Pune students go international

At the recently held Pune International Film Festival (PIFF) two students from the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) bagged awards in the Whistling Woods International Student Film Competition section. FTII won both the Technical Awards in the Student Competition Section - Manoj Kathe received the Sennheiser Promising Indian Audiographer Award for Naad and Akash Agrawal got the Sony Promising Indian Cinematographer Award for Rizwaan.

Still from the film Naad

Other than Kathe and Agrawal, Swapnil Ninave from the Film Direction course (2008 batch) has been honoured with the Best FTII Student Award.

An elated Akash Agrawal said, "The overall experience of making the film was great. Rizwaan is a short film of 18 minutes, adapted from a play. So, editing it while keeping the important aspects intact was a task." Agrawal feels that one has to enjoy their work to be successful.

Still from the film Rizwan

Kathe might be a newbie but had some interesting views to share with us, "I feel that to become a good director, passion for work is more important than what institute you hail from. It is not important which camera you use, it's the way you use it, discipline is very important for progress in this field." u00a0