Working with us: the detail.

On this page: who you contract with · governance · hire terms · manufacturer terms · the Lab and commissions · supporters · how we count · MR Helix technology · press office

Who you contract with

Futures in Film CIC (company 14621615), for programmes and the Social Impact Rental House. It is a community interest company limited by shares, not a charity. The specialist camera-support kit and the space at Pinewood come from MR Helix Ltd. If another company is on the job, the quote names it.

How a job starts. Send us the dates, the scale and what you need. We send a written quote: scope, crew, kit, days and exclusions. Nothing is booked until you confirm in writing. If another company suits the job better, we'll say so.

Governance

The company

The asset lock

Our assets, including any profit, must be used for the community we were set up to serve.

Under the CIC Regulator's guidance, assets can leave a CIC only at full market value, to another asset-locked body, or for the community's benefit. Any dividend would be capped by law. Surplus goes back into training places, production simulations and the units we run.

Our articles of association, including the asset lock, are filed at Companies House.

The board

Five directors:

• Rizwan (Riz) Wadan, founder and Chair
• Jeremy Braben Assoc. BSC, non-executive director
• Pete Swarbrick, director
• Alan Piper, non-executive director
• Nina Karwalska, director and Designated Safeguarding Lead

Ateeb Malik is Technical and Production Lead. He is staff, not a director.

The board meets quarterly. It covers strategy, finance, risk, safeguarding and community benefit, and signs off the annual accounts and community interest report. The register of directors is at Companies House. Meet the team.

Policies

The board is adopting a full policy pack:

• safeguarding children and adults at risk
• equality, diversity and inclusion
• health and safety, on set and off
• data protection
• whistleblowing
• complaints
• conflicts of interest and related parties
• accessibility
• environment and sustainability
• evidence, claims and public wording

Each goes up here with its adoption date once the board resolution is signed. Until then, ask for any current version at [email protected].

Related parties

Some directors run other companies that work with us. We name them up front.

• MR Helix Ltd provides the space and technology at Pinewood. Riz Wadan founded it and is a director.
• Pixeleyed Pictures Ltd is a production company that runs production simulation and makes films. Riz Wadan founded it and is a director.
• Screen Sisters CIC opens routes into screen work for women of faith. Futures in Film CIC provides its practical delivery. It co-develops the Faith Inclusion Toolkit. Nina Karwalska and Riz Wadan are directors.
• Helicopter Film Services is Jeremy Braben's company. Where its kit, staff or Jeremy's teaching are part of a programme, that page says so.

Directors declare these interests to the board. Dealings with connected companies are recorded and disclosed in our filed accounts.

Accounts and the community interest report

We file accounts at Companies House each year, with a community interest report (form CIC34). It covers the community benefit delivered, who we consulted, what directors were paid and whether any assets left the company. Latest filed accounts: made up to 28 January 2025.

Read our filings at Companies House · company number 14621615.

Doing due diligence?

Email [email protected] with "Due diligence" in the subject. Tell us what your process needs and we'll send what exists.

The companies

• When a unit uses the Helix or the test room, the technology comes from MR Helix Ltd.
• When a commission needs a production company, Pixeleyed Pictures is contracted.
• The Story to Screen Lab is run with Screen Sisters CIC: two boards, two sets of accounts.

Each company files its own accounts and has its own directors and insurance. Credits belong to the company and crew who earned them (see MR Helix technology).

Where the money comes from. Trading and grants. Productions hire crewed technical support from the Social Impact Rental House and host our trainees on set; that income goes back into the programmes.

Hire terms

Who owns the kit. MR Helix Ltd owns the specialist technology. Split-hire items come from the rental house named on the quote. You contract with Futures in Film CIC. Because FIF is asset-locked, the social value is something you can evidence: a trainee on set, a supervisor's record, and money back into training.

The kit.

Some items aren't offered dry. Where an operator or technician is in the spec, that's fixed.

Split-hire. Bigger camera, lighting or grip packages are split with established rental houses. One quote, one contact. Each supplier's own terms cover its kit, and the quote says whose is whose.

Hosting a trainee.

• A named supervisor, agreed in writing before day one.
• A defined trainee-grade role, with clear limits on what they touch.
• A briefing on your confidentiality terms.
• Trainees on productions are 18 or over.
• A debrief at wrap, with a short record of what they did and who supervised.

The supervised position is written into the agreement, not left to goodwill. Grades and rates follow the current Bectu rate cards.

How a hire runs.

1. Tell us the job.
2. Written quote: scope, days, crew, the trainee's place, assumptions and exclusions.
3. Prep with your camera department: built, balanced, tested and signed for.
4. On the unit, to your call sheet.
5. Wrap: signed manifest back, and the trainee's debrief.

