Earlier this year when Lucasfilm and AtomFilms put out an open call to fan filmmakers asking them to prepare their best works for the Fourth Annual Star Wars Fan Film Awards, little did anyone predict that over 100 entries would be submitted to the contest. The fan films ranged in every style imaginable -- from traditional animation to live-action drama and comedy. Out of those entries, 16 lucky finalists made it into the final round of competition, looking not only to win the award in their respective categories, but also vie for the coveted "George Lucas Selects Award," an achievement hand-selected by the Star Wars creator himself.

In the end, eight filmmakers went home with awards and the satisfaction of knowing online and in-person fans watched and approved of their cinematic tributes to the Star Wars saga.

"We had a lot of great films this year, a lot of Flash animation," director George Lucas says. "There are a lot of good stories being told. And I'm very grateful for your participation. It's always a lot of fun."

Filmmakers in the competition competed for cash prizes, and for one of the rare Star Wars Fan Film golden trophies featuring C-3PO and R2-D2. The maker of the top film has the exceptional honor of receiving the George Lucas Selects Award, chosen by the filmmaker himself, plus a \$2,000 cash prize.

The 2005 Star Wars Fan Film Winners are:

• George Lucas Selects: For the Love of the Film -- Barry Curtis and Troy Metcalf
• Spirit of Fandom: Boba -- Mark Rusciano
• Audience Choice: Sith Apprentice -- John Hudgens
• Best Comedy: Cheap Seats -- Robert Reeves
• Best Animation: Walk in a Bamboo Bush -- Tetsuro Saiki
• Best Crossover Spoof: Anakin Dynamite -- Wayne Barnes
• Best Original Concept: Star Wars: Elements -- Alabama Robert Bunch
• Best Song: One Season More -- Tim Edward Smith
• Pioneer: Return of the Ewok -- Warwick Davis

Now take a moment to meet a few of those winning filmmakers:

Barry Curtis and Troy Metcalf - For the Love of the Film

This year, New York Star Wars fan filmmakers Barry Curtis and Troy Metcalf won the prestigious George Lucas Selects Award for his film For the Love of the Film. The award is given only to the single film that George Lucas finds to be the most entertaining and technically outstanding. For their film, Curtis and Metcalf were awards prizes including \$2,000 in cash and a custom Fan Film Awards trophy.

"As a kid I used to borrow my parents video camera all of the time and make short movies, videos and mock commercials," Curtis says. "One of my fondest memories was when my older brother and two older cousins made rock videos on the stage at our church into the wee hours of the night."

Curtis and Metcalf both come from a strong theatre background. Both filmmakers got their Bachelors degrees from Southwest Missouri State University and Metcalf received his Masters from the New Actors Workshop in NYC.

When deciding on the concept for this year's award-winning Star Wars fan film, Curtis sought inspiration from a real-life incident.

"The back story of the film is based on an event that happened to Troy and I while watching Catch Me If You Can in a rundown theatre in upstate NY," Curtis recalls. "The projector broke and an usher came to the front of the theatre to calm the audience down. After about 15 minutes of waiting, they finally got the movie up and running. In the meantime, Troy and I thought it would have been funny if the usher pulled out a script and started up with the film where the projector broke."

The film was shot with a digital camera and their editor, David Leopold, worked endlessly on his home computer to put the award-winning film together.

"The person who was most significant in helping us get our film made was David Leopold," Curtis admits. "Without him, we simply could not have done it. David not only has a vast knowledge of film he is also a professional editor, sound designer and shooter."

As with many short independent films of this nature, the crew remained quite small.

"The other people who were significant were all of the actors and technicians who agreed to help us without any pay, and since we couldn't afford to pay anyone, one of our biggest challenges was getting everyone's schedule to open up so we could just film it," Curtis adds. "We also only had one day to shoot, so everything had to be organized down to the minute."

As a first fan film for both Metcalf and Curtis, For the Love of the Film seems aptly titled.

"I think it is safe to say that Star Wars has had a major impact on our lives," Curtis says. "It stretched our imaginations and has kept us young all of these years. Without Star Wars I don't think either one of us would have pursued a career in any form of entertainment."

"Making For Love of the Film has been one of the best experiences of our lives," Curtis adds. "We had a chance to work with family and good friends. It also gave us a chance to show respect to a film that has shaped how we view cinema."

