Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute (SRFTI) will hold the fifth edition of its international documentary workshop, docedge’08, from January 8 to 13.

The workshop, being held in association with European Documentary Network (EDN), will bring together experts, professionals and freshers for brainstorming sessions, at the end of which film-makers will pitch for funds for “meaningful” projects.

SRFTI director Swapan Mullick said: “It’s an occasion to bring together documentary makers and producers for an interface at an international level. This year, our focus is on an Asian documentary forum.”

Among the 26 projects selected for the workshop, from a pool of 70, are works of film-makers from India, Japan, China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Malaysia and the Philippines.

“We have a project by a French film-maker who will pitch for a documentary on Satyajit Ray. There are 19 participants from across the country, including seven SRFTI students,” said Nilotpal Majumdar, the head of the editing department at SRFTI and the co-ordinator of docedge’08.

Apart from documentary film-makers from Asia, six European tutors and seven commissioning editors from the US, Japan, Sweden and Canada will attend the workshop.

On the first four days, the participants will discuss their ideas and get them refined by international experts, who will also guide them for the pitching session on the last two days before a panel of commissioning editors. “The participants will be allotted seven minutes each to show their clips or present their ideas verbally at the pitching session,” said Majumdar.

Information and broadcasting minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi will inaugurate the forum, which will be interspersed with screening of films by directors from Lithuania and Sweden.