digital:works is an arts and educational charity that works with communities, providing training and creative assistance to produce arts and media projects. We are committed to a participatory approach ensuring that those we work with have a major say in the direction of any given project. Creative arts are an exciting way for people of all ages and backgrounds to engage with and learn about a subject or issue - especially if they are the ones shaping and leading the creative process.
Thanks to our breadth of experience and expertise, we can provide training and creative support in a range of media, from video and audio recording to fully-fledged oral history projects. We use industry standard software from Adobe and Apple.
Many of our projects are run by us from beginning to end, conceived, fund raised and implemented by our staff. On other projects we might deliver a discrete aspect of something much larger. In either case, we have experience both of delivering large scale projects and also of working in close partnerships. Partners we work with come from a variety of areas including schools, local authorities, arts organisations, faith groups, youth groups, Tenants and Residents Associations, museums and archives.
Our collective skills mean we are also able to undertake projects directly for other organisations. We make films and podcasts in both a creative or documentary style for clients.
Accessible Projects for All
Our commitment to participation means we place great emphasis on inclusivity. Our projects actively involve people from all corners of the community - be they young or old, visually or hearing impaired, or someone for whom English is not the first language.
The skills required in taking part in our projects do not depend on advanced media literacy or prior experience with digital equipment.
Community Ownership
Our goal with all projects is to encourage and maintain participants' sense of ownership of both the process and the final product. This, we believe, is the guiding principle of true participation work.
A video presentation of the work digital-works does to marry oral history, with participation work and film-making.
This was made as part of an online presentation for a Westminster City Archives Event in 2021.
We work in a range of different creative processes depending on the aims of each project.
Digital video projects are a fun and effective way of engaging with a subject matter, from young people having their say about an issue that affects them to older people reminiscing about their youth. Dramas, documentaries, magazine-style programmes and inter-generational projects all lend themselves to community-based film projects. We also undertake commissions to produce films and provide a variety of training courses in digital video for all ages as part of those projects. In addition to technical skills, our projects examine how to construct a film, whether it's fiction or documentary, from start to finish using story boards, interviews, lighting, tripods and sound. We can also cover editing skills so that participants have an input into the whole project, from planning, to filming to editing a film. These projects may take place over a number of weeks or months.
An ability to gather information from someone on a subject is an important skill in life, and particularly so if you are making a documentary, a news podcast, or writing an article for a newsletter. It is an integral part of Oral History work which helps to gather life stories or personal testimony of real life events or memories of a particular time or place. Our workshops cover the basics in interview skills - what is an open question, the importance of listening and responding, use of eye contact and body language and generally building the skills and confidence needed to carry out an interview. We also cover the use of sound recording equipment and the correct use of microphones. Training in video equipment can also be an important part of the capture of people's memories as it allows for edited material to be distributed in an accessible way - an opening into a deeper dive into the material collected.