Mark Rusciano - Boba

New York filmmaker Mark Rusciano took home the Spirit of Fandom Award for his film Boba. The award, sponsored by presented by Anthony Grandio Co., is given to the film that shows what it's like to be a day-to-day Star Wars fan.

This marks the second time Rusciano has won a fan film award, and the 11th independent film he has either directed or produced.

"In 2002, the first year of the Star Wars Fan Film awards, I didn't know what to expect; I just wanted to be involved somehow and just rushed something together," Rusciano remembers. "At the time, I was heavily into experimental filmmaking in the crude sense and even though my film A Green Hope made it to the finals, it didn't fit in. My 16mm project was out of place with its technology-driven counterparts. But the idea of showing George Lucas that his influence is not only in sci-fi effects driven filmmaking is what pushed me to keep going with the festival in 2002. I wanted George to see a film (like my 2002 film Carbonite which won the 2003 Skywalker Sound Award) and know that above all he sparks my imagination, not just to make fantasy films, but that he has simply inspired me to create. I feel that in this festival, I have been given a chance to show that even though making sci-fantasy films is not my area of interest, I can still be motivated by them."

Since this is the last fan film Rusciano says he wants to make, he had more of a desire to show off his talents as a storyteller and cinematographer, than a bluescreen director.

"With Boba I wanted to create a visual that had great cinematography as well as unique camera angles," Rusciano explains. "I wanted to stay away from special effects or animation, even though I threw around a couple of story ideas involving extensive use of both mediums. I knew this would be my last entry in this festival, so I wanted something to represent my style of filmmaking. Not much dialogue, good music, and a common thread of coincidental events that string together an underlining story that only the audience can see -- an arena where the main characters know less than the viewers about what really happens."

"I wrote the story of Andy (the main character in Boba, although never mentioned in the film) first," Rusciano continues. "Then one day during a writer's block moment, I watched my girlfriend's cat get hooked on a certain T.V. show. I am not a cat person, but Harper (the cat) had never done this in the year I had been living with her. In the original story, Andy always put a Star Wars movie on while roaming through his chores around the house. Part of the story would allow a cat such as Harper -- in this case Boba -- to have a connection with Star Wars. In actuality, I wanted to establish a fandom relationship with a feline, showing the extent that Star Wars culture reaches (in a joking manor of course) -- which then led to the relationship between Andy and the cat-sort of a "Get Smart" type of clumsy guy who doesn't realize how things around him come together. But in the end, the story is about three fans: Andy, the girl upstairs and Boba."

Shot on 16mm and digital video, with music recorded specifically for the cut of the film, Rusciano edited Boba on an AVID Adrenaline.

As with any film, Rusciano faced the obvious directing challenges including attempting to convey a story with various subplots in a short amount of time with little to no dialogue. However, Rusciano also found himself going through quite a few cat treats, just to get Harper to hit her marks.

"I need to give credit to Whiskas Moist Treats," Rusciano laughs. "Without them, I could not have shot three hours worth of cat footage!"

John Hudgens - Sith Apprentice

Tennessee filmmaker John Hudgens earned the Audience Choice Award sponsored by Star Wars Republic Commando for his reality TV crossover spoof Sith Apprentice. This is the only award completely determined by votes from viewers who visited the official Star Wars Fan Film site.

Hudgens is no stranger to making Star Wars fan films. In fact, many fan might recognize his work on such shorts as Crazy Watto, Darth Vader's Psychic Hotline and The Jedi Hunter -- which won the Audience Choice Award during the Second Annual Fan Film Awards.

"We made The Jedi Hunter for fun. The idea was so good we just had to see it made -- which is essentially what happened with Sith Apprentice. Even though we were making it for the contest, we were making it because we wanted to see it. I wanted to make something worth watching that I believed was funny."

Not only did voters think the film was funny, the high-tech nature of the film set it apart from many of the other fan films in the competition. Hudgens shot footage with a Canon XL1S camera, and edited on a Macintosh with Final Cut Pro. However instead of using a traditional set like he originally planned, Hudgens found himself creating computer-generated graphics for an elaborate dance scene he wasn't willing to cut. All of the CGI work was done on a PC with Lightwave, and all of the lightsabers effects were painstakingly created frame-by-frame in PhotoShop.