Insurance. You hold production insurance covering hired-in equipment. We check the certificate before kit leaves.

Manufacturer terms

Test-and-feedback and co-development sit with MR Helix Ltd's R&D, in its test room at Pinewood. FIF runs the learners and training places. The written scope names the contracting company before anything is booked.

What the money buys. A test day is paid work. It buys a training place, not a finding.

• We don't endorse or certify products. A report may not say what you hoped.
• We don't call you a partner unless you've agreed the wording in writing.
• We don't offer equipment loans, co-financing or production support in exchange for access.
• We don't publish anything about your product without your written agreement.

Report tiers. Private (you only); redacted public (product anonymised, method and findings published); named public (you approve the wording in writing). Every finding is marked measured, observed or operator-reported, under a confidentiality tier agreed at scope. Published reports also record what new entrants found hard, which feeds back into training.

Commissions and the Story to Screen Lab

Rights. Registering interest isn't an application and gives neither company any rights in your idea. Submitting a story transfers no copyright: the writer keeps the IP and underlying rights. Futures in Film holds the Lab's rights framework and contributor rights form, both dated June 2026. Both boards approved the Lab.

Who does what.

Each company raises, banks and reports separately. Nothing is double-counted, and neither takes money on the other's behalf.

For funders.

In-kind support counts as much as cash: script-reading time, facility hours, stock, post time or travel for writers. Supporters get no say in which stories are developed and no rights in the material.

Mentors. We name a mentor only once they've agreed in writing how they're described.

• A mentor gives notes and time. They don't decide what gets made or sit on a selection panel.
• A mentor takes no credit, fee or share of your work, and isn't your agent or producer.
• A mentor can't promise a meeting, an introduction or an outcome.
• We ask the writer what they need first and pair against that. A writer can turn a mentor down.
• Conflicts of interest are declared, and the pairing is changed.

Mentoring in the Lab is free.

Commissioned films.

• You commission Futures in Film CIC.
• If the film needs a production company, Pixeleyed Pictures Ltd can produce it under a separate contract. We tell you before you sign, and the quote says who does what.
• You own the finished film, on the licence agreed in writing before the shoot.
• Contributor consent is recorded before anyone is filmed. If contributors may be at risk, tell us early: it changes the plan.
• We share an enquiry with another company only if the project needs its kit or crew, and we ask first.

Commissioned work is tied to training, simulation and social-impact delivery, and the income goes back into the programmes.

Supporters

Donated kit. Held, insured and maintained by Futures in Film CIC, and used for training and work connected to it. Title stays with the CIC; nothing passes to another company. We only take what we can hold, insure, store and maintain.

What support doesn't buy.

• A gift funds a place. It doesn't buy a say in who we take or what we teach.
• No one is called a partner, sponsor or supporter until the wording is agreed in writing.
• Support is tied to a place, a learner, a piece of kit or a block of delivery, and reported back against it.

Who sees an offer. The FIF team and, where a decision needs it, the board. Nothing about a supporter is published, named or shown as a logo until the wording is agreed in writing.

How we name who we work with. Only in the words the relationship supports.

An organisation is named once it has agreed how the relationship is described. Text names, not logos, unless the logo's owner agrees. MR Helix Ltd, Pixeleyed Pictures Ltd and Screen Sisters CIC are connected companies, not outside supporters (see "The companies" above).

How we count and report

Formal pillar names (used in reporting). 01 Technical Innovation, STEAM and Applied R&D · 02 Production Simulation and Industry Workflow Practice · 03 Social Impact Filmmaking, Journalism and Public Discourse · 04 Industry, Academia and Supply-Chain Alignment · 05 Inclusive Representation, Cultural Safety and Community Access.

The seven-stage pathway. How we report the entry side of the work. Nobody has to do every stage.

1. Awareness. Festivals, careers talks, community and faith networks, school and college visits.
2. Engagement. Registering, a conversation, some guidance. We find out what would stop you taking a place.
3. Training. Workshops, technical sessions, demos and mentoring from working crew.
4. Simulation. A role on a production simulation, with a call sheet, kit, timings and pressure.
5. Exposure. Time with studios, rental houses, manufacturers, guilds and working practitioners.
6. Support. Feedback, access adjustments and pastoral contact between programmes.
7. Progression. Further training, shadowing, supervised placements, credits and references.

Access and inclusion run through all seven.

How the filed figures are counted.

