Making Money from Your Short Videos

We've tested a lot of ways of making money from our short films. Some are better than others. Here are a few areas we have explored and the results:

1) Signing with a short film distributor like Ouat or Shorts International etc.

Results: If you can get a short film distributor on board, it's great for television or educational sales if your title appeals to the television and education market. This is not a lifetime solution. The work that a distributor does will only last a few years. You won't get rich off their licensing fees but every dollar counts. They are usually amenable to having non-exclusive rights so why wouldn't you do it?

2) Loading your film on Amazon through CreateSpace and offering it both as a DVD and a download.

Results: Amazon takes a large piece of your revenue but it has a wide audience that it serves so I find it's smart to have your title on it. You may get sales from random people searching on the topic of your film. Or you may not. But again, it's free to load your title so why not?

3) Loading your film on sites like DynamoPlayer or IndieReign.

Results: These sites take a piece of your revenue so no upfront fees, which is nice. And they allow anyone to embed their players anywhere on the Web. That way your audience doesn't have to leave the site they are on to watch your film. This is great for promoting your film through blogs. The film can be embedded in a blog entry and your audience can pay for it and watch immediately without much fuss. The downside is that these sites are relatively unknown to the masses so your title may perform poorly due to a lack of reaching a wide audience. These sites are good if you are making a strong social media/blog push of your film.

4) Loading your film on YouTube and collecting Google AdSense dollars.

Results: I have be honest that this may actually be the most lucrative for you if your video is very popular. The more viewers watch your video, the higher chance they will click on the ads that appear on your videos. This translates to advertising dollars that your title can earn. So even though an audience is watching your video for free, you may be making a nice chunk of change on it through advertising and perhaps much more than if you charged $2.99 per rental on another site. Case in point, our short film Gay Baby is over 30,000 views in less than 2 weeks.

5) Making DVDs and using a fulfillment company like FilmBaby.

Results: Fulfillment companies are great as you don't have to worry about handling the sales and sending out your DVDs. The downside is that you have to make the inventory that is being sold yourself, store most of it, and potentially be upside down on it should your title not perform well. As DVDs are phased out, there will be less of a need for fulfillment companies.

You could do all of the above. Again, why not?

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Your Film Can Find a Home Without a Nomination or Sundance Premiere

My head is spinning at all the nominations from the Independent Spirit Awards to the Sundance acceptances. Everything comes full circle in December when the films from the year get nominated and new films are chosen to be launched at Sundance. It's overwhelming. And such an exciting time for the indie film biz.

I am the first to applaud those who are nominated for an indie spirit award and selected for Sundance. A few are close friends and I couldn't be happier for them - congrats guys! I will be rooting for you! They deserve the accolades. Every single filmmaker whose film makes the cut deserves to be there. Making a movie is tough business and we should all be congratulated for even completing a film.

At this time of year, we filmmakers have to remember that it's tough competition and that a large number of worthy titles don't make the Spirit Awards or Sundance cut. Hang in there.

None of my films (I had 1 submitted for a spirit award and 2 for Sundance) were chosen for these honorable slots this year - alas. But I know I share the pain with about a few thousand other filmmakers, which takes the bite out of the sting. Still sucks, but it's not the end of the world by any stretch.

Why does it suck? Well, anytime your project can be singled out as something to watch, it helps give your project exposure which can lead to an easier time finding distribution and a wider audience etc. And while it's okay my title didn't make the cut, it still sucks. It makes my life harder. Does that mean my project is bad. Hell no. It just means that the programmers or selection committee felt that other films fit their mandate better.

When our films don't make the cut, we have to get even more creative about how to get our titles to stand out. But in the end, we do usually find the means to access our audience. Each film has its own journey. It's one of the things about filmmaking that I absolutely love - discovering the journey for a film.