"One of the biggest challenges was the 'VaderDance' segment of the film," Hudgens explains. "I really wanted to shoot that scene at the Tennessee Theatre here in Knoxville, which is a beautiful 1920's movie palace that's just reopened after a major multi-million dollar restoration. Unfortunately, we weren't able to come to terms financially with them, so I had to come up with something else, as this was a segment I did not want to cut. Eventually, I decided to shoot the entire number with Vader and the Femtrooper against a bluescreen, and build my own theater in the computer, which combined elements of the Tennessee with Imperial architecture. That probably worked in my favor, as if we'd shot at the Tennessee, I may have just used a blank stage, and not decided to go all out effects-wise and build something so huge. Doing it CGI also freed up the camera, allowing for many more dynamic shots, as well as putting in as many stormtroopers as I wanted, since they ended up being CG as well."

Aside from the time consuming CG tasks, another daunting challenge Hudgens and his crew faced was the approaching deadline.

"We didn't get the idea until the beginning of January, barely two months before the contest deadline," Hudgens remembers. "The final shooting weekend was (due to scheduling concerns with the hotel) only two weeks before the deadline. Luckily, we'd shot many hotel scenes and the first part of the lightsaber duel in late January in Chattanooga, which allowed me to have the rotoscoping on that done by the time we shot the rest of the fight in Knoxville. We also had done all of the bluescreen work for VaderDance a week before that final shoot, so I was well into finishing that sequence as well. Still, I didn't have a rough cut until a week and half was left. As it was, certain parts weren't finished by the deadline - I submitted the film with a temporary music score in parts, as I was still waiting on the opening and closing cues. But by the time we were accepted, everything was finished and in place."

While Hudgens did much of the post-production work on his own, he says that he couldn't film parodies like Sith Apprentice if it wasn't for the help of his friends like Bob Bean, Kristen Caron, Heather Harris, Denny Humbard, and Lowell Cunningham -- who first mentioned the idea of spoofing the popular Donald Trump reality TV series.

"Lowell popped the idea, I liked it, and we started writing, as ideas immediately started flowing, like they had with The Jedi Hunter several years ago," Hudgens recalls. "We had three pages double-sided of notes in one evening -- and that made us think we were definitely on to something. The writing of these is really collaborative so I'd definitely have to thank Denny Humbard for helping us brainstorm. Bob Bean has one of the best Darth Vader costumes I've seen, and he and Kristen are both good costumers and fun people to work with. And of course, I have to thank my significant other Heather Harris, for pulling off one of the hardest parts, as both she and Bob had to do the VaderDance many, many times, over and over in full armor before I got what I needed."

The hard work paid off -- earning Hudgens and his dedicated team the coveted Audience Choice Award. As Hudgens earns his second fan film award since the competition first began, he finds himself wanting to thank George Lucas for inspiring him to pursue a career in the entertainment industry.

"Star Wars has been a huge part of my life for a long time, and definitely influenced my career," Hudgens admits. "Early on I made The Empire Strikes Quack -- another parody project that mixed Star Wars footage with audio from the original Duck Dodgers cartoon) which was on my demo reel for a long time, and got me a job doing corporate video for General Electric back in the early '90s. That demo reel also got me the job doing music videos for J. Michael Straczynski and Babylon 5, as he'd seen those early works at conventions and been impressed. I don't know if I'd have had the career I've had were it not for Lucas' and the Star Wars films' influence. Lucas has entertained us for so many years -- I'd at least like to give a little entertainment back."

Robert Reeves -- Cheap Seats

California filmmaker Robert Reeves was honored with the prize for Best Comedy for his amusing short film, Cheap Seats about a clueless Rebel pilot who just wants to see all the excitement.

Studying theater at University of Tennessee, Reeves quickly received the nickname "Spielberg" for both his beard and his passion for directing. He later went to work at the local NBC affiliate where he learned how to edit and create visual effects. His current job as a Universal Studios Hollywood tour guide has also given him contact with several people interested in pursuing careers in films.

"I've always wanted to make a Star Wars film like I did as a kid but with proper costumes and effects," Reeves confesses. "I'm a big fan of the fan films that have been made before (Troops, George Lucas in Love, Pink Five). I thought it would be fun to make one of my own. This contest gave me the proper motivation to get this movie made."

