Blood Sugar

Four-year-old Dahlia is scared of needles, but needs insulin injected several times a day. New Zealand has one of the highest rates of paediatric diabetes in the world, and while Dahlia is quite young to be diagnosed, numbers are estimated to be growing at almost 10% annually and the cause is not yet understood.

A child diagnosed with diabetes must go through many changes that are complicated to explain technically, so what better candidate to describe the condition than little girl who says "I don't know what diabetes is, but I know what it is like".

Blood Sugar has been partially funded by the Loading Docs initiative, with support from the New Zealand Film Commission and NZ On Air.

Loading Docs will match the funding that we aim to raise through Boosted - but only if we make it over $2000 which is why we need your help. Your contributions will go towards shooting costs, editing, music composition, and a trip to Rainbow's End for Dahlia!

Director Joe Hitchcock

Joe's first short film 'Kismet' premiered at Screamfest Film Festival in Los Angeles 2005, which led to being awarded an AMP scholarship in 2006. The scholarship allowed Joe to direct 'The North Pole Deception', a stop-motion mockumentary about Santa's elves being mistreated, which eventually became the highlight* of NZ's Show Me Shorts Film Festival 2010 along with a 'Best Direction' nomination (*NZ Herald). Superhero parody short 'Lapwing' screened at 12 New Zealand film festivals in 2015, while debut feature 'Penny Black' was the hit of the Arohanui Film Festival and opens around New Zealand in Feb 2016. Joe's NZFC funded short film 'Stick to your Gun' will also premiere in 2016.

IMDb / Twitter / Website

Producer Morgan Leigh Stewart

Morgan has produced over 40 music videos, commercials and short films including festival hit 'The F.E.U.C' directed by Aidee Walker, which they took to the prestigious Palm Springs Film Festival in 2013. Morgan recently produced the Make My Horror Movie feature film 'Deathgasm' and digital short film project K Rd Stories both released in 2015. Morgan and Joe have recently completed Joe's NZFC funded short film 'Stick To Your Gun'.

IMDb / Twitter / Website