First-year engineering student Sur Samtani wants to be famous.

A red carpet will mark the finale for many UCLA students’ hard work. After a week of filming by 40 to 50 student teams and months of preparation by the Campus Events Commission, the Campus MovieFest event in Ackerman Grand Ballroom will show off the talents of aspiring filmmakers and film enthusiasts.

Sixteen five-minute shorts, chosen by a judging panel of random UCLA students, various faculty and CEC members, are set to premiere today. Winners will be selected from four categories: best picture, best drama, best comedy and best social justice film, a new category this year.

“This is the only opportunity where people not in a film program could actually have the chance to make a film,” said Kristen Harkey, the CEC director for film festivals and fourth-year world arts and cultures student.

The annual event, which is hosted by Campus MovieFest and is the world’s largest student film festival, is at UCLA for the sixth year in a row. Each year, CMF provides student teams with a MacBook Pro, a camcorder and a tripod in order to create a film.

Though CEC gives out its own swag bags as prizes, the winners of each category go on to compete in regionals, where the rewards are even greater, according to Harkey.

“The big prize here is if the creativity goes on, you could potentially go to the Academy Awards and meet producers. It’s mainly networking and getting your name out there,” Harkey said.

Albert Hu, a fourth-year cognitive science student, submitted a film to Campus MovieFest this year, a five-minute drama he began work on a month ago. According to Hu, trying to break into the entertainment world takes guts, and that making it to CMF nationals would help him get his foot in the door.

“There were a lot times when I prioritized my film work over my schoolwork,” Hu said. “It was gruesome, to be honest. Sometimes it was a very frustrating process.”

Yet not every director found the competition to be so consuming. According to Samtani, making a five-minute comedy sketch was truly a short, improvisational project.

“We filmed it in about two hours and edited it in about three hours,” Samtani said. “Still, in the end I was happier with the film than I even was with the script.”

Directing styles aside, both Hu and Samtani said that they were happy for the chance to express themselves creatively. According to Harkey, this competition encourages students from both sides of campus to be creative.

“We do get a lot of people from the film club and film major who will submit, but we also get a lot of people who love filmmaking, (who) might be an engineer or science major and not usually have time to make a film,” Harkey said. “This event is a great opportunity for them.”

According to Hu and Samtani, who both consider themselves film enthusiasts, tonight is yet another opportunity to see their names up on the big screen and show their works to the public.

“I’m both excited and scared,” Hu said. “But it’s really about the journey, not the destination. I had so much fun doing this and made a lot of friends. And that’s what matters.”