• Engagements aren't people. One person on three simulations is three engagements. The 286 in the CIC34 for the year to 28 January 2025 counts training engagements, not unique learners.
• Reach isn't training. The "over 4,000" in our CIC34 counts young people reached through outreach and at the Pinewood Futures Festival, which is Pinewood Studios' event, mostly in someone else's setting. It isn't the number on our programmes. Pinewood's own reports put festival attendance at about 4,500 in both 2025 and 2026.
• Outputs aren't outcomes. An outcome is what changed afterwards: a grade held, a credit earned, a paid day worked. We report outcomes case by case, and only with consent.
• Our record starts in January 2023. Futures in Film CIC was incorporated on 27 January 2023. Earlier work was run by Pixeleyed Pictures and MR Helix Ltd and isn't counted in the CIC's figures.
• Activity register. 23 dated workshops delivered between February and July 2023.

What we can't evidence yet. We don't yet track every learner at six and twelve months, so we can't say how many are in paid work in their department a year on. Closing that gap needs consent to follow up at sign-up, one agreed definition of a destination, and someone whose job includes it.

Destinations tracking. For every learner who agrees, a short record after the course: department and grade trained in; next paid day, scheme, apprenticeship or placement, and when; the production or company, where they're free to name it; whether they stepped up a grade within a year. A name goes public only with the person's written agreement, and we check nobody was under 18 when the work happened.

Faith Inclusion Toolkit: what we measure (funder reporting). Confidence to raise faith-related needs at work; whether HoDs and production managers can plan for them in prep; whether the tools hold up under production pressure; productions and organisations committing to use them. The Toolkit, including the Abrahamic strand, is owned by Futures in Film CIC and developed with Screen Sisters CIC, which Futures in Film supports.

MR Helix technology history

The R&D and camera-support kit belong to MR Helix Ltd, a separate company. FIF grew out of MR Helix's training work. MR Helix builds and backs the kit on our units; we run the training, as a separate social enterprise.

MR Helix technology on productions: The Favourite (2018) · Luther · A 35mm ARRI 235 flown on the Helix (2016) · Panavision Millennium XL2 35mm on the Helix, field-tested with Kodak (September 2025). These are MR Helix Ltd credits, earned before or alongside Futures in Film; they are not FIF projects.

• 2015. The founder's work with the Helix platform begins, on the L'Aigle Exos exoskeleton.
• 2016. A 35mm ARRI 235 flown on the Helix, carried on an L'Aigle Eko. The Exhauss Cine exoskeleton shown at IBC; integration with the Helix follows.
• Before September 2025. Panavision Millennium XL2 balanced on the Helix after around a year of work with Panavision.
• September 2025. Panavision XL2 35mm gimbal and exoskeleton field test, with Kodak.
• January 2026. Prototype camera tracking on a working unit at Pinewood Futures Festival.

The starting point is the Letus Double Helix, adapted for cine payloads: reworked front ring and roll axis, power moved to the rear, standardised connectors, and motion profiles tuned to each camera build. The rigs have carried ALEXA-class digital bodies and 35mm film cameras. The exoskeleton moves the payload to the operator's hips and legs for longer takes. Current work: on-set power, the Helix Tune tuning software and new rig designs.

Coverage: No Film School on the 35mm test, July 2016, Newsshooter on the Exhauss Cine at IBC 2016 and the Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Hub interview with our founder, August 2025.

What we don't claim. A test day isn't an endorsement, and a report may not say what the manufacturer hoped. We make no medical or certification claims about any rig. Operators' comments on comfort and fatigue are reported as what they said.

Press office notes

Who can talk to you

• Riz Wadan, Founder and Chair: access into the industry, production simulation as training, camera stabilisation, faith and inclusion on productions.
• Ateeb Malik, Technical and Production Lead: kit, prep, how a unit runs, shooting on 35mm, applied technology in the camera department.
• Nina Karwalska, director and Designated Safeguarding Lead: safeguarding on working sets, and routes in for women of faith with Screen Sisters CIC.

Subjects

• Routes in for people the industry doesn't usually reach, and what stops a capable person getting a second and third job.
• Production simulation: a training exercise run as a working unit, with call sheet, risk assessment, chain of command, kit and turnaround.
• Faith inclusion on set: prayer, food, dress and observance planned into the schedule, and the Faith Inclusion Toolkit.
• Shooting on 35mm: stock, lab time and how a film shoot schedules.
• AI in production: using it well on a working unit, with consent, credit and human sign-off.

What we don't discuss

• Individual learners, applicants or trainees, named or not.
• Any production under a non-disclosure agreement.
• Suppliers' or productions' commercial terms, rates or account details.
• Another organisation's position. People who've worked with us speak for themselves.