The Science New Wave Award goes to a film in competition that demonstrates a bold and inventive approach to scientific storytelling. Its affinity with the Science New Wave is gauged by how much it expresses the 6 traits of the Science New Wave manifesto. This award comes with a $1,000 cash prize.

Winner: A Universe in a Grain of Sand (Mark Levinson, United States, 73 min, 2022)

Using the works of artists instead of explanatory animations, the visually rich film explores how both scientists and artists use their understanding of nature to create new tools and representations to probe the deepest mysteries of the universe.

Honorable Mention: 3 MWh (Marie-Magdalena Kochová, Czech Republic, 12 min, 2024)

A nuclear power plant worker obsessed with counting has set a maximum limit on how much electricity he wants to consume until the end of his life. In this grim but masterful 35mm film-poem with strong mathematical undercurrents, Marie-Magdalena Kochová presents to us a story of a man whose life is moving towards transformation. A loving acceptance of the fact that we are not just our bodies, but energy too (Ivan Ramljak)

The Theme-Sensitive Award recognizes a film that brings this year's festival theme - SIGNAL - to the screen in singular fashion. This award comes with a $500 cash prize.

Winner : perfectly a strangeness (Alison McAlpine, Canada, 15 min, 2024)

In the dazzling incandescence of an unknown desert, three donkeys discover an abandoned astronomical observatory and the universe. A sensorial, cinematic exploration of what a story can be.

Honorable Mention: The Lost Season (Kelly Sears, United States, 6 min, 2024)

Earth is experiencing its final winter. A streaming company hires all available camera operators to film the final weeks of this soon-to-be-lost season. After seeing their footage as a form of ecological exploitation, the camera operators refuse to commodify further climate collapse with their labor.

The In Vivo Award goes to a film that paints a daring yet realistic portrait of a scientist and/or other non-human organism. This award comes with a $500 cash prize.

Winner : A Body Called Life (Spencer MacDonald, United States, 15 min, 2024)

A self-isolated young human known as "James" delves into the hidden world of microscopic organisms, forging a tender connection with these nearly invisible creatures and developing a massive online following, as he seeks to understand his own place in the cosmos and accept the scars of his past.

Honorable Mention : A Universe in a Grain of Sand (Mark Levinson, United States, 73 min, 2022)

Using the works of artists instead of explanatory animations, the visually rich film explores how both scientists and artists use their understanding of nature to create new tools and representations to probe the deepest mysteries of the universe.

The Avant-Garde Award celebrates the film that best expresses hybrid aesthetics and experimentation. This award comes with a $500 cash prize.

Winner : Direction Of The Road (Janelle VanderKelen, United States, 8 min, 2023)

As a tree muses on their role in the Order of Things, this being (which humans normally think of as immobile) reveals the speed, agility, and finesse integral to their experience of the world. Adapted from a short story written by Ursula LeGuin, this decidedly inhuman filmic narrative uses the overlapping cyan and scarlet of anaglyph stereoscopic 3D imaging to speculate how a tree (which responds more acutely to light waves in the red and blue portions of the spectrum) might perceive the world visually. Though 3D stereoscopy is used in this film, it is intended to be viewed without 3D glasses.

Honorable Mention : Oxygen (Karel Doing, United Kingdom, 6 min, 2023)

Blades of grass race across the screen.