Bub’ is nominated for five awards at the Young Australian Film Festival, and it began with Collarts alum Abbey Hastings saying goodbye to her own childhood

Getting a short film into a festival is hard enough. Getting it nominated for five categories, and having it open the festival on an IMAX screen, is the kind of result most emerging filmmakers spend years chasing. For Bachelor of Screen and Media alum Abbey Hastings, it's what's waiting for her at the Young Australian Film Festival in 2026, on the back of a film made almost entirely by Collarts students and faculty.

Abbey wrote and directed Bub, a short film about the loss of an imaginary friend as a stand in for the loss of childhood. It's a premise that sounds simple until you hear where it came from.

"'Bub' is an extremely personal story to me, and is somewhat autobiographical," Abbey says. "When I look back at my life, I often find myself asking, 'When did I grow up? When did everything change?' That question was really the starting point for 'Bub'."

That question shaped the relationship at the heart of the film, between Harper and her imaginary friend Maisie.

"Maisie isn't just an imaginary friend; she represents a part of Harper that she has relied on to feel safe and understood," Abbey explains. "Their relationship is about that last connection to childhood, and the pain of realising that you can't take that part of yourself with you forever."

A nomination across five categories, and an opening night slot on IMAX, puts 'Bub' in front of an industry audience most emerging filmmakers spend years trying to reach. For a film written, directed and crewed almost entirely by Collarts students and faculty, that result says as much about the training and community behind it as it does about the film itself.

Abbey is direct about how much of that comes down to her time at Collarts, not just as a place she studied, but as the foundation the whole film was built on.

"My time at Collarts really shaped not only how I approach filmmaking technically, but also the kind of filmmaker I want to be," she says. "Being surrounded by other emerging creatives gave me the opportunity to experiment, collaborate and learn what it means to create something as a team. I was also able to experience different roles across productions, which gave me a much broader understanding of the filmmaking process."

That's the practical difference a Collarts degree is built to make: not just theory, but hands on time across every part of a real production, before you ever have to do it for a client or an employer.

"I owe a huge amount to the people I met at Collarts," she adds. "So many of the people I met at Collarts have gone on to become the people I continue to create with, and people I now call family. 'Bub' itself wouldn't exist in the way it does without the people who believed in the story, supported me and fought to bring it to life."

She's just as clear about what the nominations represent.

"So seeing five nominations at the Young Australian Film Festival feels like more than just a personal achievement. It feels like a reflection of that community and the incredible talent that came out of it. There's something really special about seeing people you studied alongside have their work recognised and celebrated on no other than an IMAX screen."

Abbey was also intentional about who she built that community with on set.

"I was very intentional about creating an almost entirely women and queer film crew for 'Bub'," she says. "I want to work in an industry where women and queer people aren't the exception in key creative and technical positions, but are a normal and integral part of filmmaking. Creating that environment on my own set felt like a small but meaningful way of contributing to that future."

She points to her Collarts lecturers, Dana Miltins and Adam Spellicy, as a major part of getting Bub written.

"Their guidance and encouragement pushed me to look more deeply at the story I was trying to tell and gave me the confidence to trust my own voice as a writer," Abbey says. "Having mentors who were willing to engage with the story and challenge me creatively was incredibly valuable, particularly when 'Bub' is such a personal project."

None of this happened by accident. Studying screen and media at Collarts means training across every role on a set, building a network of collaborators who stick around long after graduation, and having lecturers invested enough to challenge your work rather than just mark it. Abbey took all of that and made the film she wanted to see, with the crew she wanted to build it with, and the industry is now recognising it on its own terms with five nominations and an opening night slot at YAFF 2026.

If you're ready to start building the kind of story, and the kind of crew, that gets noticed, explore the Bachelor of Screen and Media at Collarts and see where your first short film could take you.