Camden - Filmmaker Benjamin Greené spent countless hours studying and filming the Haida people of the pacific northwest in their island community.

"They have a beautiful practices of harvesting that I just wanted to capture," said Greené.

The Washington state native travelled across the country to premiere his final product, a feature length documentary, in Camden. It's a community he says shares some similarities with his film's subject.

He said, "There are many islands off the coast here, it's a rugged coastline, that's a little different, the trees are a little different, but similar feel."

His film Survival Prayer is one of 70 screened in four days at the Camden International Film Festival. Organizers sorted through 500 submissions this year and scouted out films at other festivals, looking for documentaries with compelling stories and characters.

"There's no shortage of amazing work out there right now in the documentary community, so we're very honored to be able to share a small amount of that in the community here," said Ben Fowlie, the festival's founder and director.

And the Camden community really embraces the films. Most of the screenings this weekend were sold out.

Fowlie said, "It's really, really exciting to see everybody come together for four days in a really small community and transform it into something that is maybe slightly larger, a think tank type environment for the future of media."

It's that type of environment for everyone involved. The audience learns from the filmmaker, the filmmaker can get feedback from their audience, and the fimmakers can learn from one another.

"The films are amazing, the fimmakers are substantive people who want to talk about what they're into and to me that's a wonderful opportunity," said Greené.

As the credits roll on another successful year, festival organizers are already thinking about plans to expand for 2013.

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