Short Film Category
Films in the short film category may contain themes of a mature subject matter. Viewer discretion is advised.
Gang Li
The Restorer
2026
Filmmaker Statement
The Restorer follows Chen Yang, a mobile phone repair technician who spends his days fixing broken devices while avoiding the last voicemail left by his late mother. When encounters with an elderly customers bring back memories of family and loss, he must finally face the voice he has long been afraid to hear.
Bio
Gang Li is a Master of Film and Screen Arts student at the University of Sydney, with around six years of film and television production experience. He has worked across directing, cinematography, lighting and script development, directed documentaries broadcast on CCTV-10, China’s national science and education television channel, and published research on VR filmmaking.
Huan Feng
My world is my reflection
2025
Filmmaker Statement
This is an experimental 16mm short filmed on a Bolex H16. Using Kodak 500T film with paint and scratches applied directly to the celluloid, it translates the sensory experience of anxiety into a visceral, visual landscape.
Bio
Fung (Huan Feng) is an emerging filmmaker based in Sydney. She began learning filmmaking in July 2025, exploring moving images as a way to capture introspective and poetic moments. My World Is My Reflection is her first experimental film project.
Yi-Lun Huang
Clean Hands
2026
Filmmaker Statement
Clean Hands explores the moral decay of a rookie cop who turns to corruption to pay his mother's nursing home bills. Pushed by systemic failure, he discovers doing the right thing isn't enough. This gritty thriller examines how easily good intentions are swallowed by a broken system.
Bio
Yi-Lun Huang is a filmmaker currently pursuing a Master of Film and Screen Arts at the University of Sydney. Relocating to Australia in 2025, he specializes in screenwriting, directing, and post-production. His works focus on complex character studies and the dark, morally ambiguous aspects of human nature.
Seung-je Koh
Pt.1 Seoul Itaewon Crowd Crush
2026
Filmmaker Statement
On the evening of Saturday, 29th October 2022, approximately 100,000 individuals, crowded into Itaewon. during a Halloween celebration in Seoul's Itaewon district. A tragic disaster unfolded as crowds surged on World Food Street into a narrow 16-foot-wide alley, resulted in a horrifying crush that claimed the lives of 158 people.
Bio
With a participant-centred approach, the perspective and experiences of Norwegian survivor reconstruct the historical event visually by conveying the urgency, confusion, and chaos of the night of the disaster. This short form of documentary attempts to represent critical inquiry, while remaining attentive to the lived experiences of the tragedy.
Emilie Lapere
The Art of Trying Something New
2026
Filmmaker Statement
Through a blend of reflection and personal storytelling, The Art of Trying Something New follows a journey of stepping beyond overthinking and achievement to embrace uncertainty, creativity, and the freedom that can come from trying something unfamiliar.
Bio
Emilie Lapere is a creative media practitioner and recent graduate of the Master of Media Practice. Interested in the arts, environmental topics, personal development, and music, she enjoys working across diverse projects and exploring storytelling through different creative and practical approaches.
Hapsari Putri Larasati
20
2026
Filmmaker Statement
A short film exploring the author’s bittersweet feelings toward her transition of turning twenty.
Bio
Hapsari is a second-year design student at the University of Sydney. She loves exploring different media of art especially when it comes to memories and traces of life.
Katie Ord
Home Smart Home
2026
Filmmaker Statement
Home Smart Home is a science fiction black comedy that imagines a world where AI dominates and outsmarts the most lethal of all humans. It's about a meticulous burglar forced to confront his greatest enemy, a small and unassuming household assistant, H.I.L.D.A.
Bio
Katie Ord (she/her) is a Chinese-Australian writer/director/producer/script supervisor. Her film credits include: Forever Young (2027) Breathless Films, Her Last Laugh (2026) Joy House Productions, Sleeping Kings (2026) 27 Phoenix Street, The Cure (2026 ) Nina Oyama, Home Smart Home (2026) Novus Ordo Vitae.
Pasha Putrarinsi
The Sounds of Sydney
2026
Filmmaker Statement
This short film tells two individual stories at different stages of their study journey in Sydney, one commencing and one completing. Through the city's everyday soundscape, it explores how a place gradually becomes familiar, and how we often notice them most when it is time to leave.
Bio
Pasha G. Putrarinsi and Fadlan H. Ekantoro are Master of Urbanism (Urban Design) students at the Sydney School of Architecture, Design and Planning, with particular interest in cities and visual storytelling through design, photography and videography.
