Asia’s biggest smartphone film festival is all set to kick off in Karachi on December 19, in a revolutionary move to empower the youth

A two-day event has been organized by 'iSmart Films' which aims to encourage aspiring filmmakers to share their stories through smart-phone film making techniques.

The co-founder of 'iSmart films,' Kamran Ata spoke to HIP and said that the festival will help bring revolutionary changes in film making in Pakistan.

“It is an initiative to empower youth and providing them a platform to show off their skills,” Ata said.

He further added that it will also be the world’s 9th pocket cinema film festival of its kind featuring films, movies, and documentaries produced by using a pocket-sized mobile phone in place of conventional film making tools.

The team behind the smartphone festival includes, iSmart founders Kamran Ata and Abid Beli.

A total of 1017 films from more than 110 countries, including Pakistan, have been submitted by young filmmakers for the festival since June 14, 2015. The last date to send in movies is December 5.

Quite a few of media industry's bigwigs have been taken on board as jury members such as Shahzad Nawaz, Jami Mehmood, Furqan T. Siddiqui, Adil Murad, and Yousuf Bashir Qureshi.

Renowned drama producer/director Furqan T. Siddiqui told HIP that he is delighted to be a part of festival.

“I know the organizers personally and when they approached and briefed me about it, there was no point in not being part of the initiative. I agreed to be a part of it and am privileged to be associated with something which would give our youngsters a chance to come out of their comfort zone and experiment with something more innovative and creative,” Siddiqui said.

In the festival, the ‘School of Smartphone Film Production’ will also be inaugurated followed by the launching of a ‘Web TV.’ The organizers plan to showcase selected films from all over the world in the festival which can help Pakistan enter the international filmmaking arena.

The two-day festival will also feature a conference – an initiative to connect leaders from the media industry with the next generation of filmmakers to discuss the state and future of filmmaking.