Students from Ernest Righetti High School, San Luis Obispo High School, Morro Bay High School, and Central Coast New Tech High School were among the winners of a recent film competition.
The Central Coast Film Society announced the award winners of the 2023 Student Film and Media Arts Competition during its Student Showcase event, held at the end of May at Allan Hancock College in Santa Maria.
Submissions from finalists in the competition were reviewed by a panel of five judges: local film teacher and filmmaker Chris Hite, film festival programmer and filmmaker Cindy Kitagawa, studio owner and filmmaker Kevin Judge, author Brian Schwartz, and sound designer and filmmaker Carlos Plummer.
Participants competed in five different categories. Central Coast New Tech High School students Laslo S. Estes and Eli Heck won in the Technical category for their film, Cha Cha Ride, while Morro Bay High School student Rae Elizabeth Ruane took home the Screenwriting award for McSpade’s Circus of Splendor.
Another Morro Bay High School student, Luke Konjoyan, won the Photography category for the film Vroom Vroom. For their submission, titled Sandbox: Series, San Luis Obispo High School students Gavin Patrick Wren, Jenson Wright, and Jackson Sitt received the Central Coast Spirit Award.
Two film submissions tied for top honors in the Filmmaking category: Just Another Cheesy Teen Rom Com, from Ernest Righetti High School students Isabella Sherfield and Colin Sherfield, and The Key to Fear, from San Luis Obispo High School student Leo Gerd Eulate.
Ernest Righetti High School film teacher Jacob R. Gustafson acknowledged his students’ recent win in a statement from the Santa Maria Joint Union High School District.
“I’m very proud of my students,” Gustafson said. “They have been doing fantastic work this year, and I’m very happy to see them get recognition outside my classroom by a professional organization.”
This article appears in Pride Issue 2023.