It was only a matter of time before the National Film and Sound Archive branched out into streaming services.
The institution launched its new digital streaming platform, NFSA Player, on Thursday, taking the chance to highlight some of the Indigenous content held within its collection.
The Buwindja Collection is the first content offering to be held on the streaming service and features 17 titles, including Warwick Thornton's award-winning Samson & Delilah and Rachel Perkins' feature film Mabo.
Described as a "handmade algorithm", archive chief executive Patrick McIntyre said the platform offers a curated collection of titles, selected by Wodi Wodi woman and the archive's senior manager, Indigenous collections Gillian Moody because that are culturally relevant.
"What we can do is to select what we think are great pieces from the collection ... bringing them together in one place, put the spotlight on them, and help keep them in the public eye," he said.
"There's just so much work being produced these days, so many ways to engage with the work that we feel like our role can just be to gather things together in capsules and say, here's a great content offering.
"The Buwindja capsule will have video introductions by Gill. And she's talking about things like the history of Australian AV where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people used to have films made about them and now there's an incredible amount of talent in front of and behind the camera from Indigenous people in Australia, telling their own story."
Buwindja (which translates to "remember" in Dharawal) showcases the trailblazers and icons who forged a path for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content makers to create feature films, documentaries, TV series and animation.
As well as including three titles that are free to view, Buwindja gives audiences the option of a one-off payment of $19.99 to access the entire collection for 30 days. They can also opt to use the pay-per-view at $4.99 per paid title.
"We're an audiovisual institution, and the natural exhibition state for audiovisual are speakers, headphones and screens," Mr McIntyre said.
"And in the 21st century, that's in everyone's pocket. So we wanted to be able to share the collection in new ways and to bring it to where people are."
The archive launched the player and the initial collection to coincide with NAIDOC Week, which kicks off on July 2. In light of this, Ms Moody curated the collection to reflect this year's theme, For Our Elders.
"I think that it's important for us to not forget our past, but to also embrace it in our present, and to encourage and challenge us to change our thinking around how our stories are presented, or how we as a society, engage with these stories and then engage with change in our world," she said.
"That's what these stories can give us. They can give us insight into a really broad and amazing, Indigenous Australia."
NFSA Player is at player.nfsa.gov.au.
