Research Guides: Documentary Media: Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

Artifex: Critical Digital Methods Institute
A targeted set of research and practical resources oriented towards problem-solving and understanding current trends and key issues in the arts, informing potential opportunities for collaboration and investment.
Canada Council for the Arts Grants
The Canada Council helps individual artists, groups and arts organizations engage in projects and activities. Grants are available for Canadian citizens or permanent residents who have specialized training — though not necessarily in an academic setting — and are recognized as professionals by other artists in the field of practice.

The grants provided to individuals are most principally used for creation, production and presenting works as well as professional development, residency, travel and the development of the sector.
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Grants are organized into 6 programs: Explore and Create; Engage and Sustain; Creating Knowing and Sharing: The Arts and Cultures of First Nations, Inuit and Metis Peoples; Supporting Artistic Practice; Arts Across Canada; Arts Abroad
Harold Greenberg Fund Shorts-to-Features Program
An initiative of The Harold Greenberg Fund in association with The Movie Network, the Shorts-to-Features program is designed to greenlight and finance the production of short films, in the amount of $32,000 each, from emerging Canadian filmmakers to use as a calling card for a feature film currently in development.
National Film Board of Canada
The NFB’s English Program is a unique creative laboratory. Our producers work with creators from across Canada— filmmakers and other media artists — in the production of POV documentaries (more than 50% of our work), auteur animation and original interactive digital content for all platforms including tablet, mobile and the Web.
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We strive to use our public sector difference to produce work that in terms of approach/perspective/story would be more difficult to undertake in the private sector. Our projects come from a wide range of communities, engage with a wide range of topics and reflect voices and perspectives that are often underrepresented in the mainstream media.

As creative producers, we work closely with directors, artists and co-producers to build collaborative teams around projects, and to shape working methods and environments that promote experimentation and creativity.
Rogers Documentary Fund
Rogers established the Rogers Documentary Fund in 1996 to foster the growth of
documentary film production in this country in both official languages. Its creation helps
sustain Canada’s tradition of quality, independently produced documentary films and
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To secure documentary filmmakers the opportunity to make their art, the Fund will provide
financing to original, high-quality, provocative and/or controversial documentaries which
are licensed for prime time national broadcast. The Rogers Documentary Fund will
inject up to $2 million a year into documentary filmmaking in Canada.
There will be two funding deadlines per year. Projects will be selected for funding ten
to twelve weeks after each deadline. Participation from the Fund will be in the form of
a non-recoupable advance.