Next Lab Generation opens a call for projects for its fourth edition

After three successful editions, Next Lab Generation opens a call for the fourth edition of its workshop. The initiative, focused on the inclusion of innovative tools to streamline the production of animation projects, is once again sponsored by the Community of Madrid through the Department of Culture, Tourism and Sports. It receives funding from the Institute of Cinematography and Audiovisual Arts (ICAA) as part of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan promoted by the European Union, to discover new talents and boost the most advanced animation production from a technical and narrative perspective.

The call will be open until December 13th, 2023, at 11:59 p.m. (Mexico time), for animation projects that wish to experiment with VR, XR and AR tools along with real-time rendering engines for prototyping and animation production. It will also accept fiction productions with high animation or VFX content. Proposals may be submitted by an individual or a work team. Although projects of all nationalities are welcome, they must already have a minimum visual development. All 20 projects selected will have free access to this workshop.

Seeking the growth of the workshop in each edition, while maintaining the approach of taking advantage of the most innovative technologies, one of the novelties of this year will be the inclusion of open-source tools like Blender and its real-time render engine (EEVEE). Quill and Blender Eevee will be the main tools used in the workshop. Previous knowledge of these tools is not required as training will be provided during the Next Lab Generation event.

Registration for the workshop is also free and can be done through the event’s web. It is necessary to send two high quality images and a dossier of the project. The dossier must include a brief bio of the workshop participant indicating the position he/she holds in the project and the motivation for taking part in the workshop. 

A committee made up of professionals of the sector will evaluate the applications and select a group of 20 projects that will receive guidance on their production, applying R+D+I, extensive market knowledge, and the latest technology.

Conducted by various professionals and experts in the field, the workshop will follow the same structure as in previous editions, with an online phase from January 8th to February 25th, and a second in-person phase that will take place in Madrid from February 26th to March 2nd. Ten selected projects that have completed all the online workshop assignments and evaluated based on the delivery of their pitch and audiovisual piece will proceed to these second phase.

Participants will be able to create a teaser for their project using VR tools and real-time rendering engines and present it through a public pitch during the Next Lab Generation 2024, held in Madrid on March 1st and 2nd, 2024. A jury made up of industry professionals will pick three entries, which will be presented at Annecy MIFA 2024 in the Next Lab Generation Conference. As in the previous edition, each of the winning projects will receive 8,000 euros gross to support their development, apart from three months of mentoring, a travel grant, and registration for one project representative to attend Annecy 2024 Festival.

In the last edition of Annecy, a significant percentage of the selected projects participated in the Next Lab Generation. The short film “Cuidadoras” (Caregivers), one of the finalists of Next Lab Generation 2023, attended the French festival after being selected in the Mifa Pitches Short Films. Led by Ecuadorian Daniela Cuenca, the project received the Ciclic - Shortway award. Meanwhile, Fabiola Rosso’s “Nerea” (Dominican Republic, Spain), another of the selected projects from the last edition of the workshop, also attended the Annecy Festival after being selected in the “Stories for Women” section, a program sponsored by the Walt Disney Company, with additional support from Sony Pictures Entertainment.

“Titan Tofu” by María Luquero and “Lumen” by Enric Sant, two Spanish projects from Next Lab Generation’s first and second edition, respectively, also participated in the past Annecy Festival seeking funding in the MIFA Pitches. The latter, winner of the 2022 workshop edition, was submitted to the MIFA Pitches Digital Experiences category where it won the Stereopsia Booster award.

Next Lab Generation is mainly sponsored by the Community of Madrid through the Department of Culture, Tourism and Sports, and funded by the Institute of Cinematography and Audiovisual Arts (ICAA) as part of the Recovery, Transformation and resilience Plan promoted by the European Union. It has the support of the Ministry of Culture and the cooperation of Enisa, Annecy Festival and Weird Market.