Service
Archive Footage and Current Footage from Ethiopia
Archive research and rights clearance from Ethiopian collections, plus newly shot current footage captured to your brief anywhere in the country.
Short answer
Film Ethiopia sources both archive and current footage. We liaise directly with local and international media organisations, broadcasters, national and institutional collections, production companies and private owners to find and licence Ethiopian footage, from historical material going back decades to news and documentary coverage shot in the past few months. Where the footage you need does not exist, we shoot it to order anywhere in the country, so if you need fresh material from a market in Harar, a coffee harvest in Jimma or the salt flats at Dallol, an Ethiopian crew can capture it to your spec without you travelling. Everything is delivered in your codec, frame rate and resolution with logs, transcriptions and a rights sheet.
Archive research
Ethiopian archive is not sitting in a single searchable database. It is spread across national institutions, broadcasters, ministries, universities, church collections, private families and the hard drives of filmmakers who shot something remarkable in 1994 and never released it. Finding it takes people who know who to call and can ask in Amharic.
We run the search against your brief, come back with a viewing selection and provenance for each item, then negotiate the licence, agree the territory and term, and deliver the master with the paperwork your commissioner will ask for.
Who we go to
Finding Ethiopian footage is a matter of relationships rather than search boxes, and we have spent two decades building them on both sides. Locally that means national and state broadcasters, ministries and government communication offices, universities and research institutions, church and monastic collections, news agencies, production companies, and the private libraries of Ethiopian filmmakers and camera operators who have been shooting here since the tape era.
Internationally it means the broadcasters, agencies and NGOs we have worked for directly. When a client has commissioned material in Ethiopia before, that footage exists somewhere, and knowing who commissioned what, and when, is often faster than any catalogue search.
The result is a search that reaches across eras. Recent news and documentary coverage from the past few months is usually straightforward. Material from the past ten to thirty years depends on who held it and how well it was stored. Older film and tape exists but needs condition assessment and often digitisation, which we can arrange and cost before you commit.
- National and regional broadcasters, and their news archives
- Government ministries, agencies and communication offices
- Universities, museums, research institutions and heritage bodies
- Church, monastic and community collections
- International broadcasters, agencies and NGOs we have produced for
- Ethiopian production companies and independent filmmakers' private libraries
- Family and private collections, including material never publicly released
- Condition assessment, digitisation and restoration where the source is film or tape
Current footage, shot to order
Often what a production actually needs is not archive at all, but three shots of something in Ethiopia that do not exist in a stock library. Rather than fly a crew for two days of material, brief us and an Ethiopian crew will shoot it.
We agree the shot list, the format and the look, shoot it, and deliver graded or ungraded rushes with logs. This is how a number of broadcasters now handle their Ethiopia pickups, and it costs a fraction of a travelling unit.
- Landscape, city, aerial and time-lapse plates from any region
- Cultural, religious and festival coverage, shot with the right permissions
- Wildlife and endemic species material from the national parks
- Vox pops and interviews conducted in local languages with transcripts
- Industry, agriculture, infrastructure and development coverage
- Rushes delivered in your codec, frame rate, resolution and colour space
Rights, clearance and delivery
We clear music, contributor, location and archive rights and hand over a rights sheet that a broadcaster's compliance team will accept. Files are delivered by high-speed upload, or on shuttle drives where the volume makes that faster, with checksums and a matching log and transcription.
Archive Footage and Current Footage from Ethiopia
Questions producers ask
Can you find historical footage of Ethiopia?
How fast can you shoot new footage for us?
What formats do you deliver?
Related services
Often booked together
Filming Permits in Ethiopia
We identify, apply for and hold every permission your shoot needs: federal media authorisation, regional approvals, heritage and national park access, church and community consent, and press accreditation.
Drone Permits and Aerial Filming in Ethiopia
Aerial permissions, security clearances, no-fly assessment, licensed local pilots and in-country drone equipment, planned as a dedicated workstream with a ground-camera fallback.
Customs Clearance for Film Equipment in Ethiopia
Manifest preparation, temporary import and carnet guidance, clearing agent appointment, Bole airport attendance on arrival and departure, and re-export reconciliation.
Start a production
Tell us what you are trying to shoot
Send dates, regions, crew size and a paragraph about the film. You will get an itemised, honest answer within one working day — and we will tell you if something is not going to work.