Though my film Not Since You only played a couple of smaller festivals, it found its audience and has sold worldwide - Italy LOVES it and that's so cool. Take Me Home launched at Nashville (a great festival) and has been doing amazingly well on the festival circuit with 5 awards to date. And when I thought our festival run was over, it picked right back up with requests from more festivals. So awesome. And we are signing a domestic deal this week that includes a small theatrical.

The moral of the story is that while it would be awesome to be nominated for a spirit award or play at Sundance, your film can still have a great life if it doesn't achieve either. So don't get too sad about not making the cut. You're in good company. Use that energy to kick ass on getting your film in front of your audience in other ways.

Good luck! I'm rooting for you!

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Happy Thanksgiving 2011!

Happy Thanksgiving! My cup runneth over with love, thanks, and the joy of another year making movies.

Each year, I pinch myself that I'm able to work full time doing what I love. I'm so grateful to everyone and the stars for aligning to make it all possible.

This year we have seen Not Since You perform well in all of its channels of distribution. We have had an incredible festival run with our recent film Take Me Home and strong foreign sales and a domestic distribution deal on its way. We completed our new film The Diary of Preston Plummer and are prepping for a World Premiere in 2012. And I produced a short film about the Keystone XL Pipeline called Pipe Dreams that has been shortlisted for an Oscar. We had a wonderful LA Premiere - here's an article about it and a pic from it below. (I will also include this article from the New Yorker for background on the fight against the pipeline here.)

I will repeat, my cup runneth over. And I am thankful.

I'm looking forward to a yummy meal and wine tasting with my LA family. I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with as much love, thanks and joy!

Peace y'all!

Director Leslie Iwerks & Narrator Daryl Hannah

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How to NOT Make a Micro-Budget Feature Film

I define micro-budget features as those made for less than $200k. This correlates with SAG's definition of an Ultra Low Budget film. I have made a few micro-budget films to date and each year festivals are loaded with them.

So how should you NOT go about making them? Sometimes it's easier to talk about what not to do.

Here are areas that can be costly and what you should try to avoid when making a micro-budget film.:

1) A lot of locations - moving all around while you film takes time and money. You know how long it can take to pack a bag for an overnight trip. Imagine packing and unpacking a grip truck? Takes time, which means more shooting days, which takes more money.
2) Shooting on location where you have to fly in your actors and crew - housing, per diem, and airfare is expensive. Period. But if you have major support in a region that will give you resources and housing dirt cheap then it could be worth it. Just be careful and plan wisely.
3) Visual Effects - unless you have a friend who is able to do all of your VFX for cheap, deferred or free stay away from VFX-heavy scripts on your small film.
4) A lot of characters - actors are costly to pay and feed and house so keep the number of characters low.
5) Shots that require expensive equipment like cranes. $$$
6) Action sequences - these require time to set up shots and experienced crew who can make the shots look believable. This translates to more money needed.
7) Animals - says it all, I think: animals. And their handlers need to eat and be paid.
8) Children - says it all times infinity: children. They can't work as many hours as adults. They need a studio teacher on set who needs to be paid and their parents can be difficult. They all need to eat too. See how everything comes back to catering?
9) Stunts - again, the believability factor plays here. You want to work with seasoned stunt people on major stunts as they know how to do them safely and realistically. Experienced stunt people like to be paid well.
10) Period pieces - finding the items that indicate a certain time period can be tough and costly to buy or rent.
11) Crew - keep your crew small, which will mean keeping your equipment and lighting needs small too - which means keeping your night shoots to a minimum.
12) Night shoots - Keep your night shoots to a minimum. You tend to need light for night shoots = money.
13) Food - another reason to keep your cast and crew small. The more mouths to feed, the higher the cost to you.
14) Shooting in the water or rain or snow etc requires special equipment and crew and will slow your shoot down. And it can also increase the pay required for your actors.
15) Insurance - insurance is costly so it helps to keep your shooting days low and your risky filmmaking to a minimum.
16) Shooting days - keep the number of shooting days tight. Each day of filmming can add thousands to your budget. Don't be unrealistic though. Going over can cost you even more money than planning the proper shooting schedule.
17) Going WGA or DGA will cost you money. Micro-budget films should not be made WGA or DGA signatory. That's just my opinion as those unions will demand certain salaries and pay for pension and health and welfare for working with their members. You can find great writers and great directors who are not in the unions for your micro-budget project. Go WGA and DGA when you have a larger budget.
18) Not using pro actors. I do recommend becoming SAG signatory and using SAG actors for any sized film. It is difficult to find strong nonunion actors so save yourself a headache and time on set because they will know how to act in front of a camera and give your film a little cache by going with more seasoned and well known actors when you can.
19) Shoot any ole script - Don't shoot a crappy script because you want to make a movie. Make sure the script is AWESOME. Take your time to find the right project and make it great. That time will be extremely well spent.
20) Not paying yourself is WRONG. Even if it is deferred or as an in-kind investment or whatever. You need to be paid. You are worth it. Filmmaking is a business. Treat it so.

