It's Sunday morning and a great time to catch up on some film reading. Here are some articles I caught up with this morning. Now I'm off to write for most of the day. I am writing two rom coms at the moment.
Sunday, 31 May 2009
Saturday, 30 May 2009
Your Deliverables for Your Film
Posted on 12:50 by clark
When signing a sales agent deal and selling to a distributor, you will be asked for deliverables. You must deliver all items or your sale may be forfeited. Deliverables are extremely important, tedious and time-sucking, and costly. So get ready!
Here is a typical Deliverable list:
Mandatory:
- NTSC 4x3 Digi-Beta Master of the Feature Film for television.
- NTSC 16x9 Digi-Beta Master of the Feature Film for video.
- DA88 of the DM&E and/or M&E Track.
- Photographic Material – Either slides or a disc of stills usable for the creation of key art. If on disc must be high resolution. Need a minimum of 50 stills.
- Standard Press Kit with synopsis, cast, behind the scenes info, reviews, etc…
- Billing Block.
- Paid Ad Credit Obligations.
- Name and Likeness Restrictions.
- Music Cue Sheets.
- Music Licenses.
- Composer Agreement.
- Chain of Title.
- Copyright Registration Certificate.
- E&O Insurance Policy.
- Lab Access letter to all physical film and video elements.
- Assignment of Rights.
- NTSC 4x3 Digi-Beta Master of the trailer.
- NTSC 16x9 Digi-Beta Master of the trailer.
- DA88 of the DM&E track of the trailer.
- NTSC 4x3 Digi-Beta Master of the textless background of beginning and end titles if superimposed of the film.
- NTSC 16x9 Digi-Beta Master of the textless background of beginning and end titles if superimposed of the film.
- HD 16x9 Master of the Feature Film.
- Copyright Mortgage and Assignment.
- MPAA Rating Certificate.
- Continuity Script.
- Title Report.
- Copyright Report.
- UCC Search.
- All agreements including talent, crew, location and guild agreements.
- Electronic Press Kit.
- Extras for the DVD that include commentary, making of doc, etc…
Friday, 29 May 2009
Breaking Down Final Costs on a Feature
Posted on 07:50 by clark
I've been asked to share more about what I do as an indie producer. Well, today I'm heading over to my business partner's home to break down the final costs on our feature Not Since You.
We were able to finance Not Since You with a mix of cash and in-kind investments as well as partial crew deferrals. And now that we have a screener for buyers and a week before we receive them from the disc vendor, Jade and I are going to spend the day crunching the numbers of how much and when we owe everyone money. Of course, we anticipate a sale (important to remain positive always) so we want to be ready with a plan of where the sales proceeds will be going.
This is not going to be a fun or easy process. Yay! We have our cash investments from a number of investors, in-kind investments, crew deferrals, anticipated music licensing, legal, and sales fees, and estimates for keeping the business running each year as well as SAG residuals.
To date, we have kept very accurate records of investments, deferrals, and costs. We tracked every expense in Quickbooks from day one. Each month, Jade balances the Quickbooks file with any costs. If we had to do it all over again, it would take weeks to recreate.
Our goal is to do a cheat sheet of what we owe in each category. In essence, we will be finalizing our accounts payable, which should amount to over a hundred people owed (this is when crew deferrals get tedious to deal with).
I like to have information at my fingertips that gives me the overall outlook of the project. I am all about the big picture. So now we have the incredible task of melding this information into a master document. And that's what we will be doing today and probably a couple more days too. As we go to buyers, I want to know exactly where every penny needs to go and when we will go into profit!
Thursday, 28 May 2009
It's Back: Top 50 Hottest Young Actors from the Movie-Fanatic
Posted on 19:02 by clark
And I love it! I love it when the Movie-Fanatic does its Top 50 Lists of the Hottest Young Actors. I am constantly evaluating new actors for roles and it's lists like this that help me immensely when figuring out who's hot at the moment. So if you are casting young actors right now, definitely peruse this list.
Thoughts from Indie Filmmaker Heidi Van Lier
Posted on 17:16 by clark
I have been swamped this week with writing for various projects and my blog has been suffering, but I hope I've been providing some cool links as I barrel through my writing gigs.
Here's another cool link. Heidi Van Lier has a blog at Film Independent and she has a fun entry here about how to run an indie set without looking totally lame. Definitely give it a read.
Wednesday, 27 May 2009
How IndieVest Works
Posted on 16:44 by clark
IndieVest is a company that offers film projects to a group of investors who pay membership fees for the privilege of considering and investing in IndieVest films. I had wondered how the company works and I found this article detailing their set up. Super intriguing. Check it out.
Tuesday, 26 May 2009
Being Positive about Indie Film's Future
Posted on 08:34 by clark
It's important to be positive about indie film's future. Without hope, where would we find the inspiration to keep doing what we do and move toward establishing a strong foundation for the future of indie film?
I believe that as long as we keep fighting for survival, we will eventually figure out long-lasting solutions for a thriving indie film industry. History shows us that we human beings have the ability to survive periods of immense difficulty.
Now, for a beacon of Hope. Check out Ted Hope's 52 Reasons Why American Indie Films Will Flourish. And add to his list!
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