On Monday July 21st, 2014, the University of Western Australia (UWA) announced the opening of their new combined Art and Machinima challenge, Transcending Borders, which brings together their 7th MachinimUWA and their 5th UWA Grand Art Challenge into one event.

Transcending Borders is sponsored by Tom Papas & SciFi Film Festival, LaPiscean Liberty & SL Artists, AviewTV, Taralyn Gravois and Arts Castle Gallery, TheDoveRhode and Peace is a Choice and S&S Gallery of Fine SL Art, Jon Stubbs & UWA Student Services, as well as The UWA Virtual Worlds Project, and the prize pool is an impressive L$1,030,000, with a further L$240,000 available as special audience participation and other prizes!

Those wishing to participate are free to enter either the art or the machinima challenge – or both, if they wish; just so long as all entries are received no later than midnight SLT on October 31st, 2014. Winners will be announced in December 2014.

Entrants are invited to interpret the challenge theme, Transcending Borders, in any way they please. It might refer to transcending borders between space and time, or the past and present or the present and future, the borders separating nations or cultures or languages, or any one of the many borders we encounter as we navigate our physical and virtual lives.

The major rules in submitting any artwork or machinima to the challenge are (please also refer to the UWA blog post for the full set of rules and requirements):

Artwork entered should be able to be interpreted by the casual viewer as representative of the theme. If the link to the theme is difficult to ascertain, it should be referenced in a note card accompanying the work

Any submitted artwork should not exceed 150 Land Impact, and should preferably by submitted with COPY permissions, and art entries are limited to one per entrant

Machinima entries should preferably be no more than 4 minutes and 30 seconds in length, although this is not a “hard” rule

There is no limit to the number of machinima entries which may be submitted by an entrant, however, the average viewer should be able to determine how any given film fits with the theme; if this is difficult to ascertain, it should be referenced in the notes accompanying the film on the web

All submitted machinima must be made specifically for this challenge, and must include “For The University of Western Australia’s MachinimUWA VII: Transcending Borders” in the opening credits.

Art submissions should be made via the art entry receiver at the UWA Art Chellenge Platform in Second Life. Machinima entries should be uploaded to any publicly-accessible location, but preferably to YouTube or Vimeo, and the details of the entry (name, creator, location, etc.) supplied to Jayjay Zifanwe and LaPiscean Liberty in-world or by e-mailing the details to Jayjay (jayjayaustralia@hotmail.com).

L$515,000 in prizes in both the art and the machinima categories, with each category having a L$100,000 first prize.

Furthermore, the machinima category has an additional special UWA Prize for the best machinima which features one of the Winthrop Clock Tower, the Sunken Gardens or the Somerville Auditorim.

There are also two special Curator Prizes, one for art and one for machinima (the latter will be awarded to best film which features one artwork from the current art challenge or a winning entry from past UWA art challenges).

For full information on the challenge, including infromation on the theme, all rules, submission guidelines, prizes (including audience participation prizes) and details of the judging panel, please refer to the UWA blog post.

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