1. Broadcast Network => Group Forming Network

We’re seeing a gradual decline in television audiences while people are spending more time on social networks and this is wreaking havoc on business models. A traditional broadcast network grows in value along a linear scale, therefore the community value can be calculated based on the number of viewers. The value of social networks (a.k.a. group forming networks) grows along a very different curve as dictated by Reed’s Law. The significance of Reed’s law is that eventually the network effect of potential group membership can dominate the overall economics of the system. David Reed discovered that the community value of large networks–particularly social networks–scales exponentially with the size of the network. The number of possible sub-groups of network participants is 2 to the power of n, where n is the number of participants. This explains the phenomenal growth in the value of social networks. Adding an additional 100,000 viewers to a television audience of 1 million is no big deal, but adding 100,000 network participants to a 1 million participant social network has a significant effect of the value of participation in the network. Networking pioneer J.C.R. Licklider wrote in 1968, “we form communities of common interest, not common location.” David Reed explains these concepts in the article “Weapon of Math Destruction: A simple formula explains why the Internet is wreaking havoc on business models” (Context Magazine, Spring 1999, link) along with “That Sneaky Exponential—Beyond Metcalfe’s Law to the Power of Community Building,” a companion article originally published as an online suppliment to the “Weapon of Math Destruction,” article.

2. Institutional Funding => Crowd Funding

The internet and a growing number of people paricipating in a variety of online communites is making it possible to raise money for creative projects online. Two services that stand out inlcude: IndieGoGo and
Kickstarter. These services differ in siginifiant ways in terms of how they operate. Kickstarter is a community limited to fundraising projects that meet their curatorial goals, and projects don’t receive any money unless the fundraising goal is reached. This is good in terms of providing funders confidence their money will go to a project that will be completed. On the other hand, IndieGoGo is an open community allowing anyone raise money for their creative project. If you don’t make your goal, you can still keep the money you raised to put towards your project, however, a lot of funders might not like they’ve given money to a project that does not have the funds needed to be completed. To some people this seems to give Kickstarter the edge with their all or nothing approach. At this time, Kickstarter is only available for projects made in the United States and you must have a U.S. bank account and a U.S. place of residence in order to use the service (even though contributions can come from anywhere in the world). In favor of IndieGoGo is that it’s open to any project (not just creative, and no gatekeeper) and they have a more global perspective with campaigns in almost every country. This year (so far) fourteen films have made it to top festivals after crowdfunding on IndieGoGo, see: “IndieGoGo Films Showcased at World-Class Festivals in 2011” (Adam Chapnick, Tribeca Future of Film, September 30, 2011). There’s a rapid rise in the number of creative professionals leveraging crowd funding to support their work. One of the most impressive examples to date is Jennifer Fox’s Kickstater campaign for My Reincarnation in which she raised over $150,000 in order to get her film into distribution, she shares what she learned doing in her guest post, “How MY REINCARNATION Broke All Kickstarter Records & Raised $150,000” on Ted Hope’s blog.

3. Independence => Interdependence

In our connected world, filmmakers are moving away from the paradigm of “independent” filmmaking and embracing the notion of “interdependent” filmmaking. Unlike many industries, we’re not in competition with each other and we can benefit more from cooperation. This idea is being championed by Tiffany Shlain, Her film Connected is about the impact of the Internet on our lives and a call for to embrace a new philosophy of interdependence, for more details see see: 10 Big Ideas for the Future of Film by Tiffany Shlain (Mediashift/PBS.org, April 20, 2011) and The Power Of One: Food For Thought 2011 by Sawn Parr (Fast Company, Jun 1, 2011).

