The Scottish Documentary Institute has named the 12-person cohort for the 29th edition of Bridging the Gap.
Described as Scotland’s leading documentary talent development scheme, and supported by Screen Scotland and Northern Ireland Screen, Bridging the Gap will again enable 12 talents from Scotland and Northern Ireland to develop their documentary ideas and take the next steps in their practices. The flagship programme “combines professional development, production funding, and international festival distribution to launch emerging careers in documentary filmmaking,” organisers write.
The filmmakers will undergo a series of tailored workshops with international tutors, culminating in a pitch in early January for a chance to be commissioned.
The 2026 participants are (annotations provided by the Scottish Documentary Institute):
- Agnes Athley is an Edinburgh-based director and camera operator with roots in Sweden and Poland. Since graduating from Queen Margaret University with a degree in Film and Media, she has worked on various non-fiction projects, including her latest short documentary We Walk at Night.
- Timotej Bača is a filmmaker and documentary researcher from Belfast, with a background in fiction cinema. He graduated from UAL and subsequently worked as an Associate Lecturer for Central Saint Martins. His films focus on character-driven stories and contemporary perspectives of the stories told in Northern Ireland.
- Vanya Cantone is a producer and filmmaker from Birmingham who works across experimental and observational documentary filmmaking and community-based practices. Their work draws on personal and familial narratives to explore themes such as labour migration and working-class histories. Vanya’s most recent short Over the Other Side explores how Britain’s post-war labour shortages drove the mass migration of Irish labourers to Birmingham.
- Rory Easton is a self-shooting producer/director from Edinburgh. He has worked for the past 4 years both in-house and freelance for nationwide organisations and charities as well as his own documentary work. Also stepping into producing scripted work, he is passionate about driving grassroots and emerging filmmaking in Scotland.
- Tamara Katz. Originally from Valdivia, Chile, Tamara studied Film and Television at Universidad de Chile. Their practice focuses on documentary filmmaking, with a particular interest in archival materials, memory, and sound. They worked at the Valdivia International Film Festival and CPV before pursuing an MA in Film Directing at the University of Edinburgh, developing the short documentary The Shape of Memory.
- Blair Kemp is an artist who predominantly works with lens-based media which includes: filmmaking, photography, installation and alternative print process. Through this, he creates collaborative arts projects which aim to spotlight lesser-known stories and inspire social change.
- G Liddle has worked behind the scenes in documentary filmmaking for several years, taking on a variety of roles alongside some experience in directing. Through this work, they have had the opportunity to collaborate with thoughtful and compassionate directors whose films have made a meaningful impact. They have drawn inspiration from these collaborations, as well as from friends working across film and music.
- Emma Malins has obtained a Master’s degree in Filmmaking and Media Art from the University of Glasgow in 2025, with a focus on socially engaged disabled led practice. This year her experimental documentary, Picture This, premiered at the BFI’s We Crip Film Festival. She participated in FACT Liverpool’s Digital Crip Camp, developing an accessible immersive screen-based artwork.
- Novaa Noor recently completed an MA in Film Directing at the University of Edinburgh, with a degree in Environmental Studies. She is drawn to stories where people, landscapes and the natural world meet, and she is particularly interested in using documentary and visual storytelling to explore how we understand our place within society.
- Fran Spaeth. After studying anatomy and neuroscience, Fran completed her debut short documentary as part of the Documentary Storytelling certificate at NFTS Scotland. As she continues into filmmaking she hopes to create compelling stories that challenge the way we see things, and offer a chance to discover worlds seldom documented.
- Xuanlin Tham Xuanlin is a writer and curator whose first short documentary, Eavesdropping, was commissioned by GMAC Little Pictures in 2025. In an increasingly atomised world, the film investigated a strange intimacy that leaks through our walls – overhearing our neighbours having sex – to explore the friction, vulnerability, and political potential of existing alongside strangers.
- Born in Haina, China, Tianhui Wu is a filmmaker currently based in Edinburgh. Her practice spans moving image and experimental documentary, examining language and identity erasure, body politic and dreams. Through personal and embodied filmmaking, she works with unofficial archives, personal or found footage, and dialects, questioning what was remembered, recorded or disappeared, yet remains haunting. Her recent documentary is The Land Where Ghosts Could Speak.
