It All Starts Here… Well, Kind Of

May 18, 2026

Notes from My Year as a Sundance Institute Ignite x Adobe Fellow

Review by Leon Ristov

This time last year, I found out I had made it to the final round of interviews for the Sundance Institute Ignite x Adobe Fellowship. The Fellowship is a yearlong program that supports ten emerging filmmakers between the ages of 18–25, offers mentorship and workshops from Sundance alumni, and ends with a showcase at the Sundance Film Festival. Per the official website, the fellowship focuses on “supporting emerging documentary and fiction filmmakers from across the globe.” At the time, it felt like everything I had been working toward was distilled into this opportunity. 

Flash forward to one year later—spring of 2026. I’m about to have my final check-in with Kat and Toby, the kind people who run the fellowship. I’ve spent a year as a Sundance Institute Ignite x Adobe Fellow, and I’m receiving eager messages from this year’s interviewees. They want advice on their applications. I remember being on the other side, hoping this opportunity would work out for me. The fellowship occupied so much space in my mind. Before I even knew the outcome, I had already imagined every version of it—being rejected, being accepted, sharing the news with others, or quietly holding onto disappointment. I played each scenario in my head so many times that by the time I received my acceptance letter, it felt strangely familiar, almost like I had already celebrated it. In retrospect, that might have been the perfect mindset to carry into this experience.

During the fellowship, our first kickoff lab took place at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts. We were put up at the Porches Inn, a hotel made up of conjoined Victorian-style row houses painted in bright colors, complete with a sauna and pool that quickly became everyone’s favorite spot. I met the nine other fellows, and we clicked immediately, staying up late most nights, laughing and chatting in our swimsuits. The cohort hailed from all over—Canada, Costa Rica, India, Korea, Ireland, the U.S., and my country, North Macedonia. Over the course of a few very hot days, we shared our work and listened to Sundance Institute alumni speak, learning from filmmakers at various stages of their careers.

Gathered in the spacious, industrial rooms of MASS MoCA that somehow felt intimate, we listened to first-time directors who had achieved extraordinary success, and producers with longevity in the independent filmmaking world that one can only dream of. The humility in the room stood out to me the most. Mentors spoke about the effort and setbacks that come with making a first feature, as well as the even greater hurdles of making a second one.

“There was no illusion of a straight path or guaranteed success, just honest conversations about persistence, adaptability, and finding your way through uncertainty.”

It was then that I realized that the fellowship didn’t feel like all I had made it up to be in my head. It felt better than that—real people offering real advice.

In January 2026, I attended my first Sundance Film Festival thanks to the fellowship. I booked an Airbnb with most of the fellows, extending our stay beyond the four days scheduled for fellowship activities. “Guys… it all starts here,” Brittany would say jokingly, pausing for dramatic effect after “guys.” She was undoubtedly the funniest from our group—and probably in any group she’s part of. Still, there was some truth to the pomp. It was a historic edition—the final festival held in Park City, buzzing with excitement and nostalgia ahead of the festival’s move to Colorado in 2027. We had the chance to meet with studios and agents, attend a Janelle Monáe DJ set, and walk along the iconic (albeit freezing) Main Street, occasionally spotting recognizable faces from film and television.

But what stayed with me most weren’t those larger moments. It was the things that felt familiar. My friends Anooya Swamy and Raman Nimmala had their short films,Pankaja and O’Sey Balamma, premiering in the Official Selection. Marija Dimitrova, a seasoned Macedonian producer I was lucky to catch up with over a quick coffee, co-produced Shame and Money, the Grand Jury Prize-winning Kosovar film in the International Feature Program. My favorite film at the festival, Filipiñana—also a Grand Jury Prize-winner—was represented by MAGNIFY, the global sales arm of Magnolia Pictures, where I had previously interned. Attending these screenings became some of the most meaningful parts of the festival for me—moments of reconnecting and celebrating with people whose work I had followed closely, whose success didn’t feel foreign or overnight, but tangible and earned.

When my short film, Nikola, Nikola, screened during the Ignite showcase, projected on a large Sundance screen alongside the work of the other fellows, I found myself less focused on my achievement than on the collective strength of our films.

“There was something special about seeing all our films together—each one distinct, yet complementary to the others.”

I felt grateful for the cohort that Kat and Toby had brought together, a group of filmmakers who genuinely supported and believed in each other’s work. 

After the screening, aspiring filmmakers approached us with questions about applying to the fellowship, reminding me of how I had once imagined this moment from afar. But some of the most meaningful conversations happened among the fellows ourselves. In the minutes after the screening, we found ourselves complimenting each other’s films as if we were discovering them for the first time—sharing words of encouragement we had already said many times before.

“It” definitely did not all start here, despite our (at that point) running joke that it did. The fellowship was far from an overnight whirlwind of success. It was more of a coming together—a chance to be present with others on the same journey, and to find grounding in that shared experience. 

Things were already in motion. We just got to pause and witness it together.