4. Oligopoly => Constellation of Gatekeepers

Once upon a time talented filmmakers and/or promising projects would be discovered and/or packaged by the Hollywood studios. With high barriers to entry (e.g. specialized knowledge, scarce resources, a lock on distribution, etc.) the major studios has a tight control on the industry and operated like an oligopoly. With access to inexpensive digital technology for production and postproduction–along with social media making it possible to establish a connection with an audience–filmmakers with the talent and drive to make it have the ability to take themselves from a state of being unknown talent to becoming popular with an audience through a process of lots of hard work developing an audience on their own. It used to take an influential executive at the studio to give you a green light for a project, now you can take your work directly to an audience an see if what you’re doing resonates with them. It may still take lots of money to make a film, but the ecosystem is growing into a constellation gatekeepers working a variety of levels, for example, film production is not within reach of many organizations who may choose to fund films that promote their agendas. One example that stands out is Paranormal Activity (Oren Peli, 2007) a supernatural horror film. It was originally produced as an independent feature with a home movie camera, but was later acquired by Paramount Pictures after a representative saw the film and was impressed. It has become a very profitable film along with a very effective social media marketing campaign, see “Paranormal Activity Rides the Social Web to Millions at the Box Office” by Christina Warren (Mashable, October 13, 2009). Realistically, cases like Paranormal Activity are the rare exception to the rule, it’s still as hard as ever to find an audience, but it you have a film that resonates with an audience, there are less factors in your way, as the oligopoly has given way to a constellation of gatekeepers that are more attuned to enabling rather than limiting your potential. Scott Kirsner’s book, Fans, Friends And Followers provides a good survey of how various people have developed their audience in the new media landscape.

5. Auteurs => Collaborations

Normal Hollyn, an editor, teacher, and author of The Film Editing Room Handbook (now it a 4th edition) wrote a delightful blog post titled, “Collaboration and Why The Auteur Theory Is Bull,” in which he argues that, “it’s impossible to make a film by yourself.” He points out that not every idea the director is going to have is good, and not all good ideas are going to come from the director. Film is a highly collaborative art form. Hollyn suggests the ideal way to work with any creative person is to, “come to the table with an idea (the ‘thesis’), let that person come up with a different idea (the ‘antithesis’) and then to let those two opposing notions contribute to a third, usually better, idea (the ’synthesis’).” Hollyn argues that directors who think they are the, “sole auteurs of their work, and are too afraid or guarded to open up to other ideas, will generally miss out on those ‘third, usually better’ ideas, and their work will suffer.” Today it is easier than ever with email, Twitter, Facebook, DropBox, etc. to share and communicate and keep an open dialog as a project develops over time. But these just facilitators. The important trend is a change in mind-set in terms of what it means to be an “auteur” vs. “visionary” director. A visionary director can articulate a clear vision while orchestrating the process of synthesis that Hollyn discusses in his essay, which leads to the best work. Even Orson Welles, perhaps one of the greatest “auteurs” in Hollywood history, surrounded himself with amazing collaborators who made significant contributions to his films. He had so much respect for Greg Toland’s cinematography that he shared a title card with him. Behind the most successful “genius,” whether it be an Orson Welles or a Steve Jobs, is not an auteur in the classic sense of the term, but a visionary who collaborates effectively with creative people. There’s a huge difference between the two, and the difference boils down to creating an environment that supports synthesis.

6. Media Objects => Media Fabric

I believe Blu-Ray disks are the last physical media distribution format consumers will ever see. Everything is moving to the cloud. I love the convenience of Netflix streaming and I find it annoying I still have to wait for many movies to arrive as DVDs. Why can’t they all simply be streamed to my Mac or iPad? While licensing deals will keep a lot of media tied up in knots for a while, eventually it will all end up on the cloud. See “Apple, Hollywood Close To Streaming Movie Deal?” by Thomas Claburn, Information Week, October 13, 2011) and “Movies in the Clouds” by By Michelle Kung (Wall Street Journal, October 11, 2011). But the concept of Media Fabric (which I borrow from Glorianna Davenport) goes way beyond the notion of media living on the cloud. Davenport’s idea is that of, “a semi-intelligent organism where, lines of communication, threads of meaning, chains of causality, and streams of consciousness converge and intertwine to form a rich tapestry of creative story potentials, meaningful real-time dialogues, social interactions, and personal or communal art- and story-making.” The idea is that media is becoming something integrated into our everyday lives, connecting us in new ways that we are shaping through the very process of our interaction with each other. See “Media fabric — a process-oriented approach to media creation and exchange” by Glorianna Davenport, et. al.

