Sheffield DocFest

Sheffield Doc/Fest

File:Sheffield DocFest official logo.png
Location	Sheffield, England
Founded	1994
Awards	Sheffield Doc/Fest Awards
Festival date	June 7, 2014 (2014-06-07) to June 12, 2014 (2014-06-12)
Website	http://www.sheffdocfest.com

Sheffield Doc/Fest, short for Sheffield International Documentary Festival (SIDF), is an annual international documentary and digital media festival held in Sheffield. Since beginning in 1994, Doc/Fest has grown to become the UK's biggest festival of its kind and the third largest documentary festival in the world, making it a significant event for the global film industry. The festival includes screenings, an industry conference, a marketplace for the funding and distribution of films, and awards. It covers digital and interactive projects as well as traditional filmmaking. Doc/Fest was recently voted one of the Top Five Coolest Documentary Film Festivals in the World.

About the festival

Doc/Fest is held at the Showroom Workstation and other venues across Sheffield and the surrounding area. Fun is a key element, and the festival holds many parties. It is possibly the only film festival in the world which includes an annual themed roller disco. The festival has grown steadily over recent years.

Screenings help many films to achieve a wider audience. For example, We Are Poets secured nationwide distribution for their film after screening at Doc/Fest, and Anthony Baxter’s first feature You've Been Trumped went on to air on BBC Two.

The marketplace, which is centred around an event called the MeetMarket, also helps films achieve funding and distribution.

It has the traditional film festival element in that it screens exciting new documentaries, but it’s also a place where buyers, film distributors and producers come to meet documentary makers and find the next big thing.

— Alex Graham, Festival Chairman,

History

In 1990, Peter Symes of BBC TV Features Bristol had the idea of creating a forum for British documentary filmmakers to debate and discuss their craft. In 1993, he set up a festival board which included representatives from Channel 4, United Artists, Discovery Channel, Central Independent Television and Granada Television. They chose to hold the festival in Sheffield, an English industrial town which was just beginning to develop a media and cultural sector.

The first Sheffield International Documentary Festival was held in 1994, formatted as an international film festival and conference for documentary professionals. It included a film programme, one or two masterclasses, and a party. It lasted two days and mainly attracted London-based filmmakers and producers, plus several international commissioners and distributors.

Over the next eight years, the festival continued with around 475-700 delegates attending, and total audiences reaching around 2000. The festival became an opportunity for London-based independent filmmakers to talk to commissioners at the BBC and Channel 4, who were otherwise difficult to reach. Success at the festival might mean landing a job for the coming year.

In 2005 Doc/Fest was struggling to survive, with around 500 mostly-UK delegates and 2000 visitors. The chairman at the time, Steve Hewlett, visited the Australian International Documentary Conference where he met its director Heather Croall, who had a background in filmmaking and had founded the cross-platform storytelling event DigiDocs. He invited Croall to come and work for the festival, and two weeks later she moved to Sheffield, taking up her current position as Festival Director.

The festival was in a moribund state by the time I arrived, but I didn’t know that. I didn’t know there were murmurs that Sheffield had lost its mojo and was a little bit flat. Once I analyzed it and realized what a tragic situation we were facing, I thought, OK, we need to create something so new and different.

— Heather Croall, Festival Director

The recent rise in international co-productions meant that British producers could no longer rely solely on one big broadcaster for their entire budget, and instead had to look abroad to piece together financing for their films. To internationalize the festival and help filmmakers achieve this financing, Croall introduced the MeetMarket pitching forum, where filmmakers pitch their ideas to funders in one-to-one meetings. She also introduced the digital-focused Crossover International Summit and Crossover Market, which – like the MeetMarket – pairs buyers and commissioners with game designers, technologists, producers, digital agencies and filmmakers, all looking to tell stories in the interactive realm. Croall seeks to attract young filmmakers, uses bright lanyards to ensure delegates are recognisable, encourages people to dine in local restaurants, and makes good use of local venues.

Since 2006 Croall is credited with turning the fortunes of the festival around. It is now widely recognised as one of the top three documentary festivals in the world, and “the most significant documentary festival in Britain" . Delegate numbers have risen fivefold since 2006.

In 2007, Hussain Currimbhoy joined as programmer. In 2011 the festival moved from November to June, to better fit into the industry calendar and ensure better weather and lighter evenings for visitors.

Doc/Fest was an early advocate of crowdfunding as a source of finance for documentary filmmakers, and in 2010 staged its first festival-based crowdfunding pitching event, which was also an industry first.

In October 2012 Doc/Fest went on to launch its own crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo to raise $25k for the festival, to help stage special events. They exceeded their target.

From 2012, selected highlights from the festival have played at the BFI Southbank in London.

The effect of the festival on Sheffield's economy is worth millions of pounds. Outside of the annual festival, there is now also a year-round programme providing training, educational and cultural activities across the UK.

