German director Wim Wenders and Road Movies Filmproduktion, the production company he co-founded, have gone digital.

Along with confirming that Wenders' next film will be shot digitally in America next spring, Road Movies is to produce a slate of low-budget digital films from new film-makers under the banner "radikal digital".

Road Movies has partnered on an initial five films with broadcaster WDR and regional funding body the Filmstiftung Nordrhein-Westfalen (NRW). The films will be made with the latest digital film cameras and digitally processed and post-produced at Das Werk, the publicly-listed post-production consortium which owns Road Movies.

Most of the projects will be from newcomers from the Nordrhein-Westfalia region. The films may get a theatrical release before their TV airing.

Wenders, who will act as patron on the slate, has become a leading exponent of digital cinema in Europe, perhaps eclipsed only by Lars von Trier and his Zentropa production outfit.

Wenders is currently writing the script for a digital road movie, which will be his next film. The director shot hit documentary Buena Vista Social Club using digital cameras and digitally processed parts of The Million Dollar Hotel. He also shot U2 video The Ground Beneath Her Feet, which incorporated footage from Million Dollar Hotel, using digital technology.