Producers Week in Training on DFGDocs – The British Documentary Website

Producers Week

When:
10 - 14 November 2008
10am - 6pm each day

Where:
DFG, London

Want to become a producer, or have more control over your documentary by producing it through your own company? Then look no further than Producer’s Week.

This is an intensive five day workshop that will give you the core skills you need to run your own small production company - from the basics of raising funds and negotiating with broadcasters all the way through to delivery and transmission.

Producers Week is designed for filmmakers wanting to expand into producing and APs, researchers or emerging filmmakers who want to have more control over their work by producing it through their own company. The course will cover the full spectrum of issues you will face as a producer, from setting up your company to improving your pitching technique.

Speakers include:

•   Broadcast Independent Executives
•   Independent Production Manager
•   Development Producers
•   Media Lawyer
•   Business Affairs Manager
•   Commercial Affairs
•   Production Music Library Operations Manager

Indie producers will also give sessions during the week talking about the advantages of being a small company and discussing the ins and outs of international co-production.

The course will include:

Industry Overview and brief history
Proposals/pitching
Sources of funding – UK and Europe
Commissioning, Co-production, Pre-buys and Acquisitions
Limited Company vs sole trader, limited by guarantee, charity etc.
Inland Revenue, VAT/ Accounts/ Invoicing
Basic book-keeping
Contracts, Rights, Negotiating. Commissioning contracts
Agreements. Optioning, freelance agreements with crews
Documentary feature film finance – Tax breaks
Essential organisations
Health, safety and insurance
CVs, contacts and networking
Career strategy and long term planning

Previous tutors and speakers include:
Richard Sattin
Richard is one of the UK’s most experienced Executive Producers of domestic and international factual programming. He has excellent working relationships with broadcast Commissioning Editors at home, the US, Asia and Europe.

Over the past 15 years he has worked with every major UK and US broadcaster supplying science, music and arts to history, exploration and investigation, factual entertainment, docudramas and reality formats. He has won 25 industry awards for outstanding shows such as Hardcore (Channel 4), Gunpowder Plot (ITV) and After The Warming (PBS).

His independent production company Principal Films forged the first UK co-production relationship with Discovery’s networks in the early 1990s.

In 2005, Principal merged into Darlow Smithson Productions (DSP) where Richard has since been Head of Documentaries. As well as supervising Gunpowder Plot (ITV), Science of Survival (Discovery Channel), The Real Phil Spector and Me & My Slaves (Channel 4), Roman Vice and Weird Weapons (History Channel), he has developed a drama on Tutankhamun, a special on Egypt’s Drowned Kingdom, American Bones - a format unlocking human mysteries found in burial sites and a feature length drama documentary on building the Berlin Wall.

Find more details at http://web.mac.com/sattin/Richard_Sattin/Home.html

Click here to see his website

Nikki Parrott and Natasha Dack
Tigerlily Films is one of the top ten independent production companies in the UK. Primarily drama and documentary producers, Nikki Parrott and Natasha Dack have led their company to award-winning success. Since its inception in 1997, Tigerlily has been the driving force behind a range of cutting-edge documentaries including Ben Hopkins' 37 Uses for a Dead Sheep, as well as his landmine exploration piece, Footprints.

Find more details at www.tigerlilyfilms.com

Stephen Walker
Stephen Walker has directed 23 films for the television networks BBC and Channel Four, including Hiroshima – A Day That Shook The World, the critically acclaimed Faking It: Punk to Conductor, Hardcore,Waiting for Harvey, and A Boy Called Alex. Stephen Walker has also directed drama for BBC TV including Prisoners in Time starring John Hurt and winner of the Writer’s Guild of Great Britain Award for Best Television Drama.

Find more details at www.walkergeorgefilms.co.uk

How much:
Freelance rate: £600 + VAT = £705
Corporate rate: £950 + VAT = £1116.25

Behind the times and not yet a member? Reap the benefits here

To book your place, call us on +44 (0)20 7249 6600 or email training[at]dfgdocs[dot]com

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