Lonely Planet recently announced a new contest, asking for three minute films about anything travel related.

Grab your digital camera or mobile phone and shoot on the hoof – or dig through your existing footage. Hi-fi, lo-fi, we don’t care – just give us your “Great Moments in Travel” in the form of a snappy short film lasting less than three minutes.

The compensation is not too shabby either:

First prize is a AUD$10,000 journey comprising of one Round-The-World economy flight, an STA travel voucher, and the choice of either hanging out in Melbourne, Australia with the folks from Lonely Planet Television for four weeks; or spending that $10,000 on a dream trip.

I could certainly go for for a dream trip.

If you’re interested in applying, the contest runs until mid-January. But during the weeks leading up to the date they are featuring their favourite entries in their archive. My advice is to judge those films to see the types they’re looking for, then go shoot something better.

Granted, three minutes isn’t quite enough time to pull off an epic. But it’s enough to experiment with a few different themes and edits before settling on your final cut. Good luck!

Have any ideas tips for shooting short films? Share them in the comments!