There are a lot more hints on how to make a micro-budget film. Perhaps I should write a book? Hmmm.

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Fighting Online Piracy

Online piracy is rampant for films. Even our small indie films can be found for free online. It sucks.

As it is, indie filmmakers struggle to earn a living making movies. With piracy, we are losing out on major revenue that could allow us to be financially stable and pay our investors back so we can keep making more films.

We aren't huge studios with deep pockets. Every film sale or rental helps us keep the lights on. Should producers of quality product be forced to find temp jobs to survive when their films could be supporting them if only they weren't being stolen?

To rub salt in our wounds, web sites like Pirate Bay actually think it's funny that filmmakers want to protect their work that they spent millions creating and now have to spend years recouping. They go so far as to ridicule anyone who sends them Takedown Notices. Here are some choice quotes from their responses to Takedown Notices (from their Web site here):

1. We would like to refer you to our Legal Threats section, on which we, while having much fun, ridicule people like you. Thank you for your contribution.
2. Hello and thank you for contacting us. We have shut down the website in question. Oh wait, just kidding. We haven't, since the site in question is fully legal. Unlike certain other countries, such as the one you're in we have sane copyright laws here. But we also have polar bears roaming the streets and attacking people. 
3. ...and I would like to refer you to the relevant court cases. Unfortunately, our legal team partied quite heavily last night, so the only reference I can provide you with is Hogsta Domstolen (the Swedish Supreme Court) NJA  1996 page 79.
4. Damnit. You got us there. Now I'm scared I pissed my pants. Where should I send the invoice for cleaning them?
5. You have scored 10 out of 10 points on our Legal Threats Entertainment scale. You win the grand prize: A lifetime of ridicule on our legal threats section (http://static.thepiratebay.org/legal/)! Congratulations!
6. Please also note that I'm not currently out of toilet paper, so you may wait a while before sending legal papers.
7. Please don't sue us right now, our lawyer is passed out in an alley from too much moonshine, so please at least wait until he's found and doesn't have a huge hangover...
8. It is the opinion of us and our lawyers that you are ....... morons, and that you should please go sodomize yourself with retractable batons.

These responses are ridiculous. A professional Web site will honestly call others morons and tell them to go sodomize themselves? Sane copyright laws means it's okay to help content be stolen? Now who's insane?

These sites mock content creators and act as if they aren't culpable in copyright infringement. That's like saying you shouldn't be charged as an accessory to murder because you didn't actually pull the trigger.

Well, it's time to fight back. I have spent hours tracking down links that offer our films for free. But recently my biz partner Jade found this site that helps us find the pirates: Muso.com.

We've signed up and so far, it's found almost 500 links that should come down. That's a lot of links!

I have no idea if this site will really work but we're giving it a try and I'll report back. All I know is we need to fight for our films and revenue. Our livelihoods depend on it. And no, we aren't morons. We're victims.

