A Fraser Valley biologist and her filmmaker friend are off to the Planet in Focus film festival in Toronto on Friday after they won a Discovery World HD channel short film contest.

Chilliwack's Carin Bondar and Matthew Hawkins were chosen out of 100 entries in the third annual Film Snacks Competition, for which entrants created environmental-themed shorts that had to be under two minutes.

Bondar and Hawkins focused on the annual toad migration at Ryder Lake, a small body of water in southeast Chilliwack, in their short flick called "Why Did the Toad Cross the Road."

According to the contest's website, the film "received unanimous praise from our judges. The film won for its creativity, original storytelling, and choice of environmental topic, among other reasons."

The two likely won the contest because of their unique combination of Hawkins' behind-the-camera know-how and Bondar's bubbly personality and scientific knowledge. Bondar has a PhD in biology while Hawkins has tons of experience making and editing films.

"He's really good at the filming and I'm good in front of the camera," Bondar said. "We have a good rapport."

The short film win isn't a one-off for the two, who have been making short science-based films together for more than three years.

The two, particularly Bondar, want to break into the larger world of television science shows, but that won't be easy.

"TV is hard to break into," Bondar said. "I think the Internet is where we will find our home."

She has a website and a blog where she posts their films and has recently been asked to curate a Scientific American video blog, which she hopes will only give her further exposure.

"She's a starlet biologist," Hawkins jokes.

The ultimate goal of what they do is to make science accessible, applicable and, frankly, cool.

"It has to be applicable to day-to-day life," Hawkins said. "We did a film about cleaner fish being removed from coral reefs and we shot it in front of the hospital and asked, 'Would you live in a community that no longer had health care?'"

"Bondar's ultimate dream is to be like a David Suzuki in a role that would still involve scientific research."

"Field work is really cool," she said. "Scientists get up at 5 a.m. and sit in a bird hut in sweltering heat in the middle of Madagascar. Or at the Lizard Island research station in Australia, their job is to scuba dive four times a day to the coral reefs.

"We try to spin a story," she said. "Ultimately the goal is to appreciate biodiversity ... We are going to find a good venue for what we do."

This isn't the only contest Hawkins has won this year. He and his family entered a Cineplex Ford Flex contest to create a one-minute video "why your family is cool," and won. His prize? A year of movie passes and snacks, $3,000 cash and a Canon 7D DSLR camera.

At Planet in Focus in Toronto, the two have all expenses paid including rooms at the Fairmont Royal York and $2,000 in cash.

Bondar is excited for Sunday night's gala event, at which Robert Bateman will be honoured with the Planet in Focus International Eco Hero Award.

Watch the film by going to filmsnacks.discoveryworldhd.ca.