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VMA 2017

We are celebrating 10 years of Visual Music Award and are looking forward to your participation!
Submission deadline of the VMA and VMLC closed on Tuesday April 25th 2017 !
Jurysession May 04th | Announcement of Nominees May 08th 2017 | Award show June 23rd 2017
For updates please check VMA facebook
The Visual Music Award 2017 is presented the 10th time as an international creative competition. All those involved with visual music can participate. These include students from music- film- art- and media colleges as well as independent and employed creators from the fields of music, sound design, film, film art, new media art, experimental film, audio-visual live performance, VJ-ing and related disciplines. Companies and agencies may also participate naming their project framework. From over 100 national and international submissions, the respective winners (place 1-3) and awardees are determined each year in the categories Visual Music Award and Visual Music Live Contest. Optionally an artist can be nominated with his work for a special price. 10 – 12 works make it to the finals, the numbers differ each year. The rankings will be announced on the evening of the award show. The winners and awardees receive certificates, prices from our sponsors and a unique presentation of their works in a traditional cinema.
Oskar Fischinger

How you should submit your work

Competition Criteria "Eye Music"!
Music for the eyes: are the visuals related to the music? Is this translated by using tact, colours, forms, composition?

The VMA consists of a high-profile jury and focuses on creative aspects in the quality of music visualisations. The artistic focus, the originality, the design and the composition form the focus of the evaluations. Works are evaluated on eye music – are images audible – how is the interplay of image and sound solved.

Information about participants
Students, audiovisual professionals and also agencies can participate.

In a short text of a maximum of 1000 characters, information about the participant have to be given.
These include: name, if applicable artist’s name, date of birth, education and training place, current employment, reference to visual music and, if available, references to the work list.

Your category (VMA / VMLC) ?
Select the category to which the work belongs. Watch the highlight video and make your own image of „visual music“. You are unsure whether your work fulfills the Visual Music criteria? Just send us a sneak preview and we will give you a feedback!
Work description
In a short text, also of a maximum of 1000 characters, your work has to be described.
The production period and type (use of technology / technologies, hardware / software) should be indicated.
Note: length of work maximum 10 minutes; several works may be submitted

Work length max. 10 minutes FAQ:
What if it is a few minutes longer? – This is ok, but if it comes to a nomination, a 10-minute version has to be delivered.
What if it is significantly longer? – There is a possibility to provide an extract – but this makes the evaluation as a whole more difficult.

Submitting several works FAQ:
Can more works be submitted? Yes!
Can I participate in both categories? Yes! – if VMA is an original work and VMLC is a live documentation – i.e. the presentation of this work.

Data format and resolution
A video file, standard video formats should be submitted; resolution in SD, HD and FullHD, also other formats are accepted:
In general, the participants are free to use any media format for the production of their submission.
Letter of Agreement & Copyright
The participant of the competition ensures that he or she has submitted a contribution authored by him or her, that the work is not an illegal adaptation of a third party, and that he or she is authorized to delegate the necessary rights for the presentation of the work to the organizers of the competition.

The participant further ensures that the submitted works do not contain any third party content that is subject to copyright protection. In case of third party contributions the participant ensures that he has acquired the appropriate rights. The participant of the competition dispenses the promoters of the award from legal claims of third parties including the expenses of an appropriate advocacy.

Rights for screening and presentation
The submitted works (VMA or VMLC) will be subject to screenings by an expert jury. In the case the work will be awarded or winning it will be publically presented during the prize ceremony.

The authors give the right of use of their works to the organisers of the „Visual Music Award“ for the needs of screening by the jury and public presentations, online presentations and press usage (the latter for up to 90-seconds trailers).

Please sign and submit the „Letter of Agreement“ accordingly.

Submission fee € 0 Euro!
Works have to be submitted due to the deadline. Submissions to the Visual Music Award 2017 and Visual Music Live Contest 2017 must be received by Monday 10th April 2017 (inclusive). In the case of incomplete submissions, we will contact you, documents may be submitted after the work has been completed.

Submission fee € 0 Euro!
The participant does not incur any costs for submission or nomination. Since this is a charitable project without funding, we can not guarantee the cost of a trip to the award show in case of a nomination. Through our sponsors, however, we will try to provide an overnight stay, including an accompaniment and adequate catering, at an early pledge. Students can inquire about the cost of the journey from Germany. Unfortunately, we can not cover international participants for reasons of cost.