Lots has changed at Nova in 2025. So much so that it’s easy to forget quite how much we’ve managed to pack into the last 12 months.
It’s been a year of new ways of working, a growing client base and more award-winning filmmaking.
So, before we find ourselves fully buried in what promises to be another busy year, here’s a look back at some of the highlights from 2025.
Films about…
All in all, we reckon we spent just under 200 days shooting and delivered more than 300 separate outputs this year.
We’ve made films about people, places, heritage, culture, business and community — films about telecommunications, new approaches to social care, luxury hotels, school dinners, coastal wildlife, sixth form colleges, aviation services, major tech companies, ice hockey teams, 70-year-old youtubers… you get the picture… But it’s always with the same conscientious, craft-led approach that underpins everything we do.
Check out our 2025 showreel below
New horizons
At the start of the year we set ourselves the goal of pushing Nova’s client base beyond Hull and the East Riding, with the aim of being recognised as one of the leading video production companies across Yorkshire. Two major framework wins helped us move a good step closer to that ambition.
Back in March, we were selected as North Yorkshire Council’s video supplier, working alongside their teams to help tell the story of England’s largest local authority — its people, businesses, events and organisations.
More recently, a successful tender process secured Nova a place on Barnsley Council’s video framework. Work on that begins in the new year, with more to share in 2026.
New ways of working
It hasn’t just been about where we’ve been working — talk of AI and its rapid evolution has been non-stop all year. While the core of what we do — authentic, documentary-based filmmaking — remains unchanged, 2025 has been the year we’ve started to use AI tools in a more practical way to help speed up parts of our workflow.
We’ve also seen a shift in how content is being planned from the outset. Several clients have taken a more social-first approach, with shoots designed around portrait formats, vox pops and stripped-back production — resulting in more outputs and better performance across social platforms.
Films that tell stories
Despite those changes in how work is planned and delivered, a focus on storytelling remains as central to everything we do.
Throughout 2025 our documentary feature Burning Bridges – telling the incendiary story of the life and work of the avant-garde artist Paul Burwell. Burning Bridges was named as Prospect magazine’s film of the year and played to capacity audiences at its Hull Independent Cinema premiere at Hull Truck, as well as music venues including Cafe OTO in London, FON in Cumbria, The Old Hairdresser’s in Glasgow, at festivals in Lisbon and Sheffield and a US premiere at NYU.
As ever, there’s been plenty going on in the heritage sector. We produced a project documentary for Hull City Council exploring the restoration of the National Picture Theatre, delivered a series of films for East Riding Museums focusing on the team at Beverley Art Gallery, and created a longer piece telling the story of the gallery’s history.
Across the Humber, we’ve continued our Creator’s Choice series for North Lincolnshire Museums, working with staff to highlight some of the most valued objects in their collections.
Meanwhile, we’ve worked with the Humber and North Yorkshire Integrated Care Board to create a series of films looking at the benefits of Trauma Informed Care across the region’s youth services.
We’ve had trips to Frankfurt and Leipzig with Boston Air, London with HEY Volunteers and H&H, and Cornwall, Kent, Gloucestershire, Devon, Sussex and Essex with Park Holidays.
We worked with the team at Visit North Yorkshire to bring to life their flagship summer tourism campaign.
Partnerships, awards and giving back
We extended our partnership with Freedom Festival, covering their award-winning event in Hull as well as their new Freedom On Tour programme.
And another highlight of the year was seeing a film we worked on with H&H Agency and TrustFord win Best Video at the Communicate Magazine Corporate Content Awards.
We’ve been working with H&H for around a decade now, supporting their internal communications projects for major organisations in the UK and internationally. It’s always nice to see work recognised, but more importantly it reflects a long-standing collaborative partnership we’re proud of.
Elsewhere, we also made time for work that sits slightly outside our usual client projects.
For the second year running, the HEY Smile Foundation was our charity of the year. Across 2025 we donated around £15k in-kind, producing a series of films to support their work across Hull and East Yorkshire.
The centrepiece of that work was a longer film focusing on the lives of three Smile service users. It explored some difficult and sensitive subjects — including dementia, anxiety in young people, depression and suicide — and aimed to show the kind of support that often happens quietly in the background.
And finally…
It’s been another full-on year — busy, rewarding and, at times, challenging — but one we’re proud of.
Thanks, as ever, to the clients, collaborators and partners who trusted us with their stories throughout 2025.
We’re looking forward to getting started again in 2026.
