Rules

Judge's Rubric - SAMPLE

• PDF of Judging Rubric - Please download and share with your students!

Regulations

• Clarification will be included for maximum amount of non-student involvement--including the specific involvement of students and non-paid adults.  Like use of copyright material, primarily non-student production teams will disqualify an entry from Best of Show selection.
• Each entry requires a separate entry form submission.  Payment can be made after you have added each entry to an online "cart."
• There is no time limit for entries, but a maximum of Five Minutes per entry will be viewed by the preliminary judges (final judges may request a viewing of the full entry).
• Indicate the full running time and the start time of the five minute judging excerpt on the entry form.
• Each Entry may be entered in only one category. The jury reserves the right to move an entry to a more appropriate category.

Fees

• $12/Entry

Member Discount

Paid DAFT annual memberships include 1-10 free entries--see Member Deals for more information.

Bulk-entry voucher codes can be purchased for additional savings.

Contact us at areyoudaft@hotmail.com if you have not received your free entry codes.

Payment

Online payment is handled through Film Freeway. You can pay through using a credit card without creating a PayPal account.

Entry Content

COPYRIGHT

It is recommended that you have complete ownership and copyright to content appearing in your entry - including music, imagery, footage and talent releases.

If your entry contains material you do not own, it is recommended that you have written permission from the copyright holder(s) for use in your entry.

Photos, art and other such visuals plus various forms of music—on the Internet and elsewhere—are copyrighted, even if they don’t include the copyright character, “©” and the owner’s name. Getting the owner’s permission to use such materials is important unless the material qualifies as Fair Use or is in the public domain.

Entries to the Michigan Student Film Festival are assumed to be under fair use in copyright law.  Fair Use refers to the ability to print or broadcast materials that are copyrighted and include the following factors:

1. Purpose and character of use (i.e. non-commercial use like news reporting, teaching or reviewing);
2. Nature of the work (e.g. factual work is more likely to fall under fair use than creative work, and published works are more likely to be used fairly than unpublished works);
3. How much is used (i.e. looking at both quantity and quality of what is used; 

Use of apparently copyrighted materials without permission or a fair use argument as explained on the entry (e.g. photos from CNN.com or google.com or an artist’s soundtrack) will result in disqualification of the entry.

VIOLENT CONTENT

Excessive violent content may disqualify your entry from competition based solely upon DAFT's discretion.

DAFT: Copyright & Fair Use in Student Productions
with Attorney Lex Kuhne

Responsibility & Liability

• DAFT reserves the right to use and/or broadcast all productions entered in the Festival for educational and promotional purposes.
• Programs cannot be re-edited after they have been submitted.
• Review your entries - Vimeo/YouTube Upload - for audio and video quality prior to submission. If a program cannot be viewed by the judges due to technical issues, the entry will not be judged.