Some associate documentary festivals with All-Bran – it’s good for you but you don’t really enjoy it – but I think we have succeeded in not just making Doc/Fest more exciting but blowing people’s minds.

— Heather Croall, Festival Director,

2013

2013 saw a record number of films and delegates. Delegate numbers rose by 18% to 3,129. There were a record 18 international delegations including representatives from Armenia, Canada, Jordan, Morocco, the Netherlands, the State of Palestine, Russia, South Africa, and South Sudan, attending the festival with a special focus on factual filmmaking in their regions.

250 buyers and decision-makers from over 20 countries attended.

Film submissions topped 2000 for the first time. 120 films were shown, of which there were 77 feature length documentaries, 33 shorts, 10 interactive projects and one art installation. There were 18 world premieres, 12 UK premieres, and 5 European premieres. A record 14 films screening at Doc/Fest were developed and funded through MeetMarket, including Joshua Oppenheimer's The Act of Killing which went on to win the Audience Award.

World premieres included Basically, Johnny Moped, Emptying The Skies, Everybody’s Child, A Fragile Trust: Plagiarism, Power & Jayson Blair at the New York Times, Here Was Cuba, Mirage Men, Notes from the Inside with James Rhodes, Particle Fever, Plot for Peace, Project Wild Thing, Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic, The Big Melt, Which Way is the Front Line from Here? The Life and Time of Tim Hetherington, The Man Whose Mind Exploded, The Road to Fame, The Secret Life of Uri Geller – Psychic Spy?, Thin Ice, and To Let The World In.

European premieres included After Tiller, Dirty Wars, and Pandora's Promise.

UK premieres included The Act of Killing and The Crash Reel.

Film strands included Behind the Beats, Best of British, Cross-Platform, Euro/Doc, First Cut, Global Encounters, New York Times Op-Docs, Queer Screen, Resistance, Shorts, The Habit of Art, and This Sporting Life.

A new strand, Films on Film, screened a notable film with a documentary about it, for example The Exorcist (Director's Cut) with The Fear of God: 25 Years of The Exorcist, and John Waters’ Female Trouble with I Am Divine. This strand aimed to attract a wider mix of people, and was supported by Lottery funding through the BFI’s Film Festival Fund which provides extra resources to help grow film festival audiences.

The Doc/Fest Retrospective strand celebrated the work of Japanese filmmaker Shohei Imamura.

More than 75 directors were present and took part in Q&A sessions.

Notable screenings and events included:

• Three opening night films:
  • The Big Melt, a documentary film about Sheffield’s steel industry by Martin Wallace with a live soundtrack from Jarvis Cocker and over 50 musicians.
  • An in-cave screening of The Summit, a climbing documentary by Nick Ryan about the quest to reach the peak of K2. This was screened at Peak Cavern, a cave known as the 'Devil's Arse', in the Peak District.
  • The European premiere of Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer followed by a Skype interview with Katya Samutsevich, one of the members of Pussy Riot.
• A live soundtrack performance of Songs from the Shipyards by Mercury Prize-nominees The Unthanks.
• A look behind-the-scenes of the BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? series.
• A day of events centred around the Ken Loach documentary The Spirit of '45.
• TEDxSheffield, a fringe event which took place the day before the festival.
• The Howard Street outdoor screen which showed films for free for 12 hours each day during the festival.
• Doc/Feast, a street food market made up of local foodie businesses, plus a special Doc/Fest ale.

There were 80 conference sessions and masterclasses, and 300 speakers. Notable speakers included Adam Buxton, Melvyn Bragg, Jonathan Franzen, Uri Geller, Ira Glass, Alex Graham, Janice Hadlow, Jay Hunt, Ross Kemp, Mark Kermode, Sir Trevor McDonald, Hardeep Singh Kohli, Walter Murch, Miranda Sawyer interviewing Michael Palin, Sue Perkins, Captain Sensible, and Alan Yentob.

2012

2,657 delegates from 67 countries attended the festival, and general admissions were 20,079.

Notable screenings and events included:

• The debut of From The Sea To The Land Beyond, a documentary by Penny Woolcock with a live soundtrack performance by British Sea Power.
• A surprise performance by Sixto Rodriguez, the star of opening night film Searching for Sugar Man, which went on to win an Oscar for Best Documentary.

Speakers included Gareth Malone and Tim Pool.

2007

Speakers included Louis Theroux.

Screenings

The festival screens films to delegates and the public in a range of venues across Sheffield and the surrounding area.

Videotheque

Doc/Fest's Videotheque enables delegates to watch films from the festival programme at any time during the festival, and online afterwards. It is used by industry delegates, television programme buyers, distributors, sales agents and festival programmers, and increases the opportunities for films to be picked up and gain a wider audience.

