The ATOM Awards are a group of awards offered to Australian and New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 "professionals, educators and students", honouring achievements in the making of film

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

, television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

, multimedia

Multimedia

Multimedia is media and content that uses a combination of different content forms. The term can be used as a noun or as an adjective describing a medium as having multiple content forms. The term is used in contrast to media which use only rudimentary computer display such as text-only, or...

, and from 2007 multi-modal productions.

The Awards were established in 1982 by the Australian Teachers of Media

Australian Teachers of Media

The Australian Teachers Of Media or ATOM is an independent, non-profit, professional association in Australia for teachers of media and teachers who wish to use media effectively in their classroom....

, "an independent, non-profit association to promote media education and screen literacy in primary, secondary and tertiary education and the broader community".

Awards are now offered in 36 categories as of 2005, broken down into awards for students, tertiary students, educational resources, and general. There is also a teacher's award'. This Award is made at the discretion of the judges, and recognises the commitment, dedication and inspiration of a teacher or school, and which the judges can observe informing a body of student work as submitted in either the primary, secondary or tertiary categories of the ATOM Awards. The Teachers’ Award can neither be sought nor applied for, and is given solely at the judges’ discretion.

The awards attract student filmmakers, educational films, and even professional industry practitioners. This makes it one of the only awards of its kind.

Entries are open to Australian and New Zealand students and media industry professionals.

2007 ATOM Awards categories

Schools

• Best Junior (K-8) Film Video Production. (includes music clips, short drama, documentaries, experimental)
• Best Junior (K-8) Multimedia Production
• Best Senior (9-12) Multimedia Production. (Multimedia production: combination of image, text, audio, video & interactivity)
• Best Secondary Animation (claymation, drawing, cell 2D & 3D)
• Best Secondary Documentary
  • Images of Age Sub-category (open to Vic residents only)*
• Best Secondary Fiction
• Best Secondary Music Video

Tertiary, A production made by a student or individual enrolled at a tertiary or TAFE institution at the time of the production

• Best Short Fiction
• Best Experimental
• Best Documentary
  • Images of Age Sub-category (open to Vic residents only)*
• Best Animation
• Best Music Video
• Best Multimedia (includes web)
• Best Interactive Game

General

• Best Short Fiction (50 minutes or less)
• Best Experimental
• Best Animation
• Best Music Video
• Best Children’s Television Series
• Best Multi-modal production†
• Best Documentary Short Form (30 minutes or less)
• Best Documentary General
  • Images of Age Sub-category (open to Vic residents only)*
• Best Documentary Social & Political Issues
• Best Documentary Science, Technology & The Environment
• Best Documentary Human Story
• Best Multimedia (inc. installations and web)
• Best Interactive Game

Educational/Vocational

These category entries will be judged cross platform. Judges will be assessing best teaching/training practice, methodology, suitability to the audience, delivery and content. These entries may be websites, TV programs, videos, film, DVD, CD-ROMs or a convergence of the above, including installations.

• Best Primary Education Resource
• Best Secondary Education Resource
• Best Tertiary Education Resource
• Best Instructional/training Resource
• Best Multimedia Learning Reference (includes web)
• Best Multi-modal production†
• Best Indigenous Resource

Notable past ATOM Award nominees and winners

• Hunt Angels
  Hunt Angels
  Hunt Angels is a 2006 Australian docudrama, directed by Alec Morgan, starring Victoria Hill and Ben Mendelsohn. Hunt Angels was filmed in Sydney, Australia and opened in Australia on 30 November 2006 after premiering at the Melbourne International Film Festival in August.-Plot:In the late 1930s,...
  
  
  • Hunt Angels Productions
  • ATOM Award winner 2006

• The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello
  The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello
  The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello is a 2005 Australian short film. The first episode is labeled Jasper Morello and the Lost Airship.- Story :The First Voyage - Jasper Morello and the Lost Airship...
  