7. Specialized Competence => Media Literacy

Media was was once the domain of specialized individuals working in specialized organizations. Today, the trend is towards media production and dissemination becoming a core competency of every organization, as well as every individual. Many of us shoot a lot of casual video to share with friends, which helps us develop a sense for working with a camera. Increasingly we are purchasing smart phones equipped with spectacular cameras. Small videocameras like the Canon VIXIA provide high-quality high-definition images in the form-factor of a small camcorder. Things like smart-auto focus with face recognition makes it easy to produce good, sharp, point-and-shoot video. The ubiquity of video cameras has made it easy for anyone to pick up a camera and try their hand at media production. In the late 1990s it was essential for everyone to have a web site. Today it has become essential to enhance that web site with video. With video sharing sites like Vimeo and YouTube, we have at our fingertips an easy way to share video with others. With all the traditional barriers gone, writing with a camera is poised to become almost as ubiquitous as writing with a word processor. See my blog post, “Cinema will eventually become a flexible means of writing.”

For additional perspectives on these trends, see my companion post, “Researching Seven Macro Trends,” which provides a survey of the background research I did while preparing for this presentation. It includes micro-interviews with: Patricia Aufderheide, Perry Bard, Philip Hodgetts, Brian Lucid, Caroline Blair, Charles Papert, Steve Garfield, Chuck Green, Geo Geller, Jon Goldman, Julie Mallozzi, Kathryn Dietz, Kevin Brooks, Lee Morgenroth, Nathan Felde, Philippe Lejune, Ryan Evans, Slava Rubin, Zak Ray, Anne Marie Stein, Audrey Kali, and Brian Henderson.

This post was revised on October 17, 2011 to fix some typos and links.

I’ve been contemplating the evolution of the documentary this summer and I was delighted to see that The MediaGuardian’s recent Sheffield Doc/Fest 2011 coverage includes ten articles providing a refreshing perspective on how documentary makers are finding new ways to reach their audience. These articles provide a view into a crystal ball in which we can begin to see a vision of the future. Here are links to the articles, worthwhile reading and a good starting point for further reflection and discussion.

Social media influences documentary-makers
Social media have had a truly revolutionary effect, enabling film-makers and citizens to disseminate their own stories

Adam Curtis: happy to be different
The maker of classic documentary series such as The Trap and The Power Of Nightmares believes he is still learning his trade

New technology opens up documentary-making
Recording devices are always evolving – from 16mm cameras to iPad apps – offering film-makers the chance to innovate

Jay Hunt: Social media promotes a better viewer experience
Using multiplatform and social media is an incredibly important part of what we’re doing at Channel 4

Can you make a film and a profit?
Making money from documentaries is no easy task, but there are some business models that are generating revenues online

How the internet is galvanising support for social justice documentaries
Films that form part of a campaign for social justice are regularly appearing online – greatly increasing their reach and impact

Tools of attraction: creating multimedia content for games and TV shows
Audiences now expect stories to be told in new ways across different platforms, but commissioners often fail to produce compelling ‘transmedia’ content

The impact of Twitter on TV shows
For producers, posts on Facebook and Twitter are seen as indicators of success – but do they influence ratings?

BBC documentary boss wants programmes that do more than entertain
Commissioning editor Charlotte Moore favours quality and craft over feelgood and populist

Steve James hails a ‘golden age of documentary film-making’
Prior to his visit to the Sheffield International Documentary Film Festival, director says attitudes towards docs have changed

Image credit: Crystal Castles by Frogman (2008).

Free distribution. Nina Paley has been pleased with the results of doing free distribution for her film Sita Sings the Blues, she has managed to generate revenue from the sale of DVDs, T-shirts, and donations. She writes on her web site, “My personal experience confirms audiences are generous and want to support artists. Surely there’s a way for this to happen without centrally controlling every transaction.” Why not? In the old days many filmmakers supplemented their income with grants from Arts organizations, why not go directly to your audience for support? Paley said that “Copyleft was the best decision, the audience is distributing [my film].” Thomas Woodrow (Producer, Bass Ackwards) suggests that even if you do free distribution, you should not offer it free forever, think of it more like a traditional release window, rather than perpetually giving something away. In the end, it’s not simply a choice of one technique over another, it’s about coming up with a portfolio of techniques that makes sense for your project.

