Art and the Mobile Camera.

There’s two ways that I could introduce this story. I could tell you that there is money to be made in cell phone video. Two Aussie filmmakers spent A$57 and won a US$20,000 prize at Tropfest, the American short film festival.

This video was shot entirely on a mobile camera.

The film, largely a visual narrative utilising found words from street signs of NY and Sydney, not only became the first ever ‘mobile phone’ movie to make it into the finals of Tropfest, it was also the first film to ever win both ‘People’s Choice’ and the coveted ‘Best Film’ awards.

“We are thrilled about the turnout and the crowd’s response to this year’s films”, said Tropfest founder and director John Polson (Hide and Seek, Swimfan). “Jason’s film really exemplifies what Tropfest is all about – original, unforgettable storytelling.”

Arriving back from New York today, the boys are looking forward to sewing the seeds of their recent success, with a controversial documentary about the world’s battle to save the Tasmanian Devil and a radical new thriller/feature film. The duo will this week team with three previous collaborators, Gavin Banks, Greg Hall and Brian Dyer to launch ‘The Treehive’, a brave new film production incubator developed to foster indie film and television projects.

Or, I could just tell you that there is art to be made with cell phone video.

So, back to that making money thing. What is The Treehive? And is it about mobile phone movie making? The idea of making movies with mobile phone is not new. Here is the list of the 2008 winners of the 4th Annual Pocket Film Awards.

Here is a video about The 2007 festival.