September 14, 2020

Documentary Producers Alliance Unveils Guidelines for the Documentary Waterfall

Since our founding in 2016, the Documentary Producers Alliance (DPA) has grown to include over 300 members from 53 cities, eight countries and counting. Originally founded to advocate for producers whose role was misunderstood and chronically underpaid, the DPA’s work allowed us to realize that the issues we were facing were not due to our professional failures but to systemic ones larger than ourselves. Our goal as an organization is to identify and advocate for best practices for a field that is largely unregulated.
Read more
August 31, 2020

Producing with Care in the COVID Era: Considerations from the Community

COVID-19 exposed and accentuated long-standing fault lines in our industry: a financial sustainability crisis, the absence of labor protections, and a growing movement to reconcile decades of structural inequities between white and Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) filmmakers and communities.
Read more
January 28, 2020 @

Extended Reality (XR) Master Class

In this Extended Reality (XR) Master Class with VR editor and producer Jennifer Tiexiera, participants took a hands-on approach to the burgeoning world of XR, from terminology, the creative team structure, to the current tools and techniques that are being utilized in this space. As opposed to...

Read more
September 20, 2019 @

IDA Conversation Series: Susan Lacy

In this IDA Conversation Series, we highlight and explore the extraordinary career of Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and producer Susan Lacy. Hear how her passion for American cultural history led to the creation of PBS series American Masters and her more recent journeys in telling the stories of...

Read more
January 4, 2019

A (Revised!) Introduction to Documentary Budgeting

This is a fully revised look at documentary budgeting, and updates the 2006 Documentary article “Don’t Fudge on Your Budget: Toeing the Line Items.” At the center of the documentary "business" is the budget, which offers a map of the filmmaking process, expressing both the film you’re planning to make and how you plan to make it. Ideally, it is also a living document that can help get a film to completion.
Read more
July 25, 2017 @

IDA Conversation Series: Sheila Nevins

In this special edition of the IDA Conversation Series, co-presented with the USC School of Cinematic Arts, we traversed the unwavering career of the legendary HBO Executive Producer Sheila Nevins.

As one of the most influential figures in the history of documentary filmmaking, Sheila...

Read more

Pages