HKAIIFF2027 · Awards and Jury Regulations

Chapter 1: Purpose and Scope of Application

Article 1: Organisation and Purpose

The Hong Kong AI International Film Festival is organised by the Hong Kong AI International Film Festival Association. The Festival supports the artistic development, creative exchange, and responsible practice of AI-native films through the selection of works, creative outputs, and expressive achievements.

Article 2: Scope of Application

These Regulations apply to the Seven Unicorn Awards at HKAIIFF 2027 and the associated shortlisting and judging procedures. The Entry Guide, Jury Handbook, Submission and Technical Specifications, Entry Declarations and Permissions, and Entry Terms and Personal Information Collection Statement for this edition together form the published entry documents. Each document governs the matters expressly assigned to it.

Article 3: Works and achievements

A ‘work’ is a complete fixed film, or an interactive, generative or other audiovisual work with clear cinematic expression that can be assessed within an agreed scope. An ‘achievement’ is a creative method, digital character or world system demonstrated in a work, whose contribution can be explained separately.

Article 4: AI-Native Creation

AI must play a substantive creative role in the primary audiovisual material, performance, narrative organisation, generation rules, or audience experience. Eligibility is determined based on complete works, creative declarations, and verifiable evidence; no fixed AI usage percentage is imposed. General auxiliary or automated post-production functions cannot independently establish eligibility.

Article 5: Human Responsibility and Attribution

Each entry must identify an applicant authorised to represent the work or achievement, the people responsible for its creative direction and the relevant team. AI systems may be named in the account of the creative process, but do not replace the responsibilities of people or organisations for the entry, rights and public credits.

Article 6: Equal Evaluation

Adjudicators shall not grant preference based on nationality, region, language, age, institution, budget, company size, tool brand, or commercial partnership. Work format, running time, and technical specifications must be understood in light of their creative purpose and do not constitute automatic scoring bonuses.

One person may hold multiple roles, several people may share a role, and collective creation may be credited accurately. A company or a prescribed set of occupations is not mandatory. Authority to submit on behalf of a work must be explained separately from legal rights in the work, materials or achievements.

Chapter 2: Award Structure

The Festival establishes the following seven awards for this edition. The Golden Unicorn Grand Prix is its sole highest overall honour. Each of the three Silver Awards has a distinct subject of assessment. The three Innovation Awards have no separate gold, silver or bronze tiers.

Article 7: Number of awards

Each award recognises one work or achievement, with no joint winners for separate entries. Multiple individuals or teams who jointly create that one work or achievement may share credit. An award may be withheld if the judging requirements are not met, evidence is insufficient or the required majority is not reached.

Article 8: Multiple awards and independent reasons

A single entry may receive different awards, but each decision must have independent evidence and reasons appropriate to that award. Receiving one award does not automatically confer another. The Grand Prix does not require a prior Silver Award or Innovation Award.

Article 9: Categories and Honours

Forms such as fixed imagery, interactive narrative, continuous generation, and digital character are available for curation and review grouping but do not constitute separate competition awards. Shortlisting, screening, inclusion in the support programme, and winning must be announced under their respective official names.

Chapter 3: Complete works and enduring creative achievements

Article 10: Golden Unicorn Grand Prix

Recognises an outstanding film that brings distinctive expression, audiovisual organisation, human experience and exploration of the medium together through AI-native creation. The recipient is selected from all shortlisted works in the main competition, with attention to the work as a whole, its emotional and intellectual force, the coherence of form and content, and its level of accomplishment.

Fixed, interactive, or generative works are all eligible for consideration. Reusability, commercial development potential, series potential, or real-time responsiveness are not necessary conditions for the Golden Unicorn Grand Prix.

Article 11: Silver Unicorn · Creative Method

Recognises a method and organisational system demonstrated in a work that effectively realises creative intent. Assessment considers problem definition, selection and control, capacity for revision, verifiability and continued application. Tool lists, node counts or automation percentages cannot substitute for actual achievement.

Article 12: Silver Unicorn · Digital Character

Recognises a digital character with a distinctive identity, behavioural logic, emotional range and continuity across contexts. A character need not support real-time conversation or have become a commercial intellectual-property project. Any use of a real person's likeness, voice or performance must have an appropriate basis.

Article 13: Silver Unicorn · Worldbuilding

Recognises a world system whose rules, relationships, culture, space and causality are coherent within the work and can support further stories. Neither a particular scale, a quantity of design drawings, real-time operation nor game functionality is required.

