BIFED - Bozcaada International Festival Of Ecological Documentary (12)

Festival start: 08 October 2025      Festival end: 12 October 2025

We organize this festival in order to create a new reason to produce and introduce films and any other work of art that concentrate on the world’s problems and riches, and to pioneer the creation of a free platform and reward these works. We live in an era where too much information, and input that cannot be considered as information flow at a disconcertingly rapid pace in every plausible channel. We organize this festival so that we could all seek what is more local and smaller, and more importantly the one that is true and genuine together.

The ecological problems are increasing and becoming more and more varied; however, we also witness hope-inspiring developments. We organize this festival in order to create a platform that nurtures this hope. We hope that through our festival, the residents of Bozcaada, farmers, producers, scientists, artists, and all our guests will be informed about the current technological developments, environmental disasters and innovations, the most recent documentary techniques and also about each other’s existence. We hope that our festival will contribute to nurture solidarity.

Cash Prizes: 4,750€

International Competition for Documentaries

Fethi Kayaalp Grand Award (1500 Euro)

Madame Melpo Award (1250 Euro)

İdil Schneider-Bulut Music & Sound Design Award (1000 Euro)

Naci Güçhan Student Award (1000 Euro)

BIFED – Bozcaada International Festival of Ecological Documentary

Regulations – 2025

Dates

BIFED will take place between 8-12 October 2025 in Bozcaada. The Festival’s competition is open to films inspired of environmental issues and produced after January 1st, 2021. The deadline for all submission is April 1st, 2025.

Festival’s Mission

BIFED’s aim is to bring distinguished films on ecology (nature, human society, culture) from all around the world to Bozcaada, to unite the fields of arts and ecology and to award the most outstanding documentaries among the finalists.


Festival Sections/Awards

International Competition for Documentaries
Fethi Kayaalp Grand Award (1500 Euro)

Madame Melpo Award (1250 Euro)

İdil Schneider-Bulut Music & Sound Design Award (1000 Euro)

International Student Competition for Documentaries (Naci Güçhan Student Award - 1000 Euro)

Panorama/Screening (non-competitive section with thematic focuses)

Material Requested

Submission form completed and undersigned by the copyright owner. The submission form is available on-line.

A copy of the submission form will automatically be sent to the Festival’s e-mail address. The submission of the submission form assumes the acceptance of all the rules hereby described. The films may be sent in the following ways:

Video links. Entrants may present password protected video-links by providing the link and password information in the submission form.

Entrants may ship the DVD or Flash disc by post/courier: (DVD PAL -zone 0/2- in English or Turkish version).

Please write the title of the film and the name of the film director on the DVD or Flash disc screener media.

Films admitted to the Festival

The applicant documentaries for the competition will be evaluated by an international selection committee and jury consisted of the international artists and professionals in the field of film, arts, ecology and environment and will be accepted for BIFED 2025 for its final judgement. The authors accepted for the competition will be informed until August 5th, 2025. The decisions of the selection committee & the jury are absolute.

BIFED has the right for a second public non-commercial screening of the productions after the festival to promote its primary aims specified above.

Technical requirements for the screening format:

Video specs:

H264 codec

15000-20000 kbps bitrate

Progressive

AAC or Dolby with preferably 320Kbps bitrate or LPCM Audio

Subtitles:

The films have to include English subtitles either as an option (preferably) or embedded. Hearing impaired is not required. Additionally, the time coded dialog-list in English has to be submitted (.srt, .pdf…).

Costs

Registration is free of charge.

The shipping costs of all materials sent are to be covered by the entrants.

Translations

All films in foreign languages will be subtitled. Turkish films are required to be subtitled in English. All Festival documents will be published in both English and Turkish.

Juries and prizes

Official prizes will be assigned by a qualified international jury, composed of at least five members, appointed by the Festival’s Direction. Awards or mentions may be announced during the Festival.

Agreement

The official Submission Form to the Festival constitutes unconditional agreement to all the regulations herein. BIFED reserves the right to make decisions on matters not specified within the regulations.

BIFED – Bozcaada International Festival of Ecological Documentary

Bozcaada Belediyesi

Bozcaada – Çanakkale

Turkey

info@bifed.org
www.bifed.org