As initially reported last year, the new Warp films production company Warp X is now up and running and will be officially launched at Lovebytes, the Sheffield-based digital arts festival, on March 23. Warp X has financing of £4.5m to finance its slate of seven or eight features over the next three years. Warp Film's head, Mark Herbert says the current plan is to make three films in the £450,000 - £500,000 range and another four (or potentially five) up to £750,000. Paul Trijbits, head of the Film Council's New Cinema Fund, said that the scheme in essence creates a possibility for a viable long-term low-budget studio set-up. Herbert and former FilmFour Lab head Robin Gutch are serving as joint managing directors of Warp X; Herbert will split his time with Warp Films. Caroline Cooper Charles, producer at Lifesize Pictures who formerly ran the UK Film Council’s shorts slate, will serve as head of creative development while former Warp Films’ former head of business services Barry Ryan will move over to Warp X full-time to serve as head of production. Mary Burke will be Warp X’s development producer. The company will be based in Sheffield with offices in London and Nottingham. Herbert says even the term “low-budget” has changed since he got into film producing about five years ago. “There’s a shift in the market and the way people are making films now,” he says. “Low budget used to mean $4.4m-$5.3m (£2.5m-£3m), and now you can make that same kind of film for $1.3m (£750,000).” He says that Warp X wants to have its first project shooting this summer, which will mean it will be greenlit by May. Projects are expected to be developed for an average of six weeks, usually shoot in about four weeks, followed by four months of post – meaning only seven months from greenlight to delivery to the distributor. Herbert has experience with working under the gun – he produced Shane Meadows’ acclaimed DEAD MAN’S SHOES, which shot for just over three weeks on film, not digital. Cooper Charles says that Warp X will work with both “new and established filmmakers.” Applicants shouldn’t be completely raw talents. “We have to look for talent that is capable now of making a feature,” Cooper Charles says. “If there are people who we think are interesting but not ready we can track them so that we can get a more diverse range of voices on the screen in the long term.” They hope to work with talent from a range of backgrounds. “We are actively targeting to make the slate as diverse as possible, reflecting multi-racial Britain,” Gutch says. “This is about low-budget films that are market orientated and can be original, rather than just looking like cut-price studio films”. Warp X will obviously have ties to Warp Films, the film production and DVD distribution arm that Warp Records established in 2001. Herbert says the companies will have a “fluid” relationship and can share overhead. Any projects that come to Warp Films that can be made for under £1m will be considered first for Warp X. Yet Warp Films can potentially take on projects submitted to Warp X. The one-stop aspect of Warp X’s set-up – from initial development through to release -- is particularly unique, says Trijbits. “Nurturing filmmakers and getting their films to audiences needs so much more than just finance and that’s where Warp X’s approach to this project is innovative and exciting,” he says. Cooper Charles notes that having a distributor on board at early stages will be vital. “Optimum are key from the beginning,” she says. “They can give us the benefit of their experience in terms of what is and isn’t going to work for the market.” The financial structure should also help to build the business for young producers. “We don’t just want to encourage new directors and writers, we want to encourage new producers,” Herbert says. Aside from Warp X, Warp Films is working on the DVD release of a short film made with British buzz band the Arctic Monkeys, in post-production on Shane Meadows’ skinhead drama THIS IS ENGLAND, in development with Lynne Ramsay on her next film to hopefully shoot in late summer, and developing other film and TV ideas. [Hallowwen Feed]