Film London today launched the Dickens 2012 Short Film Scheme as part ofDickens 2012 – the international campaign to mark the bicentenary of Charles Dickens’s birth next year.

The scheme aims to inspire both emerging and established film-makers to create new, distinctive and original short films based on the life and/or work of Charles Dickens.

The Dickens 2012 Short Film Scheme is open to film-makers living in any of the London Boroughs. Applicants must submit a script, five minutes in length, themed on the life and/or work of Dickens. The scheme welcomes fiction, documentary and animation ideas, with preference given to original storylines with a powerful visual edge and innovative sound design. The application deadline is 29 August 2011.

Three awards of up to £4,000 each will be given to the commissioned projects, which will also benefit from training in the form of professional script development and production advice from first draft through to completed film. Moreover, the commissioned shorts will be considered for inclusion in Dickens on Film at BFI Southbank (January – March 2012), which will be the most comprehensive Dickens film and TV retrospective.

Full details and the application form can be found at www.filmlondon.org.uk/dickens2012shorts