The Beijing Film Academy's 16th International Student Film and Video Festival (ISFVF) kicked off on Sunday with six short films screened after the opening ceremony.

Established in 2001, ISFVF is one of the most influential student film festivals in Asia. This year a total of 1,116 works from 58 countries and regions were submitted, with 82 works from 33 countries and regions shortlisted for screening at the event itself. In the end, 10 films will be selected for awards after a one-week screening period.

To help film academies around the world better communicate with each other, ISFVF holds a special screening section each year so that students from selected overseas film academies may show their works in Beijing.

This year's participants will be students from the Film and TV School of Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and the Film and Television Institute of India.

"At the moment, film arts keep facing the double baptism of market and technology. The surge of transnational capital, the arrival of the we-media era, and the development of VR technology - all of these provide topics for the new generation of filmmakers to explore," Hou Guangming, president of the administrative council of the Beijing Film Academy, said at the opening.