  
  • 2005 Academy Award nominee
  • (Anthony Lucas, 3D Films)
  • ATOM Award winner 2005

• Noah & Saskia
  Noah and Saskia
  Noah and Saskia is a 13-episode children's television program co-produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and British Broadcasting Corporation. The show explores a situation in which two teenagers meet in an Internet chatroom, using personas that are very different from their true selves...
  
  
  • (ACTF
    Australian Children's Television Foundation
    The Australian Children's Television Foundation is a non-profit, government-funded organisation in Australia concerned with the development, production, dissemination and promotion of children's television and other audio-visual material for children....
    
    )
  • ATOM Award winner 2005

• Adam Elliot
  Adam Elliot
  Adam Elliot is an independent stop-motion animation writer and director based in Melbourne, Australia. His five films have collectively participated in over six-hundred film festivals and have received over one hundred awards, including an Oscar for Harvie Krumpet and the Annecy Cristal for Mary...
  
  
  • 2003 Academy Award winner
  • ATOM Award winner 1998

• Wildness
  • (Big and Little Films in association with Film Australia)
  • ATOM Award winner 2004

• The 20 Cent Quest
  The 20 Cent Quest
  The 20 Cent Quest is an Australian ATOM Award-winning Macromedia Flash animation created at Lara Primary School by two grade 6 students in 2003...
  
  
  • ATOM Award winner 2003

• A Wedding in Ramallah
  • (Sherine Salama, Habibi Films)
  • ATOM Award winner 2003

• Gulpilil – One Red Blood
  • (Darlene Johnson, jotz Productions)

• Martha's New Coat
  • (Rachel Ward
    Rachel Ward
    Rachel Claire Ward, AM is a British actress, columnist, film director, and screenwriter who has primarily pursued her career in Australia.-Early life:...
    
    , New Town Films)
  • ATOM Award winner 2003

• Harry’s War
  • (Richard Franklin
    Richard Franklin
    Richard Franklin is a British actor.He has had various roles in different television programmes including Crossroads and Emmerdale Farm...
    
    , Golden Seahorse Productions)

• Tulip
  • (Rachel Griffiths
    Rachel Griffiths
    Rachel Anne Griffiths is an Australian film and television actress who came to prominence in the 1994 film Muriel's Wedding and her Academy Award nominated performance in the 1997 film Hilary and Jackie....
    
    )
  • ATOM Award Nominee 1999

• Wicked Science
  Wicked Science
  Wicked Science is an Australian television series, which debuted on 2 July 2004. The series focuses on Toby and Elizabeth , two teenagers who are mysteriously turned into wizards of science...
  
  
  • (Jonathan M Shiff Productions)
  • ATOM Award winner 2004

• Round the Twist
  Round the Twist
  Round the Twist is a Logie Award-winning Australian children's television series about three children and their widowed father who live in a lighthouse and become involved in many magical adventures....
  
  
  • (ACTF
    Australian Children's Television Foundation
    The Australian Children's Television Foundation is a non-profit, government-funded organisation in Australia concerned with the development, production, dissemination and promotion of children's television and other audio-visual material for children....
    
    )

• FrontLine
  Frontline (Australian TV series)
  Frontline is an Australian comedy television series which satirised Australian television current affairs programmes and reporting. It ran for three series of 13 half-hour episodes and was broadcast on ABC TV in 1994, 1995 and 1997.-Production:...
  
  
  • (Working Dog Productions
    Working Dog Productions
    Working Dog Productions is a small film and television production company based in Melbourne, Australia. It was originally known as Frontline Television Productions Pty Ltd...
    
    )
  • ATOM Award Winner 1998

External links

• ATOM Film, Television and Multimedia Awards ATOM Award website
• AFC NewsAndEvents Australian Film Commission
  Australian Film Commission
  The Australian Film Commission was an Australian government agency with a mandate to promote the creation and distribution of films in Australia as well as to preserve the country's film history. It also had a production arm responsible for production and commissioning of films for government...
  
   description of the 2004 Awards, including finalists
• Australian Teachers of Media ATOM official website
• ATOM Awards Entry Form download ATOM Awards Call for entries here
• "ATOM's reach spreads" 2002 article in The Age
  The Age
  The Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
  
  newspaper