The Eastern Screen Alliance (ESA) is a local, regional film office that supports the development of screen productions in Hawke's Bay.
It has been working closely with Auckland based No8 Studios to secure film studios in Hawke's Bay.
Last month ESA kicked off its new workshops with a screen acting workshop held at Toitoi Hawke's Bay Arts and Events Centre.
ESA's screen acting workshop was created to provide guidance and experience for actors working on a film set.
Fifty local and national actors attended the course.
The workshop was run by a local actor and community and education manager at Toitoi, Daniel Betty, and director of photography and film lighting specialist Gilly Lawrence.
Betty said the workshop's focus was for the actors to develop skills, work on scenes and have them filmed to provide valuable feedback on their performance.
As a photography and film lighting specialist, Lawrence discussed the film-making process with the actors as he worked with Daniel to film a scene.
Currently, ESA has script writing workshops regularly led by ESA script writing member Kate Powis.
These workshops feed into the screen acting workshops, providing resident writers and actors opportunities to build their skills together.
More workshops are in the pipeline and will be hosted by highly regarded NZ actors and production experts.
Betty said in the future, he hoped ESA would be able to deliver some workshops for free to the community.
Next year marks the 40th anniversary of Utu, a feature-length film shot in Hawke's Bay by local NZ film greats Greg Murphy and Bruno Lawrence.
Betty says, ''ESA is planning to host a film festival to celebrate where we have come from, what we are doing and what influences us to be the best we can be.
"It is a chance to build local stories and celebrate Utu and our indigenous stories.''
Paunovic moved to Havelock North with her family from Croatia seven years ago.