Competitions Archives - BYU College of Fine Arts and Communications

The Paradigm Shifters

admin — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 18:26:24 +0000

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BYU Barlow Endowment for Music Composition announces 2019 award recipients

Brendan Gwynn — Mon, 11 Nov 2019 22:35:47 +0000

Nearly $100,000 was granted by the endowment to more than a dozen composers The BYU Barlow Endowment for Music Composition recently announced commission winners for 2019, including the Barlow Prize recipient and 15 additional composers who were awarded through the endowment’s commissioning programs. “The endowment’s board of directors and board of advisors work hard to realize the vision we all share with the Barlow: to provide critical support for composers with the skills to write powerful music,” said Ethan Wickman, executive director of the Barlow Endowment. Bekah Simms of Toronto, Ontario, Canada received the $12,000 Barlow Prize to compose an original work for Pierrot ensemble including percussion and electronics. The work will be performed in 2021 by a group of ensembles: Crash Ensemble, Eighth Blackbird and the New York New Music Ensemble. The judging panel reviewed 276 submissions from 28 countries before making its decision. In addition, $87,000 was granted to 15 composers who will write works for various ensembles, including the Salt Lake Symphony. Nearly 200 applicants were considered for the endowment’s General and Latter-day Saint commissioning programs. “We hope that Barlow commissions create financial security for composers seeking time and space to make their best work,” Wickman said. “We also hope that the rigorous selection process gives successful commission winners an empowering vote of confidence from their peers that vet the submissions on the advisory board.” Details for the 2020 competitions will be available on the Barlow Endowment website and Facebook page in coming months.

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BYU Center for Animation Claims Sixth Student Academy Award

admin — Fri, 18 Oct 2019 17:23:29 +0000

BYU’s highly esteemed Center for Animation became even more reputable when the short film “Grendel,” directed and produced by BYU animation students, recently won its sixth Student Academy Award. This year, the Student Academy Awards competition received a total of 1,615 entries from 255 domestic and 105 international colleges and universities. Only 16 entries received an award. Student director Kalee McCollaum and student producer Austin Rodriguez worked with approximately 40 students to make this film a reality. Thousands of hours went into the project which was supervised by professors Kelly Loosli and R. Brent Adams. The story of “Grendel” is a reverse telling of the classic Beowulf tale where Grendel, the friendly monster in the film, is joined by rowdy Viking neighbors who harass him. He slowly starts to retaliate until he realizes he’s the one who has become the monster. This realization spikes a change in character as he chooses to help save the Vikings from other creatures. Read more at news.byu.edu, sltrib.com or usatoday.com

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The BYU Launchpad

admin — Mon, 05 Aug 2019 18:34:18 +0000

With a boost from BYU’s top-ranked advertising program, students are blasting off—creating iconic campaigns and landing at the world’s most-respected agencies. More than 200 strong, boisterous Brimhall Building residents create impactful messages and effective strategies for real-world clients, squeaking colorful solutions onto whiteboards in their ground-floor workroom. Then they spend every spare dollar on props at thrift stores to make their visions come true. Logos from the biggest brands—Amazon, Nike, Holiday Inn, Gatorade, Spotify, Doritos, to name just a few of the AdLab’s clients—line the lab’s walls. And a hallway display case brims over with awards; no dust settles on the hardware, which is rotated out with each year’s haul from national and international competitions. What’s more, BYU’s advertising alumni have been creative leads for some of the world’s most iconic campaigns. Allstate’s Mayhem character, Apple’s “Welcome Home,” Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Can Smell Like,” and Gatorade’s “Be Like Mike” remix—all came out of the minds of BYU advertising alumni. These are heady times for the BYU advertising program, which College Magazine recently ranked No. 1 in the nation. Read the article at magazine.byu.edu.

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Married BYU Alums Surprise Filmmaking Community with Silent Documentary

Morgan Reis — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 20:34:55 +0000

