Straight Shooters

Project: Straight Shooters

Aim: To give young people who have offended or who are at risk of offending the chance to learn new skills

Funding: £5,000 from Positive Activities for Young People and The Prince's Trust Young people who have offended or are at risk of offending in Calderdale, west Yorkshire, have created a series of short films.

During the summer holiday last year local film-maker Richard Shaw ran a creative film-making project. Young people were referred to the project by Calderdale Youth Offending Team (YOT) and Connexions, to give them the chance to learn new skills.

The young people, who were all aged 11 to 17, discussed what films they enjoyed and why, before being taught basic camera techniques. They then worked on a scene, improvised around a given object such as a suitcase, and filmed the result. Following this, the teenagers then developed scenes and full speeches based on their own experiences, while some acted and others operated the cameras and recorded sound. The group was taken to Bradford to a professional editing suite where they worked on the film they felt most ownership of, whether as writer, actor or director.