A call for change: For anyone who thinks it's harmless to use torrents and watch content for free from illegal sites, please think about the filmmakers who made that film that you are enjoying. We are just like you with bills and families to support. We can only survive and thrive and make more films for you to enjoy if you pay for our work. Independent filmmakers often work for free to make their films because we believe in entertaining the world with stories above and beyond what the studios can provide and we RELY on our earnings from rentals and sales to live. I understand entertainment can be expensive, but it's very costly to make as well. We can't keep providing entertainment if it's going to keep getting stolen. Please stop using these sites and help us survive.

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Jameson FIND Your Audience Award Now Accepting Submissions

From Film Independent - Whiskey and Film - What a great combination! This press release says it all.

Film Independent, the non-profit arts organization that produces the Spirit Awards and the Los Angeles Film Festival, is now accepting submissions for the 2012 Jameson FIND Your Audience Award, which is one of the four Film Independent Spirit Award filmmaker grants. Funded by Jameson^®Irish Whiskey, the $40,000 cash grant is designed to assist a feature narrative or documentary filmmaker in building the audience for his or her film. The winner will be highlighted at the Film Independent Spirit Awards on Saturday, February 25, 2012. 

The Jameson FIND Your Audience Award was established last year when Film Independent saw the need to meet independent filmmakers’ biggest challenge today: getting their films out into the marketplace. Last year’s winner was Jeff Malmberg’s critically acclaimed and Spirit Award-winning Marwencol. As part of the grant process, Film Independent will provide ongoing consultation regarding distribution, marketing and publicity. 

“Distribution models are in flux and many quality, artist-driven films don’t secure a traditional release each year. Thanks to the generous support of Jameson, Film Independent is once again able to help a filmmaker get his or her movie out into the world in a meaningful way,” said Josh Welsh, Director of Artist Development. 

“We are excited to be supporting the Film Independent Spirit Awards for our third consecutive year,” said Wayne Hartunian, Vice President, Scotch and Whisky Portfolio at Pernod Ricard USA. “Our partnership maintains the brand’s commitment to film and celebrating the achievements of American independent filmmakers. Furthering that commitment, the Jameson FIND Your Audience Award tackles the most common stumbling block for upcoming filmmakers by providing the tools to share their work with a wider audience.”

Applicants must be the director or producer of a recent American narrative or documentary feature with a production budget of $2.5 million or less that has not yet received significant distribution. The film must have screened at a film festival no earlier than September 1, 2010 and no later than August 31, 2011. In addition, applicants must be past a Spirit Award nominee or winner, Los Angeles Film Festival alumnus or completed one of Film Independent’s Artist Development programs (Labs, Project Involve or Fast Track) or by nomination solicited by Film Independent. Films with innovative, alternative marketing or distribution plans are encouraged to apply. Films that have overall North American distribution deals or that have not yet begun a film festival run are ineligible. There is no submission fee and the deadline to apply is December 2, 2011. Complete submission guidelines, applications and more information can be found at filmindependent.org.

The 27^th Film Independent Spirit Awards will be held Saturday, February 25, 2012 in the afternoon in a tent on the beach in Santa Monica.  The premiere broadcast of the ceremony will air later that evening at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT on IFC. 

As the first event to exclusively honor independent film, the Film Independent Spirit Awards has made a name for itself as the premier awards show for the independent film community. Artists receiving industry recognition first at the Spirit Awards include Joel & Ethan Coen, Spike Lee, Oliver Stone, Ashley Judd, Robert Rodriguez, David O. Russell, Edward Burns, Aaron Eckhart, Neil LaBute, Darren Aronofsky, Spike Jonze, Charlie Kaufman, Hilary Swank, Marc Forster, Todd Field, Christopher Nolan, Zach Braff, Amy Adams, Lena Dunham and many more.

