While contests have proven valuable opportunities for musicians and brands alike—it creates some much-desired attention for new content for no out-of-pocket cost—certain ones have been a mixed bag for filmmakers. While film-specific contests occasionally offer worthwhile prizes (including a valuable cash reward), the prize is often "exposure," which doesn't pay the rent nor help to kickstart your dream project.
In a nice bit of name synergy, Brooklyn-based indie band They Might Be Giants has teamed up with Red Giant for their upcoming video contest. In addition to cash prizes for the selected winner and two runners-up, all three finalists receive full access to the complete suite of Red Giant products.
Founded in 1981, They Might Be Giants are one of the longest-running acts in indie music. Perhaps best known in the film world for the Emmy-winning song that opened each episode of Malcom in the Middle (You're Not The Boss of Me), the group has released 19 albums and have long been celebrated for their innovative filmmaker collaborations in both in their music videos and shows like Tiny Toon Adventures.
Credit: They Might Be Giants
For those unfamiliar, Red Giant is one of the industry's top plug-in manufacturers, hosting multiple tools that plug into popular applications that make stylizing, animating, and prettifying your footage much easier. The most popular tool around these parts is Magic Bullet Denoiser, a powerful tool used for cleaning up noisy video; Universe and Trapcode appear on a host of machines we work on as well. This is a great deal because if you were to buy every single item in their toolkit at full price, it would set you back $3,700!
Deadline to apply is March 1, 2018. Check out the TMBG site for more details.
Red Giant Products
- Trapcode Suite Motion Graphics for After Effects
- Magic Bullet Suite for color grading, denoise, and film looks
- Red Giant Universe GPU accelerated effects and transitions
- Shooter Suite download, checksum, and syncing tools
- Keying Suite chroma key tools for faster, better composites
- Effects Suite for VFX workflows including the popular Knoll Light Factory
