The Parli-Flicks Short Film Award is an annual Award that challenges NSW students in Years 5 to 12 across NSW to craft a one-minute short film exploring a thought-provoking question or theme. This guide provides some tips on how to make an engaging one-minute short film.

This year the question/theme is: What do I value about democracy?

Short Films are due: 8 August 2025

All the details of this year’s Award are here.

This Guide is divided into three parts: 

• Pre-production – where students plan their short film 

• Production – where students make their short film 
• Post-production – where students edit, complete and enter, their short film into the competition.

As a class discuss this year’s question: What do I value about democracy?

• define the word democracy – you might want to research the different types of democracy that exist around the world; 

• share ideas on how they might answer the question/address the theme; 

• think about their favourite films and share ideas about what they think makes a good film; 

• watch the shortlisted films from past Awards and discuss what they liked about each film – You’ll find links to these in the Tip section below.

Students should now decide if they want to work by themselves or with up to two other people. 

• In small groups or individually students answer the following questions to discuss this year’s theme/question and to decide how they will create their short film: 
• What is the message of your short film? (i.e.: How does it answer the theme/question?) 
• Will your short film have dialogue, actors and live filming, or will it have images or animation with a voice over?  Or will it be another type of film?  
• Will your short film have sound effects or music? Make sure that you have permission to use anything that is copyrighted.  
• Will your short film be funny or serious or a bit of both? 
• How will your short film connect with the audience and grab their attention? 
• Where will your film be set? (Think about lighting needed, possible background noise) 
• What will you use to create your film? (E.g. a mobile phone or other camera)  
• What editing software will you use for the final creation of your short film? 

Working either individually or as a group of up to 3 students, follow the steps below to create a storyboard and script:  

• List the scenes that will be in the short film and the camera shots that will be used for each scene to get your message across to the audience. For example, you can use close ups of people’s faces or objects, mid shots that focus on a person or object with a little bit of background to add to the message, or a wide shot which shows a whole scene and everything in it. This gives the audience a lot of information all at once. You can also use tracking shots where the camera follows the action. 
• Use images or illustrations to show what will be in each scene of the film so that the film maker will know what each scene will look like and what will need to be filmed. 

Now students should write a script for each scene which includes:  

•  where the scene is filmed 
•  what is in the background,
• dialogue for any characters or voice overs,
• what camera shots will be used,
• how the scene transitions into the next scene.  

Working either individually or as a group students follow the steps below: 

• Learn any lines and rehearse the script a few times before filming starts. 
• List any props and costumes that will be used and gather them all in one place.  
• Set up the space for filming – make sure it’s tidy and that there is no background noise, set up any lights that are needed, put all props on a table nearby so they can be found easily. 
• Now you’re ready to film! Enjoy! 

 Using the software editing that was chosen earlier, cut any unwanted pauses, add any visual or sound effects and add titles and credits to the short film.  

After all films are completed, teachers can upload each of their students’ short films via LaunchPad

• You will be able to upload the first film, then add each additional student entry without having to fill out all of the school and contact information again, just the individual details of each entry.