Pixel Pitch Prize goes to Aho, Hristov's Love & Engineering

Love & Engineering from Finnish producer Kaarle Aho and Bulgarian director Tonislav Hristov [pictured] won the ARTE-sponsored Pixel Pitch Prize at Power to the Pixel’s fifth Cross-Media Forum in London.

The prize, which comes with £6,000, was chosen by a jury of industry professionals from the nine international projects shortlisted during the Pixel Pitch. More than 100 projects had been submitted.

Love & Engineering, about digital geeks who try to ‘hack’ love, will be a project encompassing a feature-length documentary, live events, mobile apps and an interactive website.

Michel Reilhac, Executive Director of ARTE France Cinéma, said “This year’s projects at The Pixel Pitch were very strong, showing that we have now entered a phase where transmedia is becoming reality. Not something we talk or fantasise about, but something we do. And Love & Engineering among all of the projects has that rare quality for a story to bowl you over, using our real lives as material for transcended drama and emotions. I just love it!”

Liz Rosenthal, Founder of Power to the Pixel, added: “The exceptionally high quality of projects and participants of this second edition of The Pixel Market attracted strong interest from attending commissioners and financiers and we expect to see some exciting announcements in the coming weeks.

Also, the 14 producers who are Pixel Lab participants also had a pitching presentation curing the Cross-Media Forum.

An international jury headed by RTL Group’s Ian McClelland selected its top winner as Turning Point from Germany’s Tobias Buchne (who gets £2,000); a special commendation with £1,000 was given to The Elders Project from the UK’s Marc Boothe of B3 Media [Boothe plans to donate the award to the Black Elderly Group Southwark].

The Cross-Media Forum, which ran four days last week, is held in association with the BFI London Film Festival.

We R Democracy prs Matthieu Lietaert, Jamie Balliu