YouTube is launching a film festival that will ultimately send 10 finalists to the Venice Film Festival.
The Google Inc-owned video site announced on Thursday that Your Film Festival will take submissions of up to 15 minutes between February 2 and March 31.
Fifty semi-finalists will be selected, and YouTube users will further winnow the field to 10 by voting for their favourites online.
Director Ridley Scott’s production company, Scott Free Productions, will play an integral role in judging the submissions. A winner will be selected by a jury in Venice overseen by Scott.
The winner will receive a $US500,000 ($A480,670) grant from YouTube to produce a film with Scott Free.
Last year, YouTube released the feature-length documentary Life in a Day, which was co-produced by Scott.