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Late on Friday, our friends at the Cinema Eye Honors announced their 2013 nominees during an event held at AFI FEST in Los Angeles (and unveiled the traiditional original illustrations, like the one seen above and elsewhere in this post). Leading the pack with five nods each for these awards, which year after year highlight the very best in nonfiction cinema, are The Imposter and Searching for Sugar Man, both of which were produced by Simon Chinn (via Red Box Films) and John Battsek (via Passion Pictures). Chinn was nominated the previous year for Project Nim and won in 2009 for Man on Wire, so obviously he’s a great guy to have attached to your doc.

While neither of those titles were surprise nominees, it is really great to see some lesser known and not yet released works like Only the Young and Vivan las Antipodas! earning four nominations each. They were favorites of mine at True/False back in March and they’re two that I’d love to see again on the big screen if possible. Others I’m excited about include Detropia, which also has four nominations, Planet of Snail, which is up for the directing award, Vol Special (Special Flight), which is in the Spotlight category, and Tchoupitoulas and How to Survive a Plague, both of which really, really deserve the recognition in the editing category.

The 6th annual Cinema Eye Honors will be held in NYC on January 9, 2013.

Here are the nominees for the 2013 Cinema Eye Honors:

Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking

5 Broken Cameras Directed by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi Produced by Christine Camdessus, Serge Gordey, Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi

Detropia Directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady Produced by Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady and Craig Atkinson

The Imposter Directed by Bart Layton Produced by Dimitri Doganis

Marina Abramović The Artist is Present Directed by Matthew Akers Produced by Jeff Dupre and Maro Chermayeff

Only the Young Directed by Jason Tippet and Elizabeth Mims Produced by Derek Waters

Searching for Sugar Man Directed by Malik Bendjelloul Produced by Simon Chinn

Outstanding Achievement in Direction

Detropia Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady

The Law in These Parts Ra’anan Alexandrowicz

Only the Young Jason Tippet and Elizabeth Mims

Planet of Snail Seungjun Yi

Tchoupitoulas Bill Ross and Turner Ross

¡Vivan las Antipodas! Victor Kossakovsky

Outstanding Achievement in Production

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry Alison Klayman and Adam Schlesinger

Big Boys Gone Bananas!* Margarete Jangård

The Imposter Dimitri Doganis

Searching for Sugar Man Simon Chinn

¡Vivan las Antipodas! Heino Deckert

Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography

Chasing Ice Jeffrey Orlowski

The Imposter Erik Alexander Wilson and Lynda Hall

Only the Young Jason Tippet & Elizabeth Mims

Samsara Ron Fricke

¡Vivan las Antipodas! Victor Kossakovsky

Outstanding Achievement in Editing

5 Broken Cameras Véronique Lagoarde-Ségot and Guy Davidi

Detropia Enat Sidi

How to Survive a Plague T. Woody Richman, Tyler H. Walk, Jonathan Oppenheim

Room 237 Rodney Ascher

Tchoupitoulas Bill Ross

Audience Choice Prize

5 Broken Cameras Directed by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi

Beauty is Embarrassing Directed by Neil Berkeley

Bully Directed by Lee Hirsch

How to Survive a Plague Directed by David France

The Imposter Directed by Bart Layton

Jiro Dreams of Sushi Directed by David Gelb

Kumaré Directed by Vikram Gandhi

Marina Abramović The Artist is Present Directed by Matthew Akers

Searching for Sugar Man Directed by Malik Bendjelloul

Trash Dance Directed by Andrew Garrison

Outstanding Achievement in a Debut Feature Film

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry Directed by Alison Klayman

How to Survive a Plague Directed by David France

Marina Abramović The Artist is Present Directed by Matthew Akers

Only the Young Directed by Jason Tippet and Elizabeth Mims

Room 237 Directed by Rodney Ascher

Searching for Sugar Man Directed by Malik Bendjelloul

The Waiting Room Directed by Peter Nicks

Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Score

Detropia Dial.81

The Imposter Anna Nikitin

Into the Abyss Mark De Gli Antoni

Room 237 Jonathan Snipes, William Hutson, The Caretaker (James Kirby)

¡Vivan las Antipodas! Alexander Popov

Outstanding Achievement in Graphic Design or Animation

Beauty is Embarrassing Neil Berkeley, Anthony Maiuri

Herman’s House Nicolas Brault, Tom Hillman

Indie Game: The Movie James Swirsky

Room 237 Carlos Ramos

Searching for Sugar Man Oskar Gullstrand, Arvid Steen

Urbanized Brooklyn Digital Foundry/John Szot

Spotlight Award

Argentinian Lesson Directed by Wojciech Staroń

Bestiaire Directed by Denis Côté

Downeast Directed by David Redmon and Ashley Sabin

Meanwhile in Mamelodi Directed by Benjamin Kahlmeyer

Vol Special (Special Flight) Directed by Fernand Melgar

Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Short Filmmaking

Cutting Loose Directed by Finlay Pretsell and Adrian McDowall

Family Nightmare Directed by Dustin Guy Defa

Good Bye Mandima (Kwa Heri Mandima)  Directed by Robert-Jan Lacombe

Into the Middle of Nowhere Directed by Anna Francis Ewert

Paradise (Paraíso) Directed by Nadav Kurtz