Jamison is also a talented music composer.  His film scores for the short films “Cold Charlie” and “The Seven Year Wish” recently received Platinum and Gold Awards, respectively, from the 2011 AVA Awards.

As an organization, IFFF operates year round. Among its primary activities, it produces an annual film festival in Hollywood for youth (the IFFF Youth Fest!) and adults; IFFF advocates and encourages the creation and sharing of family films and screenplays; it conducts summer film camps; IFFF teaches filmmaking, media & family literacy through its International Family Film Institute, and it supports various film contests that promote socially responsible film products suitable for a general audience that express a fundamental respect for the positive values of life.

Now celebrating its 16th year, the 2011 International Family Film Festival will be held (March 16 – 20) at Raleigh Studios in the heart of Hollywood.  This year’s theme is Family Films are Evergreen, a literary notion that quality family films stand the test of time.

Participants were first asked to submit up to ten high concept loglines for the first round of this unique competition.  After receiving over 400 loglines, WSF President Ken Miyamoto and a film industry executive working for a major studio (name and exact company withheld due to legalities and anonymity) selected the loglines with the most potential, eventually narrowing it down to the Lucky 13.

Those thirteen writers were asked to write the first ten pages of a screenplay based on their selected logline.  The Final Five of that group were selected and then given a November deadline to complete the full screenplay.

The Final Five were then invited to Madison, WI to partake in film industry mock meetings.  These meetings were designed specifically to mirror real film industry meetings with development executives or producers to give the writers a glimpse into what to expect.  WSF President Ken Miyamoto and an independent producer from Hollywood, John Baumgaertner, held the meetings on the University of Wisconsin campus.

Writers were able to discuss and “spitball” their screenplays with Miyamoto and Baumgaertner, discuss the film industry, what to expect, as well as if the writers had any further projects completed or in-the-works, a common question that all screenwriters should expect to hear in such meetings.

All writers have been given until the end of January to complete a final draft of their competition screenplays, which will then be handed forward to our major studio affiliate, as well as additional major film industry companies, for consideration.  This will give the Final Five writers exclusive and unique access to the film industry… essentially making them all winners of this competition.

Brooke Miller Hall and Amy Gangl’s “My Own Time Machine” has won the competition’s additional prize as being selected as the official WSF Pick, based primarily on the delivery of the screenplay and the strength of that first draft at hand.

“Brooke and Amy did a wonderful job of delivering a heartfelt and character driven story, injected within the high concept of a boy time traveling back in time to see his deceased grandfather.  The screenplay delivered.  It engaged.  It had the wonder of E.T. and the fun of Back to the Future.  We’re proud to announce it as our WSF pick for this unique competition,” Miyamoto stated.

“We wish them, and the rest of the Final Five, the best of luck as they lock their final drafts and as we forward them to true film industry players for consideration.”

Miller Hall and Gangl will receive a free year long WSF membership renewal, as well as free admittance to the upcoming Spring WSF Retreat in April.

To read the loglines from the Final Five, please CLICK HERE.

WSF member Dave Thome has published his comic romantic novel “Fast Lane.”

In “Fast Lane,” Lara Dixon is determined to bring down billionaire Clay Creighton because she believes his Fast Lane media empire, which promotes “fast women, fast cars and fast living,” ruined her marriage and is a menace to all women. She proposes someone infiltrate The Rotation—three women who attend to Clay 24/7 until being replaced—to gather dirt for an expose and then become the first woman to walk away. Lara’s benefactors suggest she be the one.

Once inside, though, Lara discovers Fast Lane and Clay are not what they seem. She starts falling in love with Clay, but isn’t sure how he feels about her. Meanwhile, she finds herself in the crosshairs of people in the organization who have their own agendas.

“Fast Lane” is available for Kindle from Amazon.

Christine is also this month’s featured author at the Jewels of the Quill website, where you can read excerpts of her writing. Check out www.JewelsoftheQuill.com

The novel tells the story of Emily and Stan Remington’s maiden voyage in their brand-new, second-hand RV goes awry when a body falls off the top of their vehicle. The retired small town police officer and her husband, a retired history professor, find themselves at the center of a murder investigation involving a politician, a corporate executive, and a hippie priest. Emily butts heads with the local sheriff as their search takes them from a backwoods cabin in Wisconsin’s scenic Door County to the Bishop’s Chancery in Madison to an abandoned island in the infamous Death’s Door Straits.

The novel is available through Amazon download for the Kindle (Click on cover image) and will hopefully be available in other venues soon after.

SINBAD AND THE LAMP OF ONE, a middle-grade children’s novel, written by WSF Member Daniel Marleau is now available in print and electronic formats.