DVD and what works. Steve Savage (CEO, New Video) suggested that “DVD is not yet dead” and remains as a robust revenue streams for filmmakers. And while digital revenues might be about 10% on the average of independent filmmaker revenues (compared to 90% for DVDs), this will most likely flip just as it’s going to do in music. 2010 is the year that digital downloads will overtake CD sales in the music business, so it’s only a matter of years before the same thing will happen with films. It’s easy to predict what could happen, it’s hard to predict when, and exactly how things will happen. Richard Lorber (CEO, Kino Lorber) said “we’ve entered the postmodern era of film distribution [in which] everything is possible and nothing is working.” Ira Deutchman quoted an article (don’t recall the titled or reference) that with unusual candor summed things up, “the film business has always been hobby” challenging the “content is king” mantra. Robert Bahar (Producer, Made in LA) said of indie distribution, “This is not easy, this is like being in a rock band…”

New models are emerging. Arin Crumley talked about his new project, OpenIndie, a “”Niche social network” with the goal of connecting independent filmmakers directly with their audiences, filmmakers make their films available, Open Indie helps potential viewers request screenings and entrepreneurs to host screenings, linking potential audiences with films, much in the same way he did with Four Eyed Monsters. Related discussion included the use of Gowalla and Foursquare to help drive audience to screening locations. While digital distribution was the Tsunami in the room, there ramains strong desire among independent filmmaker, and a culultral need, to screen films for an audience.

Using social media. There was a great deal of discussion the use of social media platforms (especially Twitter and Facebook) for promoting your film, but given the panel structure of the conference, there was not a lot of time for tactical nuts and bolts, the level of the discussion remained, for the most part, strategic, but the strategic insights were valuable nuggets:

• Focus on aggregating passionate followers and don’t worry about those who hate your film.
• Online communities moderate themselves and take on a life of their own.
• Participate online speaking in your own human voice (the advice of Seth Godin and The Cluetrain Manifesto comes to mind), authenticity is currency. And modulate the frequency of your interactions with the characteristics of the community you build, we don’t want to replace the old push advertising model with the same beast in new clothing.
• Nina Paley suggested that attention is scarce, while information is plentiful.
• If you make a film for a niche audience, it’s quality, not quanitity that counts. Angel Aviles-Clinton mentioned the film, At Home By Myself With You as an example of successfully raising $46,000 using Facebook and Twitter with a modest number of followers.
• Thomas Woodrow suggests that for content creators to stand out they need to create stories around their stories.
• And many others (search on the #convonyc hashtag for more insights).

New forms? Davin Hutchins of ITVS IndiesLab and I combined our lunchtime discussions, “MicroDocs: What They Are and Why You Might Want to Make One” and “20 is the New 90: The Future of Not-So-Long Form Content on the Web,” respectively, which led to a lively conversation. I’ll write about the discussion in a future blog post, after some synthesis and post-conference discussion with the participants. Stay tuned…

It’s an exciting time to be a storyteller. Lance Weiler’s words during the closing session wrapped things up, suggesting these are “exciting times to be a storyteller” and in spite of the internet being a disruptive force, “a creative class is going to emerge.” He added that “we’re all trying to figure out how to fund, create, distribute, and exchange.” I hope Lance’s optimism wins out over the concerns over free culture and Web 2.0 voiced by Jaron Lanier in his new book, You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto, a very thoughtful critique that can’t be dismissed lightly, written from an informed perspective.

It’s up to us to create the new landscape. One thing is for sure reading between the lines at this conference: nothing is predetermined at this point and collaboration among independent filmmakers is crucial if we’re going to develop an alternative way to build and connect with audiences and develop a healthy distribution ecosystem, the mainstream mechanisms are breaking apart and we have an opportunity to fill the cracks with a vibrant alternative way to fund our films, find an audience, make our films, find collaborators, deliver media, and engage in a two-way conversation, but we have to do it, we being independent filmmakers. The media technology is in our hands. What will we build with it? How will we build it? In the process of distributing our films, we also have to reinvent the ecosystem in which we distribute our films. A good place to start thinking about this is with the resources gathered in The Workbook Project, started by Lance Weiler.

