What Arts Council Funding Enabled: Community Filmmaking in Action

We were incredibly grateful to receive £15,000 in funding from Arts Council England, which allowed us to do what we do best: create meaningful, creative spaces for young people who don’t always get access to them.

The funding enabled us to invest directly into the programme. We purchased five iPads and a laptop, ensuring young people had reliable, professional tools to work with, and used the remaining funding to deliver weekly filmmaking workshops over the course of a full year, in partnership with Motiv8.

This wasn’t about ticking boxes or running short-term activity for the sake of it. The funding gave us the time, equipment, and breathing space to run proper workshops that put creativity, confidence, and young people’s voices at the centre.

Across the year, we delivered hands-on filmmaking sessions using green screen, stop motion, and digital editing. These weren’t passive workshops. Young people weren’t just watching or being told what to do — they were making decisions, shaping ideas, working as teams, and seeing their own work come to life on screen.

Many of the young people we worked with came in carrying anxiety, low confidence, or a sense that traditional education had left them behind. Film gave them another way in. Some found confidence in performing. Others preferred being behind the camera, editing, directing, or building animations frame by frame. Everyone was able to find a role that suited them and feel valued within the group.

As the sessions developed, so did the ambition. Participants moved from experimenting with green screen and animation to creating full short films with clear messages. They worked on projects around online safety and health misinformation, choosing the topics themselves, writing scripts, filming scenes, and editing the final films. These weren’t abstract exercises — the films were screened publicly, shared online, and used to start conversations within the wider community.

What mattered most wasn’t just the technical skills, though those were significant. Young people learned how cameras work, how to edit professionally, how visual effects are built, and how stories are structured. More importantly, they learned how to collaborate, communicate, take responsibility, and lead. We saw participants who started out withdrawn or unsure step into leadership roles, direct scenes, support others, and take pride in what they’d created.

Arts Council funding allowed us to slow the process down and do it properly. It meant we could adapt sessions based on how the group was feeling, prioritise wellbeing alongside creativity, and create a space that felt safe, welcoming, and genuinely supportive — not rushed or transactional.

We’re proud of what this year-long programme achieved, and even prouder of the growth we saw in the young people involved. That’s the real legacy of this funding, and why continued investment in community arts matters.