ABOUT THE FILM INDEPENDENT SPIRIT AWARDS

Now in its 27^th year, the Film Independent Spirit Awards is an annual celebration honoring artist-driven films made with an economy of means by filmmakers who embody independence and originality. The Spirit Awards recognizes the achievements of American independent filmmakers and promotes the finest independent films of the year to a wider audience. 

Awards are given in the following categories: Best Feature, Best First Feature, Best First Screenplay, Best Director, Best Screenplay, John Cassavetes Award (given to the best feature made for a budget under $500,000), Best Male Lead, Best Female Lead, Best Supporting Male, Best Supporting Female, Best Cinematography, Best International Film, Best Documentary, and the Robert Altman Award.  The Filmmaker Grants include the Jameson FIND Your Audience Award, Someone to Watch Award, Truer Than Fiction Award, and Piaget Producers Award.

ABOUT FILM INDEPENDENT

Film Independent is a non-profit arts organization that champions independent film and supports a community of artists who embody diversity, innovation, and uniqueness of vision. Film Independent helps filmmakers make their movies, builds an audience for their projects, and works to diversify the film industry. Film Independent’s Board of Directors, filmmakers, staff, and constituents, is comprised of an inclusive community of individuals across ability, age, ethnicity, gender, race, and sexual orientation. Anyone passionate about film can become a member, whether you are a filmmaker, industry professional, or a film lover.

Film Independent produces the Spirit Awards, the annual celebration honoring artist-driven films and recognizing the finest achievements of American independent filmmakers.  Film Independent also produces the Los Angeles Film Festival, showcasing the best of American and international cinema and the Film Independent at LACMA Film Series, a year-round, weekly program that offers unique cinematic experiences for the Los Angeles creative community and the general public.  

With over 250 annual screenings and events, Film Independent provides access to a network of like-minded artists who are driving creativity in the film industry. Film Independent’s Artist Development program offers free Labs for selected writers, directors, producers and documentary filmmakers and presents year-round networking opportunities. Project:Involve is Film Independent’s signature program dedicated to fostering the careers of talented filmmakers from communities traditionally underrepresented in the film industry.

For more information or to become a member, visit FilmIndependent.org.

ABOUT PERNOD RICARD USA

Pernod Ricard USA is the premium spirits and wine company in the U.S., and the largest subsidiary of Paris, France-based Pernod Ricard SA, which employs more than 18,000 people worldwide and is listed on the NYSE Euronext exchange (Ticker: RI).  

The company’s leading spirits and wines include such prestigious brands as Absolut® Vodka, Chivas Regal® Scotch Whisky, The Glenlivet® Single Malt Scotch Whisky, Jameson® Irish Whiskey, Malibu® flavored rum, Kahlúa® Liqueur, Beefeater® Gin, Plymouth™ Gin, Seagram’s Extra Dry Gin®, Martell® Cognac, Hiram Walker® Liqueurs, Pernod®, Ricard® and Avión™ Tequila (through a joint venture with Tequila Avión); such superior wines as Jacob's Creek® and Brancott Estate®; and such exquisite champagnes and sparkling wines as Perrier-Jouët® Champagne, G.H. Mumm™ Champagne and Mumm Napa® sparkling wines. 

Pernod Ricard USA is based in Purchase, New York, and has roughly 850 employees across the country.  Pernod Ricard USA urges all adults to consume its products responsibly and has an active campaign to promote responsible drinking. For more information on this, please visit: www.acceptresponsibility.com.

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Our Short The Frolic Goes Global on IndieReign

There is a ton of activity by developers right now to offer global platforms for movies. Independent filmmakers are looking for ways to promote their content through sites without rigid rules of acceptance, like iTunes.

I own some content that I'd like to launch myself and take the aggregator fee out of the equation so I decided to work with IndieReign.

Our first title that we are premiering on IndieReign is our short film The Frolic. The site even allows us to embed the film all over the Web. So cool!

Check it out here.

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