Shout-out. Kudos to the organizers for assembling a wonderful group of people to discuss, in a productive and meaningful way, the tectonic shifts in communications technology and social media that are rapidly redefining the independent film marketing and distribution landscape. The conference was organized by Scott Kirsner (CinemaTech; author of Fans, Friends And Followers: Building An Audience And A Creative Career In The Digital Age), Tiffany Shlain (Filmmaker; Founder, The Webby Awards), and Lance Weiler (Filmmaker; Editor of The Workbook Project) and hosted by Ira Deutchman (Managing Partner, Emerging Pictures; Professor of Professional Practice, Graduate Film Division, Columbia University School of the Arts).

1. Get your own web site with integrated blogging functionality if you don’t already have one. If your current site does not have a blog, add one. The easy way to get started is to get a blog on WordPress.com (it’s free) and you can get your own domain name for the site so your web site will be yoursitename.com rather than yoursitename.wordpress.com. The book WordPress for Dummies provides a good guide if you want to get hands on with the experience of creating your own site, or find a recent design school graduate who knows WordPress to build the site for you on a unix hosting provider like pair networks. And by all means have a trailer and sample clips of your documentary available on your web site. blip.tv or Vimeo are good places to host high-quality video, while YouTube provides the largest potential audience.

2. Start Twittering, you will find that The Twitter Book by Tim O’Reilly and Sarah Milstein is a good introduction if you need one.

3. If you’re not already on D-Word, you should join the community now. Get involved in discussion with your peers. Another good community is doculink. For technically minded folks, you’ll find DVinfo.net quite useful.

4. Get involved with a regional media arts organization. For example, Boston has the
Center for Independent Documentary and Filmmakers Collaborative, which provide networking opportunities and wonderful events, for example, on Saturday, November 7, 2009, Filmmakers Collaborative will be presenting Social Media Boot Camp for Film Professionals at MassArt, an excellent way to jump start your involvement in social media.

5. Read Fans, Friends & Followers: Building an Audience and a Creative Career in the Digital Age by Scott Kirsner, a timely book that’s chock full of case studies.

6. Read Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, it’s not exactly about self-distribution but provides some valuable insights into how to best go about developing your online persona. On a related topic, there is also Chris Brogan’s Personal Branding for the Business Professional (PDF download), a free e-book on building your personal brand.

7. Some documentary filmmakers have found Facebook a very effective place to communicate with their fans.

There are many more things you can do, but this quick list constitutes a good start in adding a social media component to your self-distribution efforts. A related post on this blog, Distribution in the Digital Age might also be of interest. The DIYDays conferences and the Workbook Project are excellent resources for more information.

Photo credit: “Twitter” by respres (Flickr)

Podcamp Boston 4 will take place this weekend at University of Massachusetts, Boston – Campus Center. Here’s some info from the site: “If you’re wondering what’s next in social media, there’s no better place to find out than at PodCamp, regardless of whether you’re just getting started or you’re a veteran practitioner. Unlike other conferences which are just talking head affairs, PodCamp gives you the opportunity to learn, share, and grow your skills at any level, helping your community as it helps you. This year, we’re aiming to answer the question of what’s next – what’s next for podcasting, blogging, social media, and the crazy 2.0 world we live in. We’re featuring sessions specifically focused on your questions and the answers to them – provided not just by “experts” but by your peers and colleagues as we all learn, share, and grow our social media skills.” Here are the essential links:

• Podcamp Boston
• Registration ($50 registration fee, you must pre-register as they will not be registering people at the door)
• Schedule of Events
• Directions to University of Massachusetts, Boston Campus Center
• A helpful post from Jeff Pulver on how to get more out of Podcamp

Please be sure to follow @podcampboston on Twitter for up to the minute changes/details.

See you there on Saturday!

