A NEW film festival will take place this summer as part of the Film:New Forest project.

Due to take place in June, it will include a short film competition, screenings of locally connected films across the district and film themed events.

The festival is part of the New Forest District Council’s project to promote filming in the area.

It is now in its third year of a partnership with Creative England and the venture goes from strength to strength.

The Film:New Forest office has received more than 100 requests to film in the district in the last year, including student films, music videos, prime time dramas, documentaries and adverts.

Notable titles include The Undateables for Channel 4, Unforgotten for ITV, Britain by Boat for Channel 5, and Back to the Land for the BBC.

The economic benefit the filming has brought throughout the year to the area is more than half a million pounds spent by film crews whilst staying and filming in the area on goods, services, local crew, and accommodation.

Around 60 properties have been added to the film locations database, along with 41 new local crew and services registering what they can offer production companies looking to film in the area.

In February the filmnewforest.com website was launched along with a promotional film featuring film critic Mark Kermode, which has now been viewed over 20,000 times.

Two networking events were held for crew and students in the spring and autumn.

May saw the cinematic release of Solo: A Star Wars Story, which used Fawley Power Station as a backdrop for some scenes set in Corellia.

In September Film:NewForest was given the highly commended award from the Federation of Small Business for ‘Most Innovative Small Business Friendly programme, Campaign or Project’.

In December the team attended the Focus international production show in London.