Welcome to the East Anglian Film Archive.
Who we are
The East Anglian Film Archive is the accredited film archive for the East of England region (Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk).
Our mission is to inspire people through the unique archive films in our collections. We aim to lead the way in moving image preservation and use technological innovation to preserve our region’s film heritage for now and the future.
Our small team of specialist staff preserve and provide access to the films and television programmes in our collections.
We are part of the University of East Anglia and a member of Film Archives UK, the national network of public film archives.
What we do
We look after many thousands of films and television programmes dating from 1896 to the present day. We preserve, digitise and research the films in our care, and store them in our purpose-built vaults.
We also work with broadcasters, researchers, heritage organisations and other partners to bring archive film to audiences around the East of England and beyond. We do this in two ways.
The first way we share our films is via our own projects, often in partnership with other organisations, to make our footage accessible to a range of audiences. Recent examples can be found on our Projects page.
The second way we share our films is through licensing footage for use in other people’s projects, such as films, television programmes, exhibitions and more. You can find out more about how we license footage on our Access page.
Our collections
The films, videos and digital moving images in our care are rich and varied. They are a unique record of the social, cultural and creative histories of the East of England.
Our collections include amateur and artist films, advertising films, corporate films, travelogues, documentaries, educational films and animation. We hold unique ITV Anglia and BBC East broadcast collections, and the internationally significant Institute of Amateur Cinematographers (IAC) collection.
The collection comprises approximately 12,000 hours of film and up to 30,000 hours of videotape, which are stored in purpose-built temperature and humidity controlled vaults at the Archive Centre, Norwich. Digital assets, such as digital copies of films, are stored in our digital repository. We also hold a small collection of paper items which relate to our moving image collections.
Our history
The East Anglian Film Archive (EAFA) was established in 1976, and has been owned and operated by the University of East Anglia since 1984.
In 2003 the archive moved to a new £7.5m Archive Centre at County Hall, Norwich, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, Norfolk County Council and UEA. The Archive Centre is also the home of the Norfolk Record Office.
Our reference and research collections are held in the John and Joy Chittock Research Room. The room was opened in 2011 by the late John Chittock OBE, founding editor of Screen Digest and media columnist for The Financial Times.
Between 2014 and 2018, we participated in a major national film digitisation programme called ‘Unlocking Film Heritage’, which was led by the British Film Institute. The aim of the programme was to digitise around 10,000 titles that originated on film, and to make as many as possible accessible to all. As a result of the programme, 600 films from our collections are available to watch via BFI Player.
EAFA has been an accredited archive under the National Archives Accreditation Scheme since 2017.
Watch our films
Over 200 hours of footage is available to watch for free via our website. We are adding to this all the time, ensuring that the screen heritage we care for can be enjoyed at home, wherever you are in the world.
To watch curated selections of the films in our collections, explore our Highlights.
To find films related to your location or area of interest, search our catalogue.
For all the latest news about our events and projects, you can sign up to our quarterly e-newsletter.
Following the national ‘Unlocking Film Heritage’ programme, you can view an additional 600 films from our collections via BFI Player.