In this video I’m sharing something I’m genuinely proud of: we just dropped $15,000 to help four filmmakers bring their next short films to life. I’ve been running my horror short film contest for seven years now, and we’ve had well over a thousand films submitted from around the world. Every year I try to stack the prize package with real incentives, but this year I wanted to take it a step further—because I know firsthand how hard it is to get a short film off the ground when you’re funding it out of your own pocket. Thanks to FearPix, we introduced a film funding category as part of this year’s prize package (about $45,000 in total prizes from sponsors). Originally it was going to be two official selections at $5,000 each, but the talent in the top submissions was so strong that FearPix decided to expand it: we ended up awarding $5,000 to two filmmakers, and splitting another $5,000 into two $2,500 grants—four filmmakers funded, $15K total. I’m going to help executive produce and oversee these next shorts (and might even hop on set), and FearPix will officially produce and release them on their platform. More than anything, this was a turning point: what started as a YouTube challenge has become a real community and, honestly, a full-blown film festival. Watching filmmakers support each other, hearing their stories, and seeing how life-changing a moment like this can be—that’s why I keep building this.