Project development competition Rise & Shine

04.12.2025

Rise & Shine Projects in Development Competition

AnimatekaPRO

Old Power Plant

6.12.2025 at 12:30

 

Rise & Shine is a project development and pitching lab for first and second-time professional filmmakers with their short films (up to 20 minutes), organized by Animafest Zagreb and Animateka in collaboration with CEE Animation in three modules: focus on script, project follow-up, focus on pitch. The mentors of the fourth edition were director and scriptwriter Pedro Rivero (ES), producer Jelena Popović (NFB, CA), and producer Anna Vašova (13ka, CZ).

The projects will be competing for the CEE Animation Forum 2026 direct access award, for the Rise & Shine 2025 Audience Award and the Film Centre of Montenegro Award of EUR 1500, the Cinefila distribution award as well as the possibility to attend the Short Film Market Clermont-Ferrand 2026.

 

You can find detailed info about the chosen projects here.

 

The Rise & Shine 2025 projects are:

 

Daylight

Ayala Shoshana Guy, Fabian Driehorst

Fabian&Fred

Germany, Denmark

 

Family Recipe

Lou-Anne Gérard, Titouan Tillier

Frigo Films

France

 

I Was Born Under This Tree

Mihaela Mîndru

Romania

 

Lovers In a Dangerous Time

Daniel Sterlin-Altman, Alexandre de Paillerets

Une boîte de plus

France, Germany

 

Redefining Island

Julie Černá, Michaela Režová

Pure Shore

Czechia

 

Runaway Heart

Mery Gobec, Nataša Vugrinec

Studio Virc

Slovenia

 

Seal the Deal

Lea Vučko, Damir Grbanović

Octopics

Slovenia

 

Sighthounds

Marko Por

Slovenia

 

Stormsurge

Anna Tőkés, Balint Gelley

CUB Animation

Hungary

 

The Chestnut Fair

Valeria Weerasinghe, Eleonora Muzzi

Sayonara Film

Italy

 

The Place of Home

Henri Veermäe, Erik Heinsalu

Grafik Oü

Estonia