Conference

Conference sessions and masterclasses are co-presented by Documentary Campus. Many masterclasses and interviews from the conference are available as podcasts.

Marketplace and industry

Doc/Fest gives filmmakers the chance to pitch to representatives from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, YouTube and more. Pitching opportunities include:

• MeetMarket: selected film projects pitch to funders in one-on-one meetings
• Mini-MeetMarket: novice filmmakers and fledgling projects pitch publicly to funders
• Crossover Market: selected digital and cross-disciplinary projects pitch to funders in one-on-one meetings
• The BFI Film Fund Pitch for feature documentaries
• The Channel 4 First Cut Pitch for first time directors
• The Wellcome Trust Pitch for projects on biomedical science
• The Specialist Factual New Talent Factual Pitch for aspiring on-screen talent
• The New York Times Op-Docs Pitch for short documentaries
• The Your WorldView Pitch for projects focussed on developing countries

The festival also organises regional pitch workshops and training throughout the year across the UK.

MeetMarket

Meetmarket

MeetMarket is a documentary pitching event held at Sheffield Doc/Fest, where filmmakers meet one-on-one with UK and international broadcasters, funders and distributors to pitch their project ideas.

Festival Director Heather Croall introduced MeetMarket in 2006. Each meeting is match-made and scheduled. Since its introduction, a total of 5900 meetings have taken place, raising £27million for 369 documentary and digital projects.

In 2013 MeetMarket attracted 614 applications, of which 63 projects from 18 countries were chosen to participate, including Marshall Curry, Jeanie Finlay, Alex Gibney, Victor Kossakovsky and Joshua Oppenheimer. The selection included six cross-platform projects. During MeetMarket there were 1500 meetings between these project teams and the 286 decision makers who attended.

MeetMarket successes include Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Look of Silence, due in summer 2014. Rainmakers was selected for MeetMarket in 2008 and went on to win the 2010 Sheffield Green Award.

Digital and interactive

Sheffield Doc/Fest runs a programme focussed on new media development in partnership with Crossover Labs, which is an organisation dedicated to training people to develop new digital content and services.

This digital and interactive programme includes:

• The Crossover Interactive Summit, which is a full day of sessions exploring the digital revolution in broadcasting. Delegates can network with representatives from the film and TV industry, which have included keynote speakers such as BBC North’s Richard Deverell, Frank Rose, Steven Johnson and Katerina Cizek from Highrise. The day includes breakout sessions and round table discussions. The 2013 summit focussed on ‘Transformers’, people who want to change the world and have moved from one platform to another to do so. It was aimed at filmmakers creating apps, documentary producers moving to social platforms, app designers making hardware, and video game developers making physical objects.

• The Crossover Market, which is a pitching event for interactive and digital projects run in a similar way to the festival's MeetMarket. It took place for the first time in 2013, when 27 project teams pitched to 85 cross-platform decision makers.

• A strand of Crossover panels during the main festival conference programme, which includes sessions, commissioning editor panels, workshops, project showcasing, and cross-platform pitching competitions.

• The Crossover Lounge, which shows and hosts digital projects including those commissioned especially for the festival. This is also a space where delegates can meet and network.

Year-round, the festival together with Crossover Labs also runs training and pitching events including the Devise to Deliver (D2D) mentoring and training programme.

2014's festival will include a Crossover Expo to showcase new projects, and a new Crossover Docs strand in the main film programme. There will also be an Interactive pass available for delegates focussing on the digital elements of the festival.

The definition of documentary is now really broad and not only includes TV and film, but also digital, internet, radio, interactive, even musuem exhibits. Crossover is now a major part of our program all year.

— Heather Croall, Festival Director,

Awards

The Sheffield Doc/Fest Awards honour the best documentaries from the Doc/Fest programme, and are judged by industry professionals.

Current categories

• Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award voted for by audiences.
• Special Jury Prize for excellence in style, substance and approach. The jury is made up of UK and international documentary specialists.
• Sheffield Innovation Award for originality in approach to form and radical manifestations in the delivery of its story. The jury is made up of peers from the industry.
• Sheffield Green Award for the film that best addresses major environmental challenges.
• Sheffield Shorts Award, introduced in 2013.
• Sheffield Youth Jury Award for the film that is most engaging for young audiences. The winner is chosen by a jury of five young people aged 16-21, who take part in a series of workshops and screenings with industry professionals ahead of the festival.
• Student Doc Award for films made as part of tertiary course work at UK and international universities, judged by a panel of industry experts.
• Tim Hetherington Award presented by Dogwoof. This was introduced in 2013 to honour war photographer Tim Hetherington. It includes a cash prize and is decided by a jury including Tim’s mother, Judith Hetherington.
• EDA Award for Best Female-Directed Film presented by the Alliance of Women Film Journalists.
• Inspiration Award, introduced in 2009, which celebrates a figure in the industry who has championed documentary and helped get great work into the public eye.

