Nigerian filmmaker Innocent Yama Lamido, earlier this year, earned global recognition after winning the Future Format category at the 2026 Sony Future Filmmaker Awards.
Lamido won for Creating Without Permission, a short film made specifically for vertical viewing. His win came from a competition that attracted more than 8,400 filmmakers from 162 countries and territories, making the recognition a significant moment for an emerging Nigerian filmmaker working at the intersection of cinema and new forms of visual storytelling.
The Future Format category challenged filmmakers to explore what storytelling could look like when a film is created for a 9:16 vertical screen rather than the traditional horizontal frame.
Lamido did more than adapt a conventional film to the format. He used the constraints of vertical viewing as part of the creative challenge.
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A Film About the Space Between Moments
Creating Without Permission is a quiet, visually restrained film that explores the act of creation and what happens in the moments between more obvious events.
Sony describes the film as a meditation on “the spaces between moments”. Rather than relying heavily on dialogue, Lamido uses visual details, silence, gestures and proximity to communicate emotion and atmosphere.
That approach gives the film a distinctive relationship with its vertical format.
The 9:16 frame has become increasingly familiar through smartphones and social platforms, but Lamido treats it as more than a technical requirement. The format becomes part of how the audience experiences the story.
His win therefore speaks not only to the quality of Creating Without Permission, but also to the possibilities of filmmaking in a media environment where audiences increasingly encounter stories on their phones.
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From Nigeria to Sony Pictures Studios
Lamido’s win placed him among the filmmakers recognised through the fourth edition of the Sony Future Filmmaker Awards, a global programme designed to identify emerging filmmakers and give them opportunities to develop their careers.
The 2026 competition selected more than 30 filmmakers for its wider shortlist across Fiction, Non-Fiction, Animation, Student and Future Format categories. The shortlisted filmmakers were invited to Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City for workshops, screenings and masterclasses led by industry professionals.
Lamido had already secured the Future Format win before the main category winners were announced at the June ceremony. Sony later celebrated him alongside the other winners at the awards event.
As part of his prize, Lamido received Sony Digital Imaging equipment and was invited to participate in the programme at Sony Pictures Studios.
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A Nigerian Voice in the Future of Film
Lamido’s recognition is significant because it places a Nigerian filmmaker inside a global conversation about where cinema is heading.
Film is no longer confined to cinema screens or television. Stories are increasingly created for phones, social platforms and new digital formats, giving filmmakers another set of creative possibilities to explore.
Creating Without Permission shows what can happen when a filmmaker approaches that change as an artistic opportunity rather than simply a technical limitation.
For Lamido, the Sony award is both recognition for a specific film and an invitation to keep experimenting with how stories can be made and experienced.
His win also adds another Nigerian name to a growing list of African creatives finding audiences and recognition beyond the continent, while bringing perspectives shaped by their own experiences into global creative spaces.
At RefinedNG, we celebrate African creatives whose talent, ideas and ambition are taking them beyond borders. Follow RefinedNG for more stories about the filmmakers, artists and innovators putting African excellence on the global stage.