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Luke Eve, creator and director of 'High Life', took home three awards at this year's Melbourne WebFest..

Luke Eve.s High Life took home the most awards at this year.s Melbourne Webfest, earning Best Australian Drama, Best Director and Best Supporting Actor (Benson Jack Anthony).

Melbourne WebFest is Australia.s only international web series festival, now in its fifth year. Over the weekend it screened a selection of 50 web series from around the world, in addition to hosting industry panels, workshops and a live pitching competition conducted in partnership with ABC iview..

The festival.s keynote speaker, La-based filmmaker Christopher Leone (The Lost Room, Parallels) said: .Like the rise of independent film 20 years ago, we're now witnessing the rise of independent television delivered via the web. Melbourne WebFest is a fantastic event to discover the new wave of television creators and a damn good time..

The festival gave out some 24 awards,...

Exhibition execs discuss the virtual print fee on panel about funding the future of digital.

A second virtual print fee (Vpf) to fund future industry innovation is highly unlikely, agreed a panel of exhibition experts yesterday at a conference on the future of cinema.

“My understanding – and it’s fair to say, the understanding of colleagues at the International Union of Cinemas (Unic) and the National Association of Theatre Owners (Nato) – is that there is no appetite from studios for a second Vpf, even if no studio is prepared to state that publicly,” said Phil Clapp, CEO of the Cinema Exhibitors’ Association (Cea), during the panel titled ‘Designing the Future’.

“I think you can understand it, whether you like it or not….our understanding is that there will be no further fundamental industry-wide Vpf,” he continued.

The panel agreed that the implementation of technological developments such as laser projection and immersive sound would not require the same...

New documentary follows Tom Spicer as he leaves his Devon care home on a quest to meet Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich

Tom Spicer is wearing a huge pair of headphones and an expression of mild anxiety.

Backstage at the Honda Centre, Anaheim, California, at one of the world's biggest rock gigs, Tom is about to find out whether he will fulfill his 15-year-dream to meet his idol, Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich.

Tom is now 40, and this scene took place two years ago. But this was not just a tick on a "things to do before 40" list – it was an unprecedented achievement. Tom has fragile X syndrome, the most common cause of inherited learning disability.

Tom is hypersensitive to noise, anxious in crowds, dislikes being out of his routine and has problems communicating. Leaving the comfort zone of his Devon care home and flying 5,000 miles to America before negotiating thousands of...

A comedy about a young man and his grandfather’s fight to save their lemonade stand has won the Tropfest short film festival.

Lemonade Stand, directed by Alethea Jones, produced by Julian Costanzo and written and starring Tim Potter took out the top prize from a shortlist of 16 films.

Jones told Encore: “We made it for a few thousand dollars. I was doing an attachment on Neighbours and the producers were gracious to offer Neighbours’ props, the show’s art director’s assistant was our production designer and we had pre-production meetings on set.”

The shoot went for two and a half days in late December.

Ahead for Jones, she said: “When we won the If Award we had nothing to back that up with so I made sure for Tropfest I had some more work. I have a short film, Dave’s Dead and I also have five feature...