Article 14: Silver Award Eligibility

An achievement entered for a Silver Award must be demonstrated in an eligible work submitted for the current edition; the work need not already be shortlisted in the main competition. For an existing achievement, identify the version entered, prior contributions and new contributions. A general-purpose tool or foundation model does not itself become eligible as an achievement merely because it is used.

Chapter 4: Expressive Achievements

Article 15: Unicorn · Narrative Innovation

To recognise the work's unique organisation of time, information, perspective, causality, and meaning. Linear, non-linear, multi-perspective, or dynamic narratives are all eligible for consideration; evaluation focuses on whether the formal choices produce clear and powerful expression.

For dynamic works, jurors must verify the theme, character logic, and emotional arc during content changes. The number of branches, length of generated text, or count of endings do not directly determine narrative achievement.

Article 16: Unicorn · Audiovisual Innovation

This award recognises the unique language formed by the interplay of image, sound, motion, space, and rhythm. It is assessed according to the work's intent, encompassing realistic, abstract, deformed, static, silent, or other modes of expression, and identifies relevant human creative contributions.

Resolution, model quality, degree of realism, or technical difficulty alone do not constitute sufficient grounds for awarding; similarly, a deliberate departure from realism must form an effective expression within the work.

Article 17: Unicorn · Experiential Innovation

This award recognises works that make meaningful design to the viewing pathway, mode of participation, response of the work, or shared experience. Evaluation considers the relationship between audience action and consequences, the intelligibility of participation, the responsiveness of the work, and the coherence of the overall experience.

Applications must specifically outline the evolution of the relationship between the audience and the work, and provide verifiable mechanisms for the experience. Popularity, click-through rates, dwell time, number of control buttons, or equipment costs do not directly determine evaluation.

Article 18: Awards and contributions

Innovation Awards recognise an achievement within a work and its principal contributors. Applicants must describe contributions accurately. The people concerned must confirm final public credits; job titles, funding or representative status cannot substitute for actual contributions.

Chapter 5: Composition and Independence of the Jury

Article 19: Professional Composition

The Festival appoints a Works Jury to assess the Grand Prix and the three Innovation Awards, and a Creative Achievements Jury to assess the three Silver Awards. Both juries should include people with practical creative experience and, according to the works being assessed, expertise in film, narrative, sound, interaction or generative technology.

Qualification, technical, and rights verification personnel may provide factual explanations but, unless appointed as a juror for that specific award, do not participate in the final artistic voting. The jury list and professional background must be published prior to the announcement of results.

Article 20: Conflict of Interest

Jurors must disclose relationships with an applicant or achievement involving production, investment, employment, consultancy, agency, direct supervision, close family ties or any other connection capable of affecting independent judgement. A juror with a direct conflict of interest must take no part in accessing materials, discussing, recommending or voting on the work or achievement concerned.

Membership of a large organisation, participation in public events, or ordinary professional dealings must be disclosed and judged according to the actual relationship; they are not automatically deemed direct conflicts. Where there is doubt regarding recusal, it shall be handled jointly by the non-involved jury chair and the Festival's designated procedural officer.

Article 21: Commercial Independence

Sponsorship, computing support, platform procurement, paid services, INDEX records or market cooperation must not be exchanged for shortlisting, favourable judging or awards. Providing resources does not grant a veto over selection.

Article 22: Confidentiality and Tool Use

Jurors shall not disclose unpublished works, confidential evidence, or personal data to unauthorised third parties, nor upload them to external AI services that may retain materials or be used for training. Jurors must independently view, experience, and form their reasoning; final assessments shall not be delegated to automated systems.

Chapter 6: Review and Selection Procedures

Article 23: Eligibility and Corrections

The Festival checks the work's completion date, AI's substantive role, completeness of materials, authority to submit and suitability for assessment. Deficiencies that can be corrected must be identified in writing, with a reasonable and consistently applied response period. Applicants must be told the principal grounds for a decision of ineligibility.

Existing records may be referenced for identical data; supplementary evidence must be scoped to specific questions and necessary extent only, without requiring the resubmission of the same data for each award category. The Film Festival shall retain the submitted version and confirmation data for this round; subsequent record updates shall not automatically alter the subject of assessment.

Article 24: Professional assessment

Eligible entries undergo independent review under the Jury Handbook. For the Grand Prix and the three Innovation Awards, jurors must view or experience the complete entry. For the Silver Awards, jurors examine the associated works and evidence of the claimed achievement. Jurors record their individual observations and reasons before joint deliberation.