BYU Department of Theatre and Media Arts grad Jared Jakins and his wife Carly win Best of Show and Utah Short Film of the Year for “El Desierto” BYU media arts studies grad Jared Jakin’s short film, “El Desierto,” has received significant attention from the filmmaking community for its creative use of silence — using only sound design and music — to portray the lonely life of shepherds in the desert region of the Great Basin in the West. “This is my fourth short film, so we wanted to do something that was really different for us,” said Jakins. “We wanted to do something that other filmmakers weren’t doing. The film developed its own voice and that meant it was going to be a silent film — that was quite thrilling to us.” The inspiration for this 19-minute film produced by both Jakins and his wife Carly — who graduated from BYU in anthropology — was Jakins’ upbringing in the sheep-growing community of Fountain Green near the Great Basin, where he lived after immigrating from South Africa when he was three years old. Jakins was intrigued by the humble lives of immigrant workers who come to the U.S. on visas for three years at a time to work as fruit pickers, farm workers and shepherds. These hard-working people have been the subject of other short films Jakins has produced. “El Desierto” was awarded both the Grand Jury Prize for Best of Show and Utah Short Film of the Year at the 17th annual Fear No Film portion of the Utah Arts Festival — something that no film has ever done before. Additionally, a short film from the U.S. had not won the festival’s Grand Jury Prize for Best of Show in seven years. It has also won various prizes at other film festivals throughout the country. Read the full story at tma.byu.edu.

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BYU Music Students Excel in Classical Singer National Convention Competition

Morgan Reis — Tue, 02 Jul 2019 21:14:50 +0000

BYU professor Diane Reich accompanied three students to a national vocal competition Members of the BYU School of Music made a favorable impression on and off the stage at the annual Classical Singer National Convention Competition, which took place in Chicago at the end of May this year. The Classical Singer National Convention Competition is a multi-round elimination contest for both students and non-students. BYU students Josie Larsen, Abigail Yingling Ketch and Courtney Lawson competed in this year’s convention. All three passed the preliminary round, qualifying them to continue to the national round. “Any opportunity to perform, get feedback and experience the discipline of the profession is very valuable,” said vocal performance professor Diane Reich. “Classical Singer Music (CSMUSIC) is one of the prominent organizations for rising singers in our country. Our students were seen by numerous universities and vocal programs — exposure which could be beneficial after their studies at BYU.” Reich and fellow BYU vocal performance professor Darrell Babidge mentored the three students and supported them as they competed against some of the top classical singers in the country. “I know how hard these students work all year long, so it was wonderful to see them apply their training in a competitive situation — and do well,” said Reich. Read the rest of the story at music.byu.edu.

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BYU Students Touch Hearts with ‘Handimojis’ Creation for Deaf Community

Morgan Reis — Tue, 02 Jul 2019 20:23:15 +0000

BYU students from the School of Communications and the Department of Design came together to create ‘Handimojis’ — an ASL-friendly version of Apple’s ‘Animoji’ BYU students Sam Carlson, Amanda Rasmussen and Coni Ramirez were given an assignment in their advertising class — create an idea that uses technology to connect customers to a brand. The result of this project extended beyond the classroom walls and has encouraged a wider conversation about inclusivity and diversity. Carlson knew he wanted this project to focus on the deaf community because of his deep admiration of American Sign Language and deaf culture — a respect he gained while serving an ASL mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and working as an ASL teaching assistant for BYU. During the brainstorming phase, Carlson proposed to Rasmussen and Ramierez that they use the idea of Apple’s Animoji technology and add the ability to depict hand movement. This would allow users who couldn’t previously use the feature to have access to Animoji technology in a new, exciting and personalized way. In addition to using this for their class project, the team decided to enter ‘Handimojis’ into the Future Lions advertising competition. The challenge for the competition was to “connect an audience of your choosing to a product or service from a global brand in a way that wasn’t possible three years ago.” ‘Handimojis’ fit the goal of the competition, so they decided to make the April 15 deadline. When the team presented the idea of ‘Handimojis’ to their BYU class, they were met with hesitation as many people were under the assumption that it would be impossible for deaf users to be able to hold their phone and use ‘Handimojis’ at the same time. However, the team explained that deaf people already use just one hand when video chatting on the phone. The new feature could be easily integrated into the existing culture. The team enlisted the help of Britta Schwall, a member of the Salt Lake Deaf Community, to sign in the one minute and 15 second video clip. After they finished shooting the footage of Schwall and others from the Salt Lake Deaf Community, there was still an integral part missing — the animation for the ‘Handimojis’ hands. This task proved to be the most challenging aspect of bringing ‘Handimojis’ to life. The three advertising students knew what they wanted but didn’t have the skills themselves to execute the 3D graphics for ‘Handimojis.’ As the team hurried to find someone to do the animation before the upcoming competition deadline, they turned to the Department of Design and its animation students. They eventually got in contact with Emily Ellis, who had just learned in her animation class the exact skills and techniques that would be required to complete the ‘Handimojis’ idea. “Emily was the answer to our prayers,” said Carlson. “With four days until the deadline, she pulled off some kind of magic. Seeing her animation was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen — it was exactly how we imagined it.” Rassmussen took Ellis’ animations and added them into the video only hours before the Future Lions competition deadline. Although the team’s idea didn’t advance in the competition, the team felt proud of their work and commitment to include a group of people that had previously been excluded from using Animojis. Schwall asked the team for permission to share their video on her Facebook to show what she had helped with. While the post was initially intended for Schwall’s immediate family and friends, the post now has over 48k views and 800 shares. Many of the comments on the post ask if ‘Handimojis’ is available for download or mention they weren’t able to find it in the App Store. While this app hasn’t been picked up by Apple, these comments show high interest and appreciation for this idea created by BYU students. “Seeing how the Deaf community reacted to it was more fulfilling than winning any award,” said Carlson. “It was a reminder to me why I first got involved with advertising — there’s so much good and positive change we can be a part of.” Read additional coverage at ABC4.