This book will help you think about new business models, how to build an audience around you work, and challenge the old notion that independent media makers should think of themselves as auteurs waiting to be discovered by the record, movie, or television industries or a forward thinking curator. The mainstream is interested in commercial product, the lowest common denominator, the latest fad. Once upon a time you had no other way to find an audience, the gatekeepers ran the show. Today you can find your audience using your own unique voice, rather than trying to fit someone else’s mold. It’s a brave new world and Scott’s timely book provides practical insights into carving your own path towards nurturing fans, making friends, and building your own following. We may always have mainstream media, however, today, as both audiences and media makers, the internet has opened up an alternative channel of distribution full of possibilities, most of which we have yet to see, which I hope will bring us a viable alternative to industrial media product, and instead, hand-crafted, authentic stories, unique messages with new points of view, and personal media to enrich the soul of a new generation. What do you want to express? You have the answer deep inside of you. What can you do to get your expression out to an audience? Scott’s book provides an introduction to how people have been doing that.

Purchasing the book through the links on this page provides Kino-Eye.com with a much appreciated commission, thank you.

Cecy and Camilo Ramirez

David Redmon and Ashley Sabin made the film over the course of 5 years and tells the story using a mix of cinéma-vérité digital video, Super 8 and 16mm film, and home movie footage shot by Cecy and Camilo. After watching the film, in addition to being moved by the story itself, I also found myself reflecting how this film could not have been made in the era of 16mm documentary from the 1960s through the 1980s, it would have simply been impossible in terms of shooting logistics and cost. The availability of small inexpensive digital video cameras made it possible for the filmmakers to give cameras to their subjects to expand the points of view of the film. Intimidad is currently playing in film festivals around the country and recently won the Best Documentary award at the Sidewalk Film Festival in Birmingham, Alabama. What follows is a transcript of my conversation with the filmmakers with some light editing for readability.

David Tamés: We’re here at the Independent Film Festival of Boston where I just attended a screening of David Redmon and Ashley Sabin’s Intimidad which was followed by a lively question and answer session. David and Ashley, thanks for talking with me again.

David Redmon: This is really exciting, we were here last time talking with you about Mardi Gras: Made in China, right?

Tamés: Yes, that was it. So I wanted to ask you both a few questions, about the film, and top of my mind, is your relationship with the subject, this is not your typical cinéma-vérité film where a filmmaker observes a subject and it’s not your typical home movie where people are making films about themselves, it seems to be a fascinating hybrid of home movie and cinéma-vérité, could you say a little bit about that?

Ashley Sabin: It’s kind of interesting, because especially, I mean, each film the production is different and the relationships that you develop are different because it’s based on personalities and how people feel open to the camera and what the camera does to their everyday life. With Cecy and Camilo, it was this sort of immediate connection that I feel that we all felt, and they got really comfortable in front of the camera very early on, to the point where they didn’t even notice that the camera would be on or off and we would were learning Spanish with them, so there were funny, awkward moments of trying to pronounce something incorrectly that was an ice breaker and we stayed in Rinosa we would spend time with them and time is very different for Cecy and Camilo, it’s much slower, the sort of time that ticks by and what they do during the course of the day, people can view very simple things, washing their own clothing, or cooking, but it’s in those small moments that to me were you could see the film as a home video, but then you look at the cinéma-vérité side and it’s really telling, these patterns that would develop over days and days, and you look at our footage and we would like have days of Cecy washing her clothing on the ribbed tub and that was part of their lifestyle so it was really important to convey that and to convey that warmth, and the feeling that we had when we were around them, but also at the same time which is the home video side, but at the same time having a cinéma-vérité where we would have these scenes and it’s building towards something, but we’re observing with this camera sort of in a hands-off way, so it’s this tricky tango that goes on with those two elements of the film.

Tamés: How did you meet Cecy and Camilo in the first place?