Article 25: Versions and Testing

The submitted version and necessary operating conditions must be recorded prior to professional review. Major content changes must be declared and subject to consistent handling; technical repairs shall not covertly alter the creative content being assessed. Dynamic works must include an independent path for jurors and appropriate repeated testing.

Article 26: Shortlisting and final checks

Main competition shortlists and Silver Award shortlists may be determined separately. Key facts, credits, eligibility and award recipients are checked before results are announced. Unresolved rights or evidence issues cannot be offset by artistic scores or commercial value.

Article 27: Fair Access

During the review period, necessary communication between applicants and jurors shall be arranged and recorded by the Film Festival. Private hospitality, gifts, benefit exchanges, or non-public pressure shall not be used to influence the selection. Normal public promotion shall not be prohibited on this basis.

Chapter 7: Voting and Results

Article 28: Minimum number of eligible jurors

The final decision for the Golden Unicorn Grand Prix shall be made by at least five unconflicted formal jurors who have completed the review; other awards shall be decided by at least three jurors. In the event of insufficient numbers due to recusal, the decision shall be made only after a qualified substitute juror completes an equivalent review.

Article 29 Method of Decision

Jurors shall first record observations and five-level evaluations across each dimension according to publicly disclosed criteria, and then deliberate on the overall achievement of the candidate works. Dimensional records shall not be mechanically summed, and undisclosed weights shall not be applied. The final result shall be determined by reasoned voting.

The Grand Prix requires the support of at least two-thirds of the eligible jurors participating in the vote; other awards require more than half. Withholding an award may be a voting option. If the required majority is not reached, jurors must first discuss their differences and vote again on the candidates receiving greater support. If the threshold is still not met, the award is withheld. The chair has no additional casting vote.

Article 30 Recording and Publication of Reasons

The Festival retains records of completed assessments, conflicts of interest and how they were handled, final votes and reasons for awards. It publishes the winning work or achievement, confirmed credits and a jury statement relevant to the award. Private opinions, unpublished content and confidential evidence do not become public automatically because an award is made.

Article 31 Awards and Badges

Trophies, certificates, computing resources or other support, and their conditions of use, are governed by separate official announcements or written confirmation. A stated resource value does not mean it can be exchanged for cash. Shortlisted entrants and award recipients may use only official titles, years and marks that match their actual status.

Article 32 Follow-up Cooperation

Awarding does not automatically constitute INDEX registration, rights certification, commercial valuation, distribution, or trading commitments. Related records, authorisations, and market cooperation shall be advanced only upon separate consent and specific conditions from the rights holder.

Chapter 8 Procedural Safeguards and Rule Application

Article 33 Procedural Review

Applicants may submit a written review request regarding factual errors in qualification, unhandled conflicts of interest, incorrect version usage, or significant procedural deviations, accompanied by verifiable data. Such reviews shall be submitted to info@hkaiiff.org within fourteen calendar days of notification of the relevant decision or publication of the result; new evidence discovered subsequently may be submitted separately for explanation.

Reviews shall be handled by personnel who were not directly involved in the original decision and have no conflict of interest, or by an independent substitute juror for re-evaluation where necessary. Mere disagreement with artistic judgment shall not constitute a ground for procedural review. Applicants shall be informed of progress and expected response times during the handling period.

Article 34 Correction and Revocation

In the event of false information, significant rights issues, or procedural defects that would substantially affect the outcome, the Festival may defer publication, correct attributions, re-evaluate, or withdraw results. Prior to making an adverse decision, the affected party must be notified of the relevant matter and afforded a reasonable opportunity to respond; emergency protective measures shall be limited to what is necessary.

Article 35: Amendment of the Rules

Changes materially affecting eligibility, fees, permissions or judging require a clear public announcement and direct notification. Routine website updates must not retrospectively impose additional burdens on entries already submitted. Where necessary changes affect existing entries, the options, withdrawal and refund provisions in the Entry Terms apply.

Article 36: Documents and Language

These Regulations are made available in the official published versions of the various languages, which correspond to identical document numbers and revision versions. The content in each language shall be consistent; in the event of any discrepancy, the Festival shall provide a public clarification and treat affected applications fairly, and shall not alter conditions on the basis of unpublished translations.

These Regulations govern awards and procedures; the Jury Handbook governs assessment criteria; the Submission and Technical Specifications govern delivery details; and the Entry Terms and Personal Information Collection Statement govern permissions, fees, information processing and disputes. Clarifications must not expand rights beyond those stated in the original documents.