La Poudrière

1) terms of admission

Applications are open to French and foreign students, trainees of continuous professional studies wishing to specialise in animation filmmaking, professionals wanting to broaden their skills or self-taught practitioners of the art.

Candidates should have a practical knowledge of animation and a solid artistic and cinematographic background. They should also be mature, highly motivated and able to develop personal film projects. Minimum age required is 22 years, except for special cases. Teaching is in French.

Students in initial training will only pay for application fees of 1,000 euros annually as training costs are taken care of by the school's various public and private partners. The training course is also open to professionals on individual educational leave and job seekers. Quotes for the training can be sent on request.

2) terms of selection

Application forms are available from December for courses beginning in mid September of the following year. Applications should be sent in before mid March. The exact date will appear on the application form. Selection is divided into two stages: short-listing from portfolios and a final selection from tests and an individual interview.

Application portfolios

Application portfolios must contain :

• the official school information form, completed by the applicant and including corresponding administrative documents,
• a motivation letter, explaining reasons for wanting to join la Poudrière and for choosing the field of filmmaking, along with information on activities and personal interests (maximum 3 pages),
• a curriculum vitae (maximum 1 page),
• a work portfolio containing :
  • a) essentially animation work (films, tests or experiments) with explanations about work conditions and indications about the applicant's personal contribution to the particular project; any personal animation film projects in progress (synopsis, storyboard, preparatory sketches etc.). These projects will not be developed during the course of studies.
  • and drawings, photos, sets, models, strip cartoons, texts, synopsis, music, etc… showing examples of the applicant's artistic experiments and work.

Tests and interview

Recruitment is a concerted decision made by the school's management team who review all the applications received. The candidates short-listed are all invited to la Poudrière for a day of tests, followed by an interview of about one hour before a jury made up of the management team and one or two industry professionals.

Description of the tests :

• graphic design and storyboard (4 hours)
• free writing on an imposed subject (3 hours)

The tests are followed by an individual interview to find out about the background of each candidate and his/her ambitions, analyse existing work and future professional projects (45 minutes).

The tests and interview are considered as a whole and neither part is eliminatory. At the end of the tests and interviews, the jury once more reviews all the applications and selects around ten candidates. Some candidates can be put on a waiting list.

3) Application form request

Please use following form for any application form request.
Area indicated by a star * are required for the validation of the form.

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