Short Films Competitions
SIFF’s Short Films Competition is divided into three categories: Live Action, Animation, and Documentary. Shorts are all about fitting a profound statement into a concise and beautiful package, and the films in each category of this competition earn their spot in the finals by telling a well developed, compelling story in 40 minutes or less.
The Short Films Competition jury, comprised of filmmakers, journalists, and industry professionals, selects the winning films for each category, which will be announced at the Golden Space Needle Awards May 17 and awarded a cash prize of $2,500 each.
Alt Shorts
81 min.
From visually poetic mood pieces to found-footage mash-ups, this year’s collection ranges from somber to surreal to hilarious.
Animation4Adults
91 min.
Some films deserve to be animated. These ten short films will open your visual cortex to all of the glorious possibilities in store when we tell stories through animation.
Best of NFFTY 2026
78 min.
These award winning shorts from the 19th National Film Festival for Talented Youth (NFFTY) showcase the breadth of talent from emerging filmmakers 24 years old and younger around the world.
Brave New World
88 min.
In alternate presents and imagined futures, familiar threats are twisted into novel visions where our protagonists fight to adapt, survive, and prevail.
The Family Picture Show
82 min.
Explore the stories and fables that connect young people all over the world with this showcase of family-friendly shorts appropriate for ages 6 and up.
Reality Check
93 min.
These inventive and enlightening nonfiction shorts highlight the quiet—and in one case quite loud—ways that people assert their dignity in times of war, disaster, division, and competitive burping.
ShortsFest Opening Night
93 min.
It is our great pleasure to open our ShortsFest Spotlight with this collection of superb films from around the world: whether narrative or documentary, live action or animation—these films prove short is truly sweet.
Sound Visions
102 min.
A cast of quirky characters, including an animatronic cowboy and a marathoner with a soft spot for Dick’s burgers, star in these Washington-made shorts that showcase the vitality of our local filmmaking community.
Spacing OUT
101 min.
It is both the space occupied and the space conceptualized in these six stories of dreams and distraction that give meaning to the lives of the queer folk leading them.
Teachings of the Elders
70 min.
Indigenous Elders share teachings through story, land, and memory, guiding future generations with wisdom rooted in perseverance, relationships, and enduring cultural knowledge across communities.
WTF! Nightmare Fuel
96 min.
From the disturbing to the disgusting, a compendium of short films to haunt your dreams and make you wonder WTF?!