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June 01, 2007

Help us shape the future of the awards...

This pioneering year of the awards have proved to be extremely successful and has highlighted the exceptional wealth of talent the West Midlands has to offer. Due to this encouraging response Screen WM is inviting the screen media community to help shape the future of the awards.

We want to give the screen media industry in the West Midlands the opportunity to tell us what categories they would like to see in the future media talent awards. The awards, which cover TV, film, radio, games, animation and digital media, are designed to promote the talent in the region, so who’s better to tell us what talent should be recognised and promoted then the individuals and companies involved.

Let us know what you think by emailing us or leave your comments below...

The Winners

Excellence in Development – Big Button Media

Big Button Media is a corporate video and multimedia production company from Birmingham and was recognised for its continuous development and strive for growth. It has not only dramatically increased the number of staff employed at the company since its inception, but also produced and developed a diverse range of projects from corporate video production to include camerawork, editing, animated graphics and website design. Other company achievements have included winning the Chamber of Commerce ‘Marketing Campaign of the Year’ in 2005, being shortlisted in the ‘Best Corporate’ category at the Royal Television Society Awards and they have recently opened a satellite office in Cambridge.

New Filmmaker – Simon Bovey

Simon Bovey, a filmmaker from Worcester, impressed the judges with his fresh, innovative, style and creative story-telling ability. The ambitious filmmaker beat off the rest of the competition with a portfolio of work including his short films A Soldier’s Tunic, The Waiting and more recently The Un-Gone. The Un-Gone has received immense critical acclaim having screened at a number of prestigious festivals, notably at the Curzon Soho, Lund Fantastisk Film Festival (Scandinavia’s most important science fiction festival) and the Los Angeles International Short Film Festival.

Simon has also gained a reputation as one of the leading science fiction writers for BBC7 with his unconventional and action packed series. One of these Cold Blood was the most requested repeat in the station’s history.

Outstanding Achievement – Rural Media Company

Herefordshire based The Rural Media Company was nominated for Outstanding Achievement, an award that recognises those who have exceeded expectation in the industry. The organisation beat off the strong competition to claim the award, having developed and implemented a range of highly successful initiatives, which have made a significant impact both regionally and nationally. These have included the creation of the Borderlines Film Festival – the largest rural film festival in Europe, the development of MediaNet- a region-wide network for media educators and practitioners, and being the only publicly funded company to partner BBC to explore the potential of local broadcasting.

Winners Announced!

The winners of the media talent awards were finally revealed at an exclusive ceremony on Friday 1 June at the Hotel du Vin.

Guests at the ceremony, which was held in association with the Hotel du Vin and ORB Creative, were welcomed with a champagne reception before the festivities got underway. During the ceremony, hosted by Adrian Goldberg, it soon became clear the abundance of screen media talent from throughout the whole of the West Midlands as the competition was fierce. However there could only be one, or three winners, and they were:

Excellence in Development Award - Big Button Media
New Filmmaker Award - Simon Bovey
Outstanding Achievement Award - The Rural Media Company

The celebrations continued as guests joined Screen WM in toasting the winners, but all the exceptional talent in the region in the Cellar Bar.

Check back soon to see photos of the event.....

May 21, 2007

media talent awards

This year Screen WM is thrilled to launch the media talent awards - the West Midlands' premier awards dedicated to the screen media industry.

The screen media industry in West Midlands has flourished over the years and now has over 4,000 audiovisual establishments collectively employing over 23,000 people (not including freelancers). We believe that the media talent awards is a significant step towards acknowledging the great effort and perseverance of the people and organisations in the industry, and celebrating this exceptionally creative and diverse region.


This year's media talent awards consists of three categories:

  • Excellence in Development
  • New Filmmaker
  • Outstanding Development

and excitement is now mounting as we now approach the first exclusive awards ceremony where the names of the winners will finally be revealed!


Make sure you check back again soon to find out who  won these prestigious titles and how you can help shape the future of the media talent awards...