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Shooting People
started up in 1998...

Founded by filmmakers Jess Search and Cath Le Couteur, (for 60 filmmaker friends), it started in the belief that the best way to get independent films made and out into the world was to learn from others doing it themselves. And to share ideas, collaborators, knowledge picked up from shoots and other film experiences back in return.

Now, 12 years on, with 38,000 members and over 200 new crew and cast joining every week, this core principal remains the same and as important as ever.

Independent filmmaking can be a pretty tough business. But it's also a pretty exciting business right now. And Shooters are doing great things; creating distinctive bold films that are breaking out, defying old paradigms to find new audiences, trying out fresh-fangled cameras and aesthetics, creating alternate models for funding and exploring different ideas to create sustainable careers.

To get a sense of how we enable this stuff, meet a few Shooters who, in the past 12 months, have:

found collaborators and made great films
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- Rob Lemkin, Mary Ann Bruni, Emily Kunstler and Lucy Walker were all shortlisted for a 2011 Oscar.
- Tracy O'Riordan produced The Arbor, undoubtedly one of 2010's best films. Read our interview with Tracy.
- Debs-Gardner Paterson's debut feature Africa United was picked to be a Gala Screening at London Film Festival.
- Matt Harlock and Paul Thomas's American: The Bill Hicks Story did brilliantly at the UK box office, surpassing big doc hitters such as Food INC, Yes Men, Tyson, End of the Line, Religulous, Burma VJ and Oscar winner The Cove. They blogged about their adventures on Shooters.
- Oscar Sharp won the £30,000 Grand Prize at the Virgin Media Shorts Awards for his film Sign Language, having already won 10,000GBP for the same film through a competition run by reed.co.uk. Nice work!
- Lucy Cooke's much-talked-about 'sloth film' went viral and has had 2 million views to date.
self-distributed their feature films, retaining their independence
Read our distribution tools blog for the very latest
- Emily James fearlessly explored the world of crowd-funding and creative commons with her doc Just Do It: Get Off Your Arse and Change the World. Shooters helped her reach her match fund target of £10,000
- Andrew Lang successfully self-distributed his award-winning film Sons of Cuba. Have a read of his fascinating bulletin post series on the process.
had their films reviewed by Shooter patrons Michael Winterbottom, Lucy Walker, Asif Kapadia and Stephen Woolley
watch films, upload your film, meet our patrons
- Our Film of the Month competition gets the top 3 films voted by Shooters each month, reviewed by one of our beloved cineaste patrons. Open to the public, it has views of around 27,000 hits a month.
- Here's what Cara Mertes, Director of the Documentary Film Program at the Sundance Institute, said about James Lees' film Pockets which won July's Film of the Month. Here's what funny man Larry Charles ('Borat', 'Bruno') wrote when he reveiwed Shooter Jacqueline Wright's film Junglophilia:
  “Pockets is an astutely conceived and executed film. Visuals and sound are graceful and fluid, fitting the manner and mood of the interviewees and their stories. On the street shooting is its own particular art form, and Lees' smart structure allows for ample emotion to infuse this haiku of a film; a piece that includes the past, present and future, instantly making strangers recognisable”
  — Cara Mertes
partnered with us to give blindingly fun festival
see what's on now in our film calendar
- We get asked to partner with more than 50 film festivals and organisations large and small every year. One of our favourites is RoofTop Films, run by Shooters Mark Rosenberg and Dan Nuxoll. They screen cutting edge films from spectacular rooftops of New York throughout the summer. We also really like the formidable duo of Shooters Ian Francis and Pip McKnight who put on the ecclectic and anarchic Flatpack festival in Birmingham, UK every year.
offered discounts to help you save money, tickets to cool stuff, and training opportunities to keep you competitive.
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- Organisations have also joined as shooter members to offer you the latest in MA programmes, and other short/long film, animation, acting, camera and writing courses to keep you competitive across the industry.
- In addition there are countless ways you can save considerable moolah - whether picking up free tickets to screenings or buying kit, books, film festival passes and so on. The size of SP means that shooters get offered discounts and freebies that are consistently way above the norm.
had a pretty good time
join other shooters in the pub
- Shooter Henry Scholfield was flown to Barcelona this year to pick up the Grand Prize for an ad viral competition we supported with Mofilm. Henry's ad for Samsung was made for a thrifty £250. He walked away with serious cash and has been invited to make Samsung's next ad with Producer Jon Landau from Avatar.
- We partner with various campaigns throughout the year to help you earn decent cash and/or get your work in front of people who can help your career.
- But MOST IMPORTANTLY... two members got married after meeting on Shooters. Where there is film, there is clearly love. Please say congrats to Helena Mitchell (now Astbury) and Jake Astbury.