Asifa India recently announced International Animation Day celebrations for 2021. As a part of its 2021 celebrations, Asifa organized Awards of Excellence, Pitch Fest for filmmakers, portfolio review for students, and panel discussions with top global experts, and a series of student competitions.
Asifa India recently marked two decades of receiving its official Charter in India and its parent body, Asifa International, also celebrated its 60th year of establishment. It organized a series of activities throughout 2020 across India which included Awards of Excellence, Women Creators Program, Spiritus Mundi short film with NID-Vijayawada students. In a move designed to bolster national membership and expand member services, ASIFA India has also announced sweeping changes to its organization. In addition to now being formally registered with and recognized by the Indian government, the body has realigned its management structure and added few members.
Here are some of the programs Asifa India conducted during 2020-21:
Asifa India Core Committee: Asifa India President Saraswathi Vani Balgam is the force behind sustainable activities in India for nearly two decades and manages Dancing Atoms in the US. She leads the team with the help of many active volunteers in India. Sesha Prasad A.R., Sanjay Khimesara, Siva Kumar Kasetty, R.K.Polina & R.Vinod are the Asifa India Core Committee Members.
International with NID, AP: As part of its global initiative to mark its International Animation Day Asifa India created a two-minute animated story with 10 NID-AP students. The two-month-long initiative was driven by Asifa India president Vani Balagam and core committee member Sanjay Khimesara with the active support of NID- Vijayawada director Sekhar Mukherjee.
Chapters Involved in Spiritus Mundi: ASIFA has 40+ chapters throughout the world supporting professional animators with a diversity of social-economic backgrounds, ethnicities, genders, ages, and political systems. The ten chapters involved in Spiritus Mundi include: ASIFA Australia, ASIFA Bulgaria, ASIFA BIH, ASIFA Finland, ASIFA Hellas, ASIFA Iran, ASIFA India, ASIFA USA Central, ASIFA USA South, ASIFA Switzerland.
Asifa India eCG Meetup 20-21: During the lockdown period Asifa India has been actively organizing a series of knowledge-oriented workshops & sessions with top international experts like Walt Jones, Ed Hooks, Pilar Alessendra, Dr.Stuart Sumedha, Joseph Kslender, Vaibhav Kumaresh, E.Suresh, Kalp Sanghvi, Upamanyu Bhattacharya, Ravishankar Venkateswaran, Chetan Sharma and others under its eCG meetup series.
Asifa India Chapters & Evangelists: Asifa India has its formal chapters in several cities including Hyderabad, Indore, Pune, Bangalore, Mumbai and others. It has recently strengthened its team of volunteers, city co-ordinators & evangelists from all across India.
International Animation Day & Awards of Excellence: Asifa India marked International Animation Day in 2020-21 across 10+ cities via a series of Sessions & Contests organized by its chapters, volunteers, and city supporters. Winners for its Awards of Excellence were announced based on a team of four jury members including Annual Animation Show of Shows at Acme Filmworks, Inc. curator & presenter Ron Diamond, Entertainment marketing diva Jan Nagel, Greengold Animation CEO Rajeev Chilaka & Animagic India co-founder Gayatri Rao.
You can check out the list of winners here: Awards of Excellence 2020-2021
Women Creators Program: In March 2021, Asifa India partnered with Unreal Sea and launched ‘The Women Creators Program’ with Epic Games’. The programme included Mentors like Saraswathi Vani Balgam, Charuvi Agarwal, Marta Ampudia Dalmau, Arvind Neelakantan, Dean Reinhard, Jack Condon, Karan Parikh.
After an Expert Session on Virtual Production 18 of India’s talented women producers and VFX professionals were finally selected and were given a four-week long virtual training and mentoring programme during April-May. During August 2021 Epic Games & Asifa India conducted Session ‘Unreal Women Creators Presents their Unreal Short Films’ where Pragati Wadhwa, Rounak Magoo, Nida Arshia, Gayatri Rao, Ria Banerjee and Pratima Pal presented their films during a session moderated by Saraswathi Vani Balgam.
Here are the details of the upcoming Asifa India Programs under IAD’21:
Awards of Excellence-2021- Students & Professional Categories
IAD Celebrations 2021 across India & Virtual Event
Pitch Fest for Filmmakers
Portfolio Review for Students
Series of Student Competitions
Panel Discussions & Masterclass
Studio Presentations
To know more visit: www.asifaindia.com