The idea behind the story of Cheap Seats came to Reeves when he was only 12-years-old as he watched A New Hope.

"I was watching Star Wars again for the umpteenth time and during the award ceremony scene at the end, it occurred to me that the guys in the back of the hall may not have the best view," Reeves says. "Could the guy by the far wall see? Did he even know what was going on? While planning for this year's contest, I remembered this idea and thought it might make a good short film."

Shot on Mini-DV with a Canon GL1 camera in one day and edited using Final Cut Express on a Macintosh G5, Reeves and his skeleton cast and crew consisting of family and friends made the film in his guest studio.

Several of Reeves' fellow Studio Guides at Universal Studios Hollywood participated in this project. Jesse Banda, an aspiring screenwriter, helped flesh out the story. The actors in this film -- Paul Brown, Patrick Garland, Jason Ginsburg, Commodore James, Christopher Lawrence, and David Maddox -- all contributed to the dialogue. The husband and wife team of Christopher and Jennifer Rawson provided camera and sound work. Reeves' wife Joanne and Jennifer Lawrence served as costumers. His wife also provided craft services for the cast and crew.

Even with a dedicated crew, and an extremely short shooting schedule, Reeves' still came across a filming adversary he hadn't bargained for -- Mother Nature.

"The morning of the shoot Los Angeles was experiencing one of the strongest downpours it had in weeks," Reeves recalls. "This almost prevented the majority of the cast from arriving to the shoot. It also made it difficult to move the set from the garage to the studio where we filmed. The rain was falling, the streets were flooded, and the set was very hard to move. Two days later, when I planned to start post-production, we had a power failure that lasted all day. I couldn't even look at the footage from the shoot."

But luckily the film came together, and Reeves' Cheap Seats tickled the funny bones of both viewers and judges which in turn earned the award for Best Comedy.

"These awards acknowledge the hard work that goes into making a labor of love by those who have a passion for the material," Reeves says. "Star Wars fans are some of the most devoted and loyal followers of any fan group. As George Lucas himself once said, there is a greater opportunity in this day and age for someone to make a high quality film with very little money and simple equipment. So there are now quite a few more films out there to see."

Tetsuro Saiki -- Walk in a Bamboo Bush

Japanese filmmaker Tetsuro Saiki was honored with the prize for Best Animation for his creative short film, Walk in a Bamboo Bush -- his first ever fan film. Sponsored by Code 3 Collectibles, Saiki was awarded a custom Fan Film Awards trophy, \$1000 in cash prize plus a die cast Millennium Falcon replica.

In the early '80s, Saiki studied film at Los Angeles City College alongside fellow classmate Tamra Davis, who would later go on to direct the films Half Baked and Billy Madison.

Filmmakers George Lucas and Jim Jarmusch influenced Saiki's desire to create a cinematic piece of art, as well as pursue his studies in the United States.

"George Lucas changed my life. He is the one who made me go to the U.S. and study cinema, and he also introduced me to Kurosawa's films," Saiki explains. "While I was in cinema classes in LACC, I was thinking that I would be a director in the U.S. But I changed my mind when I saw a film that pushed me to go back to my own country. It was Stranger Than Paradise, a Jim Jarmusch film. I was beaten by the film. It is hard to explain though. I thought the film kept asking me, 'Where is your background?' or 'What do you have deep inside of you?' So I came back to Japan." Making the entire film using Adobe AfterEffects, Saiki admits that he hadn't any goals of awards and major recognition when he first envisioned the animated short.

"I always have aspirations to make at least one film in my life," Saiki says. "However, talking about Walk in a Bamboo Bush, I made it as a labor of love. I didn't know anything about these awards when I started making the film. In fact, I made this for my amateur two-member band, Jazzy and Groover. My partner and I wrote a song called "Walk in a Bamboo Bush" and I made the visuals to go with the music. I did it just for fun."

Wayne Barnes - Anakin Dynamite

Star Wars characters frequently find their way into pop culture whether it be references in films, music or TV shows. But what if Anakin Skywalker was less of a cool bad boy and more of a nerdy loser trapped in a high school not so far, far away? That's exactly what Arkansas filmmaker Wayne Barnes envisioned when he made Anakin Dynamite -- the winner of the Best Crossover Spoof Award.

