Wild Talk Africa calls for natural history, wildlife pitches

Wild Talk Africa is Africa's key film festival and conference for natural history and wildlife film and television programming. It is a four-day event including workshops, seminars and commissioning panels, as well as networking events with international delegates and industry leaders.

Filmmakers interested in pitching their work to commissioning editors are invited to submit their ideas in advance. These will be moderated and 12 successful proposals will be awarded a slot at the Open Pitching Sessions.

Top national and international commissioners

Filmmakers will have an opportunity to pitch to top national and international commissioners and funders. Past years' pitching panels have included commissioning editors from Animal Planet, NHK Japan Broadcasting Corp., BBC NHU, National Geographic, SABC, NFVF, Smithsonian Networks, NHU Africa and more. All documentary formats and all natural history subjects are eligible for submission, and the panel will critique and comment on each pitch.

"This is a fantastic way for filmmakers to present their projects to some of the best global exhibition platforms for wildlife films," said festival director Donfrey Meyer. "We are really pleased to be presenting the festival at the same time as the Durban International Film Festival and Durban FilmMart, where the film industry gathers to network and start the conversations that lead to the creation of projects."

For those not selected for the open pitching sessions, there will be other opportunities to arrange one-on-one meetings with commissioners at the festival, and there will be "speed-dating" pitching sessions, subject to availability.

Submissions should be sent in as a one-page project summary, along with photography from the production, a short biography on the filmmaker/producer and the name and contact details of person pitching. A short (five minutes maximum) sample reel of the work-in-progress is recommended but not essential. This can be a promo, sizzle reel, or clips from the development process or research. Submission deadline is 6 June, 2013.

For more information on Wild Talk Africa, go to www.wildtalkafrica.com. For tips and information on how to pitch log in and go to the "Free Resources" page.