For the third year in a row I had the pleasure of serving as a judge for the Imagine Science Film Festival. Along with fellow judged neuroscientists David Eagelman and Darcy Kelley and documentary filmmaker Robb Moss, I watched a slew of short films that touched in one way or another on science. The awards were just announced, and so I thought I’d hunt around for some online sites where you can watch them, either as previews or in their entirety. Here’s what I found:
The Scientist Award went to the best short that depicts a scientist in an accurate and original way. We awarded it to “Chasing Birds in Beringia” by Stephani Gordon:
The Nature Scientific Merit Award went to the best short that incorporated science in a compelling narrative. The winner was
Eagleman Stag, by Mikey Pease. Here’s a trailer; the full movie is ten minutes long.
The Visual Science Award was given to the best short that depicts a science in a visually-engaging manner. This year’s winner was “Breast Stem Cells”
by Etsuko Uno & Drew Barry. Here’s their visualization:
There were also some movies that got honorable mentions. For the Scientific Merit, here’s the trailer to the creepy, understated “The Sierra Project”
and here’s “Yuri Lennon,” which packs a lot of drama into a very long shot at an astronomer’s face. This is the full movie, with German subtitles.
For the Scientist Award, here’s “E. chromi”:
and “Transgenic Spidergoats”:
For Visual Science, “How to Feed the World”:
And finally, “Do you know what nano means?”
The Nature’s People’s Choice Award, the best film voted by the Imagine Science Film Festival audience members, went to “Until,” a movie about longevity by Barry Gibb. If I find the video, I’ll post it.
Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to everyone who is putting science on film in one way or another!
Originally published October 25, 2011. Copyright 2011 Carl Zimmer.