Talia Rabin
Sacrifice
2026
Filmmaker Statement
Sacrifice demonstrates the duplicity of the integral human sacrificial nature. Through this, there is an endless stream of vulnerability, facades, love and fear. Ultimately, it is the unoriginal, unavoidable fear of death that breeds fear into life, forcing sacrifice into all walks of existence. Sacrifice explores such connections and dichotomies.
Bio
Talia Rabin is a current second-year student at SCA, undertaking a BVA and Advanced Studies. Her practice majors in screen arts, with additional focuses in experimental sculpture and photography.
Hannah Rahim
Chimera
2025
Filmmaker Statement
Chimera' is an experimental short on how we remember dreams and memories either in fragments or imagined. This was my first time filming on 16mm, and I shot this project with two rolls of Kodak Vision3 250D on a Bolex H16.
Bio
Hannah Rahim is a final year Film and Screen Arts student who aspires to be a cinematographer. She knew she wanted to be a filmmaker after watching 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' when she was 14. She has written and shot other short films and short documentaries.
Andrew Robards
Terminal Velocity
2024
Filmmaker Statement
Terminal Velocity is a poetic meditation on flight, perception, and the evolving relationship between humans and machines. Framed as an AI dream of flight, the film combines text developed through dialogue between artist and neural network with footage captured in a single FPV drone journey by Balin Williams. Recorded through the analogue headset feed of the drone operator—favoured for its immediacy and low latency—the low-resolution imagery becomes an embodied point of connection between body and machine. Set to an atmospheric score by Tim Mahony, Terminal Velocity reflects on the desire for vision, speed, and technological becoming.
Bio
Andrew Robards is an Australian filmmaker, artist, and researcher working across experimental cinema, moving image installation, and hybrid screen practices. His work explores technology, memory, and cinematic materiality, with projects screening at festivals and galleries nationally, including the award-winning short film The Remains.
Sabine Ruben
Autonomous
2026
Filmmaker Statement
My film Autonomous aims to convey humanity’s overwhelming loss of agency in the face of artificial intelligence. This film creatively analyses how people have handed over their autonomy to choose to digital technologies like ChatGPT and the resounding effect it has on morality and mortality.
Bio
Sabine Ruben is a second year Bachelor of Arts (English) and Bachelor of Laws student. She has always engaged in fine art practices and recently found an appreciation for moving picture. She made this film on a semester exchange at New York University in a Tisch School of the Arts beginner filmmaking course.
Kimberly Strange
Paradise Found
2026
Filmmaker Statement
Paradise Found aims to explore the way our perceptions influence how we experience art and the world around us. This work initially focuses on the rich sounds of a lake environment including the many birds, sounds of the water and sounds made when rowing in a sculling boat. The visual aspect is initially blurred and distorted, making the viewer create their own image to match the sounds they hear. The visual scene is revealed, taking the viewer into a new reality as their perception changes.
Bio
Kimberley is a current student at the SCA and has been drawn to screenarts. She likes to use film to present a story about the subjects of her works. She is passionate about human and animal rights and thus features in her works. She also likes to explore image and film making and to explore ways to present visually interesting and thought provoking works.
Giselle Tuetuekin
Will I
2025
Filmmaker Statement
Will I is a short film about the quiet fear many women carry in their daily lives. It follows a woman simply trying to get home, moving between what’s real and what she imagines could happen. The film shows how even normal moments can feel heavy, how our bodies stay alert, and how safety never feels guaranteed. "Will I" is about that uncomfortable truth many women know too well... walking, breathing, hoping and wondering… will I make it home?
Bio
Giselle Tuetuekin is completing a Master of Interaction Design and Electronic Arts, using film and visual storytelling as a form of creative expression. Her work explores emotion, vulnerability, and shared human experiences through intimate and socially driven narratives.
Shimmy Yang
Trip to X
2021
Filmmaker Statement
Trip to X is a short documentary film, shot in New South Wales, Australia. The film captures the adventure of me and my friend Gabe exploring an abandoned powerhouse station till the next sunrise. The film was mostly shot with an 8mm handheld camcorder and includes some scenes shot with a NOKIA phone and an IPHONE. The film was selected to be part of the Sydney Underground Film Festival and was nominated Best Experimental Short at Indie Short Fest in LA in 2021.
Bio
Shimmy is a 3rd year pharmacy student at the University of Sydney. During uni break, she often works on her various creative projects such as film and music. Her work frequently delves into themes of alternate realities and pattern recognition.