To coincide with the relaunch of Script Pitch on the SP site, we’ve spoken to the man behind it. SP’s Andy Conway, a Birmingham based lecturer, screenwriter and novelist.

We profiled the expanding career of American filmmaker and October Film of the Month judge Ira Sachs at the beginning of the month. Here he tells us his side – how he got his start, how he’s maintained his independence, and how he has been giving back.

Arriving at the end of September is Bristol’s popular Encounters Festival, one of the UK’s premiere stages for short film and animation. To get you in the spirit for all things short film, we’ve spoken with five Shooting People members who have films included in the competition, about the paths they took into filmmaking, the films they’ve made, and what they’re working on next. Here’s the first three.

Renting filmmaking equipment can be a costly and arduous process. A lot of the time its easier and much more cost effective to borrow from friends and collaborators. Newly launched service KitMapper offers a much easier and affordable way to source equipment, letting filmmakers hire kit from other nearby filmmakers. Listers can advertise their equipment on a browsable or searchable map, and hirers can search for what they need and where they can find it near them. We caught up with…

Michael Lengsfield is a Screenwriter, and Scriptwriting Lecturer at the University of East Anglia. We spoke briefly with him about teaching the craft, developing your writing process and the (free) online course he is launching with FutureLearn.

Pegah Farahmand is the Editor of Channel 4’s short film strand Random Acts. Dedicated to the arts, Random Acts was created in 2011 to “escape the conventions of arts broadcasting and to expand its possibilities.” Pegah joined them last year, and in this guest blog tells us about her experiences with shaping a new direction for the platform, as well as offering advice to SP members about how to pitch films to her.

  BFI’s LGBT-orientated festival Flare returns for a special 30th edition next month, and the programme has now been released. The festival, known as London LGBT Film Festival until a re-envisioning a few years ago, is the biggest LGBT film festival in Europe and seems to grow in scale and stature each year. This year sees the inclusion of over 100 features and 50 shorts, and a wide looking events and industry programme. This year’s programme is split into three enigmatically titled…

Investigative documentary filmmaking can impose real challenges and risks, especially if you’re taking on one of the biggest oil exploration companies in the world. Director of the Oscar-nominated documentary Virunga and long-time Shooter, Orlando von Einsiedel, opens up about making a film that really takes a stand. Touching on Netflix distribution, teaming up with Leonardo DiCaprio and his career in filmmaking. Orlando started off shooting snowboarding videos before delving into documentary filmmaking, tracking down incredibly varied stories across Africa, Asia, the Americas and the…

Fresh from portraying Martin Luther King Jr in Academy Award-winning Selma, acclaimed English actor David Oyelowo has come on board as April’s Film of the Month Patron. David is a graduate of prestigious LAMDA, and his past films range from indie darlings to blockbuster treats with roles in A Most Violent Year, The Butler, The Paperboy, Interstellar and Lincoln. . Now one of Hollywood’s most sought after acting talents, David will be able to provide fantastic insight on your films.…

As the sun sets on SXSW 2015 – we look back at some of the highlights. Here’s some more from Chris and Ben’s time in the deep south, their screening of Nina Forever and when they met the ruler of the roost… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0fjpZ7HC_A&feature=youtu.be