Production financing programs

Screen Australia aims to invest in a range of audience-engaging and culturally relevant programs including feature films, television drama, children’s television drama and documentaries.

In selecting projects in which to invest, Screen Australia will value excellence, audience engagement and Australian cultural content across all platforms. Productions funded must have cultural merit and an awareness of the market, both here and overseas. We will involve the industry in the selection process.

Features: the assessment of the level of Screen Australia funding for features will be flexible, taking into account the Producer Offset, market attachment, the commercial, cultural, artistic and critical merit of the project and its ability to reach a wide audience or a specific targeted audience in Australia and overseas.

Short animation production: this special program acknowledges the unique characteristics of this area of production activity, and aims to support the further evolution of  Australia’s animation sector.

Documentary: Screen Australia will continue to invest in Domestic and International documentaries, as well as in low-budget documentaries and significant documentaries of particular cultural relevance.

TV drama: supplementing the adult TV drama program is a Low-budget Television Drama Program, which seeks to provide further opportunities for producers to make distinctive TV programs that challenge television conventions in all genres.

Children's TV: this program aims to provide high-end entertaining television production and new cross platform viewing opportunities to Australian children. Includes funds to support the production of distinctive Australian children’s drama with no requirement for an international presale.

Screen Australia intends to work with the industry to identify and fund quality programs. Screen Australia will not use the marketplace by itself as the key criterion for determining which projects are necessarily funded and supports the notion of assessment-based funding and investment.

Applicants for production financing must satisfy the general eligibility requirements for Screen Australia funding set out in the agency’s Terms of Trade, including the requirement that projects have Australian content.

Indigenous filmmakers may apply to any Screen Australia program in addition to the funding programs of the Indigenous Branch.

Screen Australia does not negatively discriminate on the basis of racial background, sexual preference, culture, language, gender, or physical or intellectual disability.