"Currently, I work as a Senior Art Director so I'm surrounded by creative minds," Barnes explains. "We're constantly bouncing ideas around to each other: storyboard sequences, movies we wish someone would make, ideas we have. Things we've never seen anyone do before but mostly what we think would be cool. Since college, I've kept a small journal with these ideas and one day I began to flesh some of them out. I began to write rough drafts and outlines but they would often springboard into other ideas. I had to teach myself some aspect of discipline and see if I would even be interested in the process of filmmaking."

Barnes finally decided to take the plunge into amateur filmmaking using his Sony Digital 8. Another friend who owned a similar model volunteered to shoot footage, and with Final Cut Pro software and a G5 Mac, Barnes and his crew were able to begin production on his first fan film.

"There was a timeline I was focused on which was all I needed to get on the move," Barnes says. "I began production on what, at the time, I believed was a reasonably simple Star Wars-inspired short which ultimately, for my first film short, proved to be too daunting of a task in the timeframe. The deadline for the submissions came and the overall short was about 55-60% done. I wasn't going to make it but I had to at least submit a part of it. Fortunately, the film had three different Star Wars-related shorts acting as 'commercials.' I cut them together in a continuous reel and made it to FedEx with five minutes to spare. That was the beginning of my filmmaking experience."

One of those "commercials" was a trailer spoof that merged the action-packed world of a trouble Jedi and a not-so-thrilling life of the school nerd who doesn't realize how unpopular he really is.

"The backstory for Anakin Dynamite came when, one night, a friend and myself were finishing the set for another film (the original film I had planned to submit)," Barnes recalls. "A friend had just loaned me his copy of Napoleon Dynamite so it was fresh on my mind. As we were building this Star Wars-related set, we just kept cracking up at how well you could juxtapose the two characters and, to some extent, stay true to Anakin's story. As the hours went by, the jokes kept coming. The next day, I wrote the script. That Sunday evening, we shot it and I had the first cut by the following Tuesday. I had planned on this being one of the 'commercial breaks' of the larger production. As the deadline approached and the main film wasn't very close to completion so in order to get something out there, which was after all, my goal, I cut the commercials together and sent them in. Ironically, one of the other two commercial's was for another "Sith Apprentice" spoof. I think that's this year's hot button."

With Anakin Dynamite, Barnes found that the short deadline proved to be somewhat of a blessing. "Anakin Dynamite was such a last minute, barebones shoot, there really wasn't any time for things to go wrong," Barnes admits. "I think it's one of those instances where if I had any more time to think about it, I would have over-thought it and run it into the ground. Working with friends, not paid actors, who are trying to learn their lines in an afternoon and go through the motions is something else, though. After awhile, the repetitive nature of it really wears them down. And of course, that's when I'd usually say 'Okay, just one more for good measure.'"

"The main thing I was surprised by was how long it took to tweak the details," Barnes continues. "I'd say the Anakin Dynamite I sent in was actually the rough cut. My thought was to send it out and if, by some miracle, they liked it, I'd then submit the final version -- color corrected, tighter editing and of course, a musical score. But then I was informed that I had to submit exactly what they approved. No harm done really, I just hope that one day, perhaps, they'll let me do the 'Special Edition.'"

Being part of a fan film winners list that cites George Lucas as a major influence, Barnes has plenty to say about the iconic filmmaker who not only entertains audiences over the generations, but also strives to create new technologies to help bring his immense vision to life.

"George Lucas has driven so many advancements within his medium just so he can see his ideas realized in the way he sees it in his head, which is the goal of all artists, I think," Barnes explains. "To convey your message as richly and intricately as you originally imagined it, hopefully without compromise. He created something that has been so inspiring. He created a story that still endures."

Winning the Best Crossover Spoof Award is just the beginning for Barnes. Learning the ins and outs of do-it-yourself filmmaking has lit a spark in Barnes that he's eager to keep lit.

"I would love to pursue a career in filmmaking," Barnes says. "It's the culmination of so many artistic endeavors into one cohesive piece. Photography, drawing, writing, painting, sculpture -- it's all in there. It's definitely something I'm interested in. And, if I could never build a career around it I would definitely continue to make short films in my free time. It's another creative outlet. I have a lot of ideas I want to explore beyond Star Wars parodies but Anakin Dynamite was such a fun weekend project. (It cost more to overnight the film than it did to make). Going from concept to completion on even a small production like this I know I definitely learned quite a bit and I've so much more to learn."

