A CHARITY which provides access to creative film and digital media facilities and tuition is celebrating after two short films made by their youngest groups have been selected to be screened in California next month.

The films, made by Signal Film and Media's Signal Starters and Barrow Island Community Primary School, have been selected to be featured at the first Annual Palm Springs International Animation Festival, beating 2,700 other submissions from 103 countries.

The first animation selected for inclusion, The Day Before Christmas , was made by the Signal Starters film club for 8-to-11-year-olds in December 2016 as part of a Film in a Week project.

The stop-frame animation was created by 16 young people under the tutelage and guidance of Signal's filmmakers, and tells the story of a young girl who has Christmas spirit brought to her doorstep by a troop of lively snowmen.

Signal Starters was a film and media project supported by the BBC's Children in Need.

Aiming to direct youngsters in the Barrow area towards developing their digital media skills, Signal plan to relaunch the project, pending funding at the end of the year.

The Lost Station is the second animation selection, made by Year Five pupils at Barrow Island Primary School as part of 2016's Heritage Lottery-funded project Lost Journeys of the Furness Railways, telling the story of Barrow's Island Road station.

Pupils were trained by the Signal team in oral history recording and stop-motion animation before recording local residents' memories.

Year Five teacher Paul Alalouf and deputy head Vicky Evans said: "Barrow Island Community Primary are thrilled to be selected for PSIAF - we never thought for a moment that, with such humble beginnings, our film would garner so much recognition and be so thought-provoking across the other side of the world for a little-known bit of our history which is so everyday for most people who live here.

"It is quite astounding."

PSIAF 2017 aims to challenge, transform and inspire a new world of storytelling with its inaugural festival.

The Day Before Christmas will screen on Friday, November 10, at the Richard Arts Centre at 6pm as part of the Winter and Holiday Animated Shorts section, alongside films from more than 103 countries.

Brian Neil Hoff, festival director for PSIAF 2017, said: "Animation is a powerful form of art with the ability to educate, inform and inspire a new world of storytelling.

"Our goal and passion is to celebrate amazing animated films, the talented artists and their teams from around the world."