Khan Academy
FreeDocumentary Filmmaking Step by Step - How to get it made
4.5(788)14k studentsALL LEVELSEnglish
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This course is taught by a documentary director who has made ten feature-length documentaries, and it follows a project from financing through production and distribution. Its lessons draw on mistakes made along the way, so the focus is on practical lessons from real productions.
One of the more specific points is how fair use can sidestep heavy clearance fees, a concern that many first-time documentary makers do not expect to face.
Documentary makers who want experience-based guidance rather than general theory. The course runs about five hours.
*Updated, 2025, with new assignments and resources*
Get filmmaking secrets, from finding (and securing) financing, through surviving production, through distribution and everything in between from me, Adam Bhala Lough, a Spirit Award nominated, Emmy nominated, 3-time Sundance Film Festival alum and one of Filmmaker Magazine's Top 25 Indie Filmmakers to Watch.
Who am I?
I'm an internationally acclaimed filmmaker. I directed the HBO series TELEMARKETERS, which was nominated for an Emmy in 2024, and three documentaries that were the #1 documentary on the iTunes charts. I've had an incredible amount of success in my career, but I have also failed many, many times. You will learn where I failed along the way so you won't make the same mistakes.
I'm also a mentor at the Sundance Native labs and Latino Screenwriting labs so I know how to teach in a concise and clear way.
Why should you take this course and not another?
You will get secrets only a seasoned pro can reveal- from the beauty of not paying insane clearance fees by claiming "fair-use," to how to get into a film festival without any connections. It's all in this 5 hour course.
Other courses give general knowledge of how to make a film from people with minimal actual real-world experience. This course is taught directly from my experience making ten feature length documentary films, all of which have received worldwide distribution and been translated into many languages.
*Watch some of the documentary short films made by my students at youtube. com/worldcinema:
Rickshaw Girl by Muzahidul Islam Zahin, a filmmaker and activist based in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Kwizera: A Story of Hope Born from Risiliance by Sahil Laul, a filmmaker based in the USA
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Tracking since 15 Nov — not enough history yet to tell you whether today's price is any good. Watch the course and we'll tell you when it drops.
This is what we recorded in US pricing — not every price this course has ever had, and prices differ by country.
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