Voting

BIFA has a large and diverse voting group made up of past nominees and winners and top film professionals and filmmakers. Although our pool of voters is over 1500-strong and continually growing, around 400 voters take part in ‘active duty’ (voting for the nominations) each year. All voters, ‘active’ and ‘inactive’, are welcome to vote for the winners in many categories (see list below). The winners in the rest of BIFA’s categories are decided by two independent, annually-appointed juries: the Filmmaker Jury and the Performance Jury.

BIFA’s voting process revolves around group discussion, with teams of voters meeting throughout the year to talk about the films that they have seen before privately casting votes. Each stage in BIFA’s process is reached by rounds of voting: the longlists are decided by Round 1, the nominations by Round 2 and the winners by Round 3.

Additionally, BIFA presents honorary awards, which are bestowed either by BIFA’s Board and Nomination Committee or by its independent juries. These honorary awards include The Richard Harris Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Film by an Actor, which is decided with the input of the Harris family, and the Special Jury Award.

Voting PROCESS

The majority of the watching / voting process takes place in August, September and October, when all entered films are seen by a minimum number of voters and discussed at subgroup meetings. Votes are then cast privately in two rounds, to reach the longlists and then the nominations. In calculating the results, BIFA takes into account the number of people who have seen a film.

The long list for the Best British Independent Film award is reached by discussion and consensus amongst all voters: each subgroup gets to put forward four to eight films from their entries that they feel are the best British independent films of the year. These suggestions are collected to form the Best British Independent Film Award long list of around 20-30 films, which is fed into Round 2 voting.

All voters are welcome to vote for the winners in the following categories:

• Best British Independent Film
• Best International Independent Film
• Best British Short Film
• Best Documentary
• The Raindance Maverick Award
• The ten Craft categories (Casting, Cinematography, Costume Design, Effects, Editing, Make-up & Hair Design, Original Music, Music Supervision, Production Design, Sound)

BIFA’s two juries vote for the winners in the following categories:

Filmmaker Jury	Performance Jury
Best Director Best Screenplay The Douglas Hickox Award (Best Debut Director) Debut Director – Feature Documentary Debut Screenwriter The Special Jury Prize	Best Lead Performance Best Supporting Performance Best Joint Lead Performance Best Ensemble Performance Breakthrough Performance The Special Jury Prize

BIFA’s Nomination Committee oversees the adjudication and voting processes and has the responsibility of making final decisions in all matters pertaining to entries, eligibility requirements, rules and processes. The Nomination Committee also meet with subgroup representatives to scrutinise and confirm voting results.

BIFA also presents two honorary awards: The Richard Harris Award, which is bestowed by BIFA’s Board and Nomination Committee; and the Special Jury Prize, intended to recognise an individual or organisation for their outstanding contribution within the British independent film industry, which is decided by both BIFA Juries.

Conflicts of interest

Conflicts of interest are declared to BIFA and voters sit out any discussions of films which they have an interest in. Conflicted voters may still vote, but they may not vote for films which they have an interest in. Additionally, BIFA carries out rigorous checks on votes to ensure that any undeclared conflicts of interest are discovered, and voting results are inspected by our scrutineers, Wiggin.

APPLY to vote

If you’re interested in applying to vote for BIFA, please take a look at the criteria required to be a BIFA voter and apply here.