Funding
for animation production in the UK
The two
most important sources of funding in the UK are the National Lottery,
which is used the fund the UK Film Council and various regional support
bodies, and the tax break system for feature films currently in effect.
Support is largely aimed at feature films rather than TV programmes.
UK Film
Council
The UK
Film Council is the national film agency established in 2000 with a
remit to develop film industry and film culture in the UK. Overseen
by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport and deriving most of its
funding from the national lottery. In the 2004/5 financial year, the
UKFC handed out £27m for development, production and distribution
and other activities including cinemas, training andpublications.
Animation
feature films and shorts are eligible for UK FC funding. Illuminated
Film Co's A Christmas Carol (2001) and Graham Ralph's Water Warriors
(still in development) have both received loans.
In comparison
with other, longer-established national film agencies, the UK Film Council,
and the public film support ecology surrounding it) is a complicated
thing to summarise. The headlines are:
- The UK
FC is one of the most European-minded film agencies. Any citizen of
the European Union can apply for funds and your film does not even have
to be in English.
- The UK FC gives grants for feature film development and production,
but not television.
- The UK FC is part film agency and part watershed through which National
Lottery funding passes to other institutions, including the British
Film Institute and the agencies serving the regions and nations of the
UK: that is, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales and nine regions of
England.
For more
information, go to the UK
Film Council website.
National
and regional funds
The UK
Film Council allocates part of its annual income from the National Lottery
to Scottish Screen, the Northern Ireland Film and TV Commission and
nine agencies covering different areas of England. For the most part
the RIFE agencies support short film production, training and educational
programmes. However, the NW England agency has set up a film and TV
production fund offering financial support to companies and productions
made in the city of Liverpool. The Merseyside Film and Television Development
Fund makes grants of up to €380,000.
Wales has
wound up its lottery-funded body Sgrin and replaced it with a Creative
IP Fund administered by the national governing body, the Assembly.
Links to
national and regional funds are here:
Scottish
Screen
Northern
Ireland Film and TV Commission
Welsh
Assembly
NW England:
North West Vision
NE England:
Northern Film & Media
Yorkshire:
Screen Yorkshire
West Midlands:
Screen West Midlands
East Midlands:
EM Media
Eastern
England: Screen East
South Western
England: South West Screen &
Cornwall Film Fund
South East:
Screen South
London:
Film London
Tax incentive
The government
offers tax incentives to encourage the production of feature films in
the UK. These provide
a complementary source of funding for animated feature films (television
programmes are no longer eligible for the programme).
Tax incentives are incorporated in the Finance Acts. Films with a production
budget of less than £20m qualify for tax relief of 20 per cent,
films with a budget for more £20m and above qualify for 16 per
cent. A minimum of 25 per cent of the budget is to be spent in the UK.
Arrangements apply only to "British Qualifying" films, where
at least 70% of the production activity takes place in the UK, where
the film is covered by one of the UK's bilateral co-production treaties
or the European Convention on Cinematographic Co-Production. A complete
review of all the UK's international co-production treaties is currently
in progress.
Films taking advantages of the scheme include Valiant (2005).
The website
of the UK Treasury has
more information.
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