Awards season might be underway, but another invite-only film event has served to showcase the behind-the-scenes work that ensures the craft, creativity and expertise powering the UK’s screen industries remains successful and sustainable.

Film London’s second annual Skills Summit brought together over a hundred high-level representatives from film, television, games and academia. Experts in their respective fields, attendees from organisations like Disney, Netflix, Banijay, The London Film Academy, ITV, Goldsmiths, Sony Pictures and Apple TV+ met with the aim of recognising and sharing innovative practise allowing the city’s workforce to thrive and the UK to retain its reputation as a centre for creative, technical and storytelling excellence.

Forming part of Film London’s work as lead organisation for the BFI’s Metro London Skills Cluster (MLSC), supported by the National Lottery, the event focused on the burning questions facing employers and employees alike in the current environment, addressing key challenges facing the screen industries. The event also provided an opportunity to highlight key MLSC successes over the past 12 months, including:

· Providing training and skills support to over 1,300 people
· Placing almost 150 people into below-the-line roles across the screen industries, from crafts-based roles to essential back office positions
· Connecting over 200 early-career workers with industry mentors
· Brokering 2,700+ days of employment via Film London’s Equal Access Network platform, Stride
· Expanding a database of 3,000 ready-to-work screen industry professionals.
· Inviting 500+ Equal Access Network members to key industry networking events in 2025

A ‘fireside chat’ format between Sara Putt, BAFTA Chair and Founder/ MD of Sara Putt Associates and Adrian Wootton OBE, Chief Executive of Film London and the British Film Commission, opened the event, centring on the need for adaptability in times of change.

Elsewhere, panels included heads of production, line producers, hair and makeup artists and heads of training, skills and recruitment from companies and organisations like Warner Bros. Discovery, 60Forty Films, Framestore, the BFI and The Film & TV Charity, as well as individuals working across production, aesthetics and script supervision.

Putt said: “As someone who spends most of her waking life talking to people about films, production and the state of the industry, I’m a huge believer in the idea that every threat is an opportunity when flipped on its head. That’s no less true when looking at the shifts going on right now in our sector. Amid all the flux and change, we’re also witnessing new types of storytelling, new types of storyteller and new tools that may—or may not—change the way those stories get told. If we’re going to capitalise on this change as an industry then it’s important not only for us to learn, adapt and upskill ourselves, but also to help new generations of talent do the same. Today’s Summit is a really important inflection point, a moment to challenge ourselves on whether we’ve truly got the right approach and training to meet these challenges from AI, from changing models of production, head on? To this end, the work of Film London and the Metro London Skills Cluster is invaluable in helping our industry train for and fill the roles it needs tomorrow as well as today.”

Wootton commented: “London and the UK continue to produce globally renowned film and TV content, underpinned by our world class crew base, the very lifeblood of our screen industries. To ensure the UK remains at the heart of cutting-edge film and TV production, we must continue to invest in our workforce, find solutions to existing skills gaps and futureproof for what comes next, all while improving the diversity of our crews. Everyone involved in the Metro London Skills Cluster is committed to making this happen, and I’m proud that in the last 12 months alone we’ve been able to train over 1,300 film, TV and games professionals and help almost 150 of them find roles across the industry. Being able to engage in a fruitful dialogue with our peers and partners from The National Film and Television School, the Association of Colleges and London Higher, the Capital City College Group, Middlesex University about our shared successes and the challenges we’ve faced was powerful, productive and thought-provoking, and I’m proud of the role we’ve collectively been able to play as part of the BFI’s UK-wide network of Skills Clusters. Over the next three years, we plan to deliver even more training to help below-the-line talent at every stage of their career secure and retain the roles that our industry is crying out for.”

“Alongside our partners and strategic bodies such as ScreenSkills we’ll be doing everything we can to ensure the industry’s workforce is ready to seize the opportunities from whatever the next generation of production looks like,” Wootton concluded.

Other posts by :

1. SpaceX outlines Starlink cellular delivery plan
2. NAB vs CTIA on C-band release
3. Laser terminals to operate at 100x faster
4. Starlink success in Spain, but South Africa proves difficult
5. RocketLab doubts over Mynaric bid
6. IRIS2 free for government usage?
7. Bank: AST SpaceMobile will orbit 356 satellites by 2030
8. SpaceX launches 600th rocket
9. Starlink: 10m customers and counting

Categories: Press Releases

Tags: bafta, British Film Commission (BFC), London