8th November 2010

filmpossible Winners Announced

Holland BloorviewSeventy-three entries, seven judges, and over 62,000 online votes cast has produced a winner: Taryn Green, a 28-year-old freelance film editor from Sudbury, Ontario, has claimed first prize of $5000 in Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital’s filmpossible contest, which challenged entrants to create a video bringing visibility to disability.

Taryn’s winning video, The Triangle Girl Retold, is a touching retelling of a story she wrote at age six, in which the triangle represents her disability, Cerebral Palsy. She longs to be like everyone else, but in the end, she becomes more confident and proud and embraces her disability, or “inner triangle”.

“Filmpossible was a great learning experience for me, as well as a very humbling one,” said Taryn. “I was competing against so many amazing videos that really challenged my own perception of disability. Through filmpossible, Holland Bloorview initiated a great change toward the public perception of disability. We need to keep this dialogue alive long after this contest is over. It is important to keep watching all the videos and to keep telling our stories.”

Taryn plans to make donations to the Children’s Treatment Centre and to the YWCA Sudbury via the United Way. “The Children’s Treatment Centre helps so many children with disabilities and the wonderful people here helped my family and me in my early years.” Taryn’s prize will be presented in Sudbury by Holland Bloorview representatives on November 18th.

Taryn’s filmpossible journey was not without setbacks. In the midst of recovery from surgery, she received word that her original entry, The Triangle Girl, was disallowed as she had unintentionally overlooked the requirement that videos be created for filmpossible. Disappointed but undaunted, she confirmed that the contest rules allowed her to submit another entry, and gathered friends and family to retell the story in a new way.

Second prize, a $500 movie gift card and a Mars gift package furnished by Mars Canada, went to Brigitte Patinaude of Ottawa, for her simple but powerful challenge to our assumptions, Does it Really Matter. Tammy Embrey of Port Colborne took third prize for Kiesha’s Story, a moving tribute to her daughter who has multiple disabilities. She will receive an iPod Touch and iTunes gift card, donated by Gemsbok Technologies.

Honourable mentions went to Graeme Mislan, Jeremy McCracken and Joseph Park/Matt Carvalho, all from Toronto, who will each received a Flip Video Camcorder donated by Cisco. All of the filmpossible videos can be viewed online at the filmpossible site.

“We congratulate all our winners and entrants,” said Christa Haanstra, Chief of Communications and Public Affairs at Holland Bloorview. “Through their creative and powerful works, they have brought visibility to disability and opened dialogues across Canada, between parents and children, in classrooms and boardrooms and beyond. They have helped to create awareness of a world where children with disabilities can live life to the fullest.”

This entry was posted on Monday, November 8th, 2010 at 11:18 am and is filed under Awards, Contests, National News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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