Docs Ireland Marketplace 1

Docs Ireland 3 returns in June 2021 will return with an online industry edition of the festival in June 2021.

Docs Ireland, the island of Ireland’s only industry focused documentary festival will return in June, with an online industry programme for emerging and established filmmakers, including the second edition of the festival’s documentary marketplace.

Industry events will take place online between the 16-20 June 2021, presenting a series of discussions, case studies, masterclasses and pitching sessions for non-fiction filmmakers.

In addition to these targeted industry events and seminars, the return of the Docs Ireland Marketplace will bring together top documentary industry players and documentary filmmakers from Ireland, the UK and internationally, to pitch their projects in curated, private one-to-one meetings. Applications for the marketplace are now open. Decision makers will be announced in the coming weeks, and will include leading investors, broadcasters, sales agents and distributors, who will engage with filmmakers and help them to develop new opportunities.

The Covid-19 situation has had a tremendous impact on the documentary filmmaking community, and the industry programme will be reflective of this impact, highlighting methods of diversification of skills within the industry, and other opportunities in documentary and factual filmmaking.

Events at the industry festival will include a training event focused on audio documentary, the landscape for this type of factual output, and it’s place within the wider documentary industry; providing an opportunity to meet the commissioners and makers of some of the most exciting contemporary audio content.

There will also be a day concentrating on the art, business and ethics of archival use in documentary, a decidedly covid-friendly filmmaking process, with contributions from world renowned producer, visual researcher, and clearance specialist Elizabeth Klinck, and a case study of a recent high profile documentary feature.

We will also have sessions dedicated to Documentary Shorts Commissioning, featuring Irish, UK and international organisations like TG4, the Scottish Documentary Institute and Doc Society; Co-Production Opportunities in the Wake of Brexit, supported by Creative Europe Desk Ireland; and a spotlight on Immersive Documentary Filmmaking.

The Docs Ireland Northern Ireland Screen Pitch will return for its third edition, with the opportunity to pitch for a chance to receive £7,500 in feature documentary development funding from Northern Ireland Screen. Applications for the opportunity will be launched in the coming weeks.

Through it’s programming and outreach, Docs Ireland is dedicated to continuing it’s support of emerging documentarians, particularly through the Ignite Documentary Talent Development Programme, which brings six projects from first time feature doc filmmakers through a hand-ons, intensive training programme, in partnership with Cork International Film Festival.

The full industry programme will be launched mid May. We hope to be back in cinemas by autumn 2021, and perhaps some weird and wonderful venues over the summer, so please keep an eye out for further exciting information in the months to come.

Submissions for the 3rd Docs Ireland festival are still open for Irish and International Feature Docs, Short Irish Docs, Young Filmmakers Competition and VR Films. For more information and to submit your film visit  Film Freeway.

Docs Ireland is supported by

Northern Ireland Screen, Belfast City Council, Department For Communities, BFI FAN, TG4, Arts & Business, Film Hub NI, and BBC Northern Ireland.