2013 Winners

The awards were held on 16 June 2013, and presented by Jeremy Hardy.

Award	Winner
Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award	Joint winners: The Act of Killing and Particle Fever
Special Jury Prize	The Act of Killing Special mention: Mothers
Sheffield Innovation Award sponsored by BT Vision	Alma, a Tale of Violence
Sheffield Green Award	Pandora's Promise
Sheffield Shorts Award	Slomo
Sheffield Youth Jury Award	God Loves Uganda
Student Doc Award	Boys
Tim Hetherington Award	The Square
EDA Award for Best Female-Directed Film	Rafea Solar Mama
Inspiration Award	Nick Fraser, editor of the BBC's Storyville

The Alliance of Women Film Journalists also presented a Special EDA Award to Sheffield Doc/Fest's Festival Director, Heather Croall, naming her 2013's Ambassador of Women's Films.

2012 Winners

The awards were held on 17 June 2012.

Award	Winner
Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award	5 Broken Cameras
Special Jury Prize	Marina Abramović: The Artist is Present
Sheffield Innovation Award sponsored by BT Vision	Bear 71
Sheffield Green Award	Law of the Jungle
Sheffield Shorts Award	The Globe Collector
Sheffield Youth Jury Award	Photographic Memory
Student Doc Award	The Betrayal – Nerakhoon
EDA Award for Best Female-Directed Film	Going Up The Stairs
Inspiration Award	Penny Woolcock

2011 Winners

Award	Winner
Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award	Give Up Tomorrow
Special Jury Prize	The Interrupters
Sheffield Innovation Award sponsored by BT Vision	Welcome to Pine Point
Sheffield Green Award	You've Been Trumped
Sheffield Youth Jury Award	We Are Poets
Student Doc Award	Eighty Eight
Inspiration Award	Nick Broomfield

A Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to Albert Maysles.

2010 Winners

Award	Winner
Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award	Joint winners: Father, Son and the Holy War and Scenes from a Teenage Killing
Special Jury Prize	Pink Saris Special mention: Nostalgia for the Light
Sheffield Innovation Award	The Arbor Special mention: Prison Valley
Sheffield Green Award	Rainmakers Special mention: Into Eternity
Sheffield Youth Jury Award	The Battle for Barking Special mention: Marathon Boy
Student Doc Award	No Easy Time
Inspiration Award	Kim Longinotto

2009 Winners

Award	Winner
Sheffield Doc/Fest Audience Award	Junior
Special Jury Prize	Videocracy
Sheffield Innovation Award	LoopLoop Special mention: The Big Issue
Sheffield Green Award	Blood of the Rose
Sheffield Youth Jury Award	Sons of Cuba
Student Doc Award	Arsey Versey
Inspiration Award	Adam Curtis

Year round programme

Doc/Fest activities outside of the five-day festival include:

• Screenings, for example the BFI Doc/Fest tour which takes a selection of the festival's film programme around the UK, and screenings at Latitude Festival 2013.
• An ongoing mentoring programme for filmmakers.
• Training, workshops and networking events for filmmakers.
• A structured internship and volunteer programme for young people.

Future

Croall is insistent that she intends to retain the intimate, “boutique" vibe by keeping the festival within the city’s walking precinct and plateauing attendance at around 3,500 industry delegates and 30,000 to 40,000 members of the public.

We want to make sure that we always offer a very egalitarian experience for everybody. We’re not into anything to do with VIPs being siphoned off away from everyone else. It’s important that filmmakers feel there is access to people that they don’t normally get access to. Growth is exhausting, to be honest. We can’t just keep growing and growing. What we want to do is consolidate and make the festival experience a concentrated injection of fun, business and new technology awareness.

— Heather Croall, Festival Director,

Festival directors

• Heather Croall, 2006–present
• Brent Woods, 2002–2005
• Kathy Loizou, 1996–2001
• Paula Shirley, 1995
• Midge MacKenzie, 1994

Festival chairpersons

• Alex Graham, 2011–present
• Steve Hewlett, 2005–2011
• Christo Hird, 2000–2004
• Roger James, 1997–2000
• Marian Bowan, 1996
• Peter Symes, 1994–1995

Festival patrons

• Alan Yentob
• Armando Iannucci
• Clive Betts
• Dan Snow
• David Liddiment
• Dinah Caine
• Greg Dyke 
• Joan Bakewell
• John McVay
• Kevin Macdonald
• Linda McAvan
• David Puttnam
• Marina Lewycka
• Meg Munn 
• Peter Salmon
• Roly Keating 
• Stuart Cosgrove
• Michael Palin
• Charlotte Moore

External links

• Official website
• Crossover official website