Channel 4

From 4docs

3 Minute Wonder

3 Minute Wonder is a long running short slot on Channel 4. They are usually commissioned as a series of four 3 minute shorts from budding directors who haven't yet had the chance to make a film for broadcast TV and are aired at 7.55pm every weekday.

Each week is thematically driven. The films are connected by subject, but they also have to be able to stand alone and be understood in isolation.

First Cut

First Cut is a strand of half-hour primetime docs, aimed at the brightest and the best new directing talent. Films will be showcased primetime on More4, with the best also running as a series on Channel 4.

The strand will be eclectic in style and subject, but all films should be bold, attention-grabbing, entertaining, original, contemporary and accessible. Ideas must comfortably sustain 24 minutes and hold their own in a primetime slot.

You get a fixed budget of £45k per half hour and the support of Channel 4 who will pair you with an experienced exec and a production company to "warehouse" your film.

This is not an entry-level strand. You should have several years of production experience under your belt, perhaps as an AP or even as an up-and-coming director of broadcast or non-broadcast films or shorts in any genre. You should be a generator of ideas, have real visual flair and be looking to get your first primetime network terrestrial credit.

First Cut Case Studies

• Bruce Fletcher sets out to chronicle the pop princess breakdown industry in Saving Britney Spears

• Lucy Cohen goes searching for stories of the un-mourned dead in her First Cut film, Watch Me Disappear