Alabama Robert Bunch - Star Wars: Elements

Southern filmmaker Alabama Robert Bunch mixed education and space fantasy in one of the more interesting fan films with his educational Star Wars: Elements -- the winner of the Best Original Concept Award.

"Stacek the Wise and I decided to turn the 'Modern Major-General' chapter from Gilbert & Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance into a Star Wars character educational," Bunch explains. "We love opera, and we love Star Wars, so why not combine the two? You can also catch a little of Wagner's 'Ride of the Valkyries' in Elements as well. As a chemist, I knew only one method to order and present a multitude of characters -- a Star Wars Periodic Table!"

Using storyboards, illustration and animation done completely in Macromedia Flash with all sound design handled in Sound Forge, Bunch was able to finish the production in spite of a computer that seemed to crash like clockwork as they worked tirelessly to meet the approaching competition deadline.

"My computer started crashing four months into production because there were hundreds of vector animations running at once," Bunch recalls. "Initially, we made every 'element' animate at the end of its pop, but it proved too processor-intensive."

This isn't the first fan film Bunch has created out of a labor of love. Bunch and his team have created seven animated Star Wars fan films ranging in genre from an anime music video to a beer commercial. However, Star Wars: Elements differed from his other films due to the extensive animations of nearly 200 characters.

"I recognize fan films for what they are -- one of the truest and highest forms of tribute," Bunch says. "I rank fan filmmakers at the top of the list along with fan costume/model makers, artists, expanded universe writers, convention attendees and the real deal Star Wars maniacs who stand in line for weeks just to get into a film premiere."

Tim Edward Smith - One Season More

As all film fanatics know all too well, some films are not only remembered for their epic scope, or impressive action sequences, but for a memorable song worth singing in the shower. The Best Song Award went to Texan filmmaker Tim Edward Smith for his fan film, One Season More.

"Originally I wanted to create a short animation, so I decided to draw upon another work that I had created about 5 years ago," Smith says. "Star Wars: The Musical (no relation to the stage show currently playing at Celebration III) is a concept album that was created by me along with another composer (Hunter Nolen). I decided to take one of the songs in the musical and create the story of the animation around it. Of course, this was also a chance for us to improve the song and get a great new recording."

The film, which is completely computer-generated, uses references from A New Hope including the terrain of Tatooine along with the entire homestead and courtyard, as well as Luke Skywalker himself -- singing.

"Accuracy was important to me because I know there are a lot of die-hard fans out there that would notice if even the smallest detail wasn't right," Smith admits. "So I created everything that was recognizable from the reference material, even if it only appears on screen for a moment. From there I had to create Luke. This, of course, is the most important model since he is the focal point of the film. It was several months of work. It was around September 2004 that I heard about the fan film contest and decided that if I was going to get it in on time I'd really have to hurry. At this point I had to edit the song down to a shorter running time so that I could actually finish before the deadline. Over the next four to five months, I created unique hand-painted textures for each model and then began the process of animation. "

"Since our budget was basically 'nothing' we couldn't afford the cost of using motion capture for Luke's performance so I used two separate video cameras at opposing angles to record my co-writer (Hunter) performing the actions of Luke as he sings and moves throughout the film," Smith continues. "I was then able to digitize that footage and use it as a reference, but the animation of the character itself still had to be done by hand. Every turn of his head, blink of his eyes, move of his arms, was all done frame by frame until each shot was completed. This was quite an undertaking for me since I was learning some of the software as I was creating the film and doing many things I had never done before. This is easily the hardest thing that I have ever done. Luckily for us I was able to finish and send the film off to AtomFilms within two days of the contest deadline."

This is Smith's first official fan film (not counting the films Smith says he played around with as a teenager), and his passion for Star Wars and its music is apparent.

"Star Wars had a huge impact on me as a kid," Smith admits. "Without them I may have never gone into a creative field such as filmmaking and film scoring. They are always in the back of my mind reminding me to keep my own creative works original, inventive and entertaining."

To see all the films chosen for this year's Star Wars Fan Film Awards, please visit the AtomFilms official site here.