The Archives for Education and Make Film History projects make available over 300 films from the BFI National Archive, BBC Archive, Northern Ireland Screen, the Irish Film Institute and the London Community Video Archive for creative reuse by emerging filmmakers in schools, film training and higher education across the UK and Ireland.
Following a successful pilot at Kingston University in 2017 led by filmmaker and academic Dr. Shane O’Sullivan, these films are now available to emerging filmmakers and educators in the UK and Ireland through educational licensing agreements with our project partners. Films licensed by the LCVA may be used subject to their Terms of Use.
Once licensed by an educational institution, over 300 archive films can be downloaded by tutors for use in the classroom, on campus or online. Students watch the films on our platform, choose an archive film to respond to and download up to ten films a year to reuse in their work, integrating clips of up to 2 minutes into their own documentaries.
Click here to sign up or contact Dr. Shane O’Sullivan with any questions.
92 higher education institutions have signed up to the scheme:
Anglia Ruskin, Arts University Bournemouth, Atlantic Technological University, Bangor, Bath Spa, Bedfordshire, Birkbeck, Birmingham City, Bolton, Boomsatsuma, Bournemouth, Cardiff, Central Film School, Chester, Coventry, Cumbria, De Montfort, Derby, Dundalk Institute of Technology, Dun Laoghaire Institute Of Art Design and Technology, East Anglia, East London, Edinburgh, Falmouth, Future Works, Glasgow, Gloucestershire, Goldsmiths, Grŵp Llandrillo Menai, Hertfordshire, Huddersfield, Keele, Kent, King’s College London, Kingston, Lancaster, Leeds Arts University, Leeds Trinity, Leicester, Lincoln, Liverpool, Liverpool Hope, Liverpool John Moores, London Film Academy, London Film School, London Met, London South Bank, Manchester, Maynooth, MetFilm School, Middlesex, Munster Technological University, National College of Art and Design, National Film and Television School, Newcastle, Northampton, North East Scotland College, Norwich University of the Arts, Plymouth, Plymouth College of Art, Queen Mary University of London, Queen’s University Belfast, Ravensbourne, Reading, Regent’s University, Roehampton, Royal College of Art, Royal Leamington Spa College, Screenology, Sheffield Hallam, Southampton, Southampton Solent, Staffordshire, Suffolk, Sussex, Swansea, Technological University Dublin, Trinity College Dublin, University Centre Weston, University College Cork, University of the Arts London, University College London, University for the Creative Arts, University of South Wales, University of the West of Scotland, UWE Bristol, York, York St John, Waterford Institute of Technology, Westminster, Winchester and Worcester.
Read our FAQ for more details and download our free 40-page Creative Reuse Guide.
We’re also pleased to welcome the following institutions to the Make Film History project: Into Film, Leeds Film, Screen South, Exeter Phoenix, Docs Ireland, Nerve Centre/Rathmullan Film Festival, Fresh Film Festival, First Cut! Youth Film Festival, Screen Wexford, Irish Film London and the British Council. Showreels featuring short clips of some of the films available can be viewed below and you can follow the project on X
Credits: Film stills and summaries used on this site are adapted with permission from the BFI Player, BBC iPlayer, IFI Player, NI Screen Digital Film Archive and the BBC and LCVA websites. They retain the copyright of these archives and any third-party rights holders. Film clips included in the showreels are streamed with the permission of the BFI and BBC.