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BYU Students Set Record at One Club for Creativity Competition in New York

Morgan Reis — Tue, 25 Jun 2019 17:35:42 +0000

Students from the BYU School of Communications and the Department of Design competed in an event hosted by one of the most prestigious graphic design and advertising organizations in the world BYU design and advertising students dominated at The One Club for Creativity competition held each year in New York City — considered to be one of the top international award competitions for advertising and graphic design students. While the categories for these awards are vast, recognition in even one category showcases excellence in creativity and is a high honor. Collectively, BYU took home a new school record of awards during this year’s One Club for Creativity competition. Six advertising students and one graphic design student received gold for their portfolio submissions — more than any other university. To win a portfolio award, students must submit their best pieces in a portfolio as a single unit, which the judges — approximately 10 industry leaders from various artistic specialities — will look at collectively. This year, The One Club for Creativity reported that there were 8,751 portfolios submitted from designers in 45 different countries. From these submissions, the judges chose 14 gold winners from diverse disciplines, half of which were BYU students. “The portfolio competition in particular is held in such high esteem because they are not just recognizing one piece in your portfolio, but your entire body of work,” said Alexa Spiroff, an advertising student. “To be a portfolio winner means the judges are acknowledging that every piece of work in your book is award-winning.” Cam Tribe and Sara McLaws won for advertising. Connor Dean, Jedediah Thunell, Bentley Rawle and Alexa Spiroff won for film and TV commercials. Laura McNeill won for graphic design. In addition to the seven golds won by BYU students for portfolios, four individual advertising projects won gold, three won silver and one won bronze. They also won five gold cubes, two silver cubes and one bronze cube in the ADC Awards category. In the One Show category, BYU advertising students won one gold pencil, one silver pencil and three merit awards. McCall Keller, another BYU graphic design student, won a bronze cube for his redesign of King Kong Magazine. Nineteen advertising and graphic design projects were merit winners — all contributing to the competition’s ultimate ranking of BYU as the #2 program in the world. BYU advertising professor Jeff Sheets, who is a board member and judge for the One Club for Creativity, was asked to present the portfolio awards and give students their awards on stage. “It was a very fulfilling moment for me personally to be able to present so many awards to our very own BYU students,” said Sheets. “I had witnessed first-hand all of their hard work and creative determination.” Winning such a prestigious award can help students put their names out there and launch their professional careers after they leave BYU. “The One Club is really well known across the graphic design and advertising communities, so to be able to have that on my resume would really help with validating my work,” said McNeill. “I think even the networking that can happen from it is valuable.”

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Opera Student Mary Hoskins Joins Ranks of Met Performers

Martha Duzett — Tue, 04 Jun 2019 17:27:24 +0000

Hoskins competed as a semi-finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions New York’s Metropolitan Opera House at the Lincoln Center is one of the most prestigious and beloved stages in the genre. A Met performance is a bucket list item for even the most renowned opera stars and is among the loftiest dreams of aspiring professional singers. This dream came true in March for 20 of the top young opera singers in the country — including BYU’s own Mary Hoskins. The 65th annual Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions started at the district level with each singer bringing five arias to the competition. Hoskins won the Utah District auditions alongside her brother Jonah and advanced to the regional level, where she became one of four singers from the Rocky Mountain Region to continue on to the semi-finals in New York. “I couldn’t quite comprehend it when it first happened,” said Hoskins on learning that she would be performing at the Met. “Even when I was there, I don’t think it hit me until I was actually singing on the stage.” Read the full story at the School of Music website.

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BYU Communications Grad Students Take Home Second Place at Case Study Competition

Sydnee Gonzalez — Sat, 06 Apr 2019 01:16:28 +0000

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