debut the short film at ADFEST 2025, held Thursday 22 – Saturday 22 March 2025.

All Fabulous Five directors will be flown to Thailand to premiere and discuss their films on stage. ADFEST will provide return economy airfare, ground transportation, accommodation, and a full delegate registration to ADFEST 2025.

In addition, all Fabulous Five films will be automatically accepted for the Young Director Award (YDA). As YDA is also committed to support and promote creative talent in commercial film production, 2 additional New Director Lotus winners will also be accepted to the YDA.

Find more information on eligibility and submission process to the Fabulous Five here.

Script submission deadline is Friday January 2 2025.

For more details on other New Director Lotus categories and all Lotus Awards categories, visit www.ADFEST.com.

Deadlines for entry submission to all other Lotus categories are Friday December 13 2024 for the Early Bird Deadline, and Friday January 10 2025 for the Regular Deadline.