Grand Prize
Candy
Jiaze Li (@DiDi_OKK)
Festivals · Festival · Brand or platform
Lumara Film Festival
A juried AI film festival presented by Venice with MoonPay, with cash prizes and a cinema screening in New York.
- Organiser
- Venice.ai
- With
- MoonPay
- Held
- First edition
2026
ResultsRoxy Cinema, New York · Results published 30 Oct 2026
Winners
Serenissima Award (made with Venice)
Black Thunder
Ryan Lightbourn
Terminal Award (experimental)
REVIVER
Aleksey Dor
Get Shorty Award (under two minutes)
Ato de — Later
Luke Mazey
Mouse Award (young audiences)
FIX
Eunha Lee, Sora Lee & Hakhoon Lee
Rekt Award (finance or crypto satire)
JUST SAY SOLANA
Yassine Le Gall
Jury Selection
Mianmian
Yingjie Chen
Key dates
About this edition
- Eligibility
- Any AI platform; all visual footage must be AI-generated and the tools disclosed. English subtitles required. Works already selected, screened or awarded by another AI-focused festival are ineligible. Free to enter.
- Prizes
- Up to $100,000 in cash plus Venice credits; Grand Prize $32,000 plus 3,200,000 Venice credits (terms).
- Jury
- VOIDSTOMPER, Gossip Goblin (Zack London), Chris White, JBOOGXCREATIVE, Heavy Pulp, Sündermann, BLVCKL!GHT, Ansem and FaZe Banks.
Why it matters
Lumara is one of the few platform-backed AI festivals to put its finalists on a real cinema screen, and it pays its winners in cash as well as credits. Its categories reward storytelling and genre rather than one vendor’s toolchain: entrants could use any AI platform, and only the Serenissima Award is tied to Venice. Most of its nine judges are working AI filmmakers.
The 2026 edition
The organisers say more than 700 films were entered. Six Grand Prize finalists and category nominees were announced on October 16, and the seven winners were revealed at the Roxy Cinema in New York on October 26. The terms name Venice.ai and MoonPay as organisers, with Venice.ai administering the festival and paying the prizes.
Candy took the Grand Prize, Mianmian the Jury Selection (described in the terms as the runner-up) and Ato de — Later the Get Shorty award for films under two minutes. Ryan Lightbourn’s Black Thunder won the Serenissima Award and Production Pi’s FIX the Mouse Award; FIX had earlier received a Higgsfield honourable mention. REVIVER and JUST SAY SOLANA have no standalone release from their makers, so their links open at the points where they play in MoonPay’s official winners programme. Seventeen further films are celebrated on the official site.
No second edition has been announced.