ITFS Early-Bird Accreditation Ends March 1

STUTTGART, GERMANY -- Take the last chance to get your Early Bird accreditation [1] for the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film. The ITFS Early Bird Offer ends after March 1, 2013. The Final deadline for all accreditations is April 8, 2013.

For the 2013 edition of the festival, the ITFS gained the all-time record of over 2.200 film submissions for the nine competitions! The competition and supporting programs show the newest films from all over the world, for example from Germany, France, Malawi, Australia, China, Japan, Canada, Latvia, and many more. Of course the Oscar winners Brave and Paperman and the César winner Ernest et Célestine will be shown. Animation artists like Atsushi Wada (Berlinale Silver Bear 2012) and Jakob Schuh (The Gruffalo), David Silverman (The Simpsons), Academy member Ron Diamond, or Barry Purves, one of the most prominent authorities of puppet animation, will be presented and are expected to come.

Top-level workshops and selected national and international film and art schools will be presented as well as animation studios such as Constantin Film, Pixar or Aardman Animation. The children’s festival Tricks for Kids in the Mercedes-Benz Museum presents the best and most recent films and series for children and families. Simultaneously with the festival the FMX – Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Transmedia (April 23 to 26) and the Animation Production Day (April 25/26) will take place again. With its enthusiastic audience, unique locations and numerous national and international guests (2012: 80.000), the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film is a fixture in the animation film scene.

Special anniversary highlights have to be part of the 20th edition: Twenty important pioneers of the ITFS will give a personal retrospective by presenting twenty films of previous festivals which they have selected on their own. The Mainzelmaennchen, some of Germany’s most popular cartoon characters are celebrating their 50th anniversary in 2013 and are going to have their official Mainzelmaennchen birthday gala at the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film. The ITFS will depict worldwide developments in animated film with several programs: e. g. the host country India, Animated Africa or the Arabic world of animated film and media.

For more information, visit www.itfs.de/en [2].

Source: 20th Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film