Redmon: I grew up in north Texas, and then went to school in Texas, and several times I went to Reinosa and meet with people who work in the factories with different organizations and I met a woman who made Victoria’s Secret bags, the pink bags, and she made them inside her house, with her children, and I did an interview with her much like you’re doing now, and I wrote an article about it and promised her I’d come back some day and she said, “wonderful,” and for years later we went back, and when we went back she wasn’t there, so Ashley and I ended up renting a house just down the street from Cecy and Camilo. When I say street, it’s a dirt roads and if it rains it’s very muddy, and that’s how we met Cecy and Camilo, they were thousands of pallets out of which people would build their homes, their outhouses, and their fences, so we knocked on Cecy and Camilo’s door one day, and Cecy came and said, “hi” and we started talking with her about the pallets and I think we were filming ten minutes later in a very conversational way and she was incredibly comfortable, she said she’s never been to a movie theater, there was much more to the conversation, but that’s basically how we met them.

Tamés: So what kept you filming, what got you engaged with their particular story and with their daughter Loida, what kept you going back and shooting over the course of five years?

Redmon: We became intrigued with the idea that they were making fire hydrants and Victortia’s Secret bras, [it started out as a] thesis film [...] but once we found out they had a daughter in southern Mexico, then we thought we were going to make a short film where we simply go to southern Mexico and reunite with the daughter, and be a happy ending, and the film would be over, but in fact, that’s where the film really begins, and the other idea was the thesis film, which is not the film at all.

Sabin: It’s interesting with documentary films today there’s a pretty rigid form of telling the story in which there’s a thesis, in a way, I find it uncomfortable, because directors use their subjects to tell the story the director wants to tell, as opposed to seeing what’s inherent in the actual story and in the footage, and with Intimidad we decided, we wanted to make a thesis film we went in and [thought that] Victortia’s Secret is really interesting contrasting the sexy images of the models and the advertising campaign vs. the intimacy that the family is experiencing, so it’s like these two kinds of intimacy, and so we wanted to tell that story and actually at one point had Victortia’s Secret models and all sorts of montages in the film, but it didn’t work so we slowly had to take it out of the film and realized this is a slower film, this is a film about family, and hope, and the desire to want to be together, and struggle together, and it’s not really about what we want it to be about, it’s about about what Cecy and Camilo’s lives are, so, it was kind of interesting to go through that process and realize, you know, we’re wrong and we have to figure out, like, we have to stick to their story because that’s what the story that really rings true in the end.

Tamés: That’s one way this film really differs from Mardi Gras: Made in China, that you had the opportunity to spend five years with your subjects and get very close to them.

Redmon: Intimidad is different than Mardi Gras: Made in China in that Mardi Gras: Made in China follows a commodity chain [...] that brings us into contact with different people, whereas Intimidad we spend five years with one family to find out where they go geographically and where they end up, so it’s there are similarities but Intimidad could have been a story about the commodity chain of a bra, the manufacturing in a Mexican plant, the selling in a United States Victortia’s Secret shop, and then a woman buys the bra, she throws the bra away a year later, and that bra gets recycled and goes down to Mexico, where people sell it as second hand clothing, and then Cecy comes and buys that bra, when in fact she probably made that same bra, she’s buying second hand bras, and there is a story there to be told, but, that’s the story we had to set aside because we really listened to the footage and listened to what their story was about and set aside that thesis film.

Loida Ramirez

Tamés: So as a filmmaker, what was it like giving Cecy and Camilo cameras and having them shoot part of the film, and what was most surprising about that experience?

Sabin: I think what was most surprising about giving Cecy and Camilo a camera and leaving it with them is how they were watching how we were composing shots and how we were holding the camera steady and learning in that hands-on way to the point where you can clearly see the footage, we’d go down there and look at this footage and look at that footage it’s not only just a way of communicating and saying look at what’s happened in the past couple of months but when you haven’t been down here, but also, they were proud of how they were fiming it, it sort of nurtured a desire to film and document and tell a story in a way that it’s their own life story and what’s also interesting is we showed them footage all along, but then we showed them a rough cut of the film and it was about seventy minutes long, and because we asked for advice, and what they thought about it, first of all, [they said] “it’s way too short, it needs to be longer, it needs to be like four hours,” and “your missing this scene,” “there’s not enough Loida,” “you need to put that in that scene,” it was this interactive dialog that was really interesting, because they just don’t have the access to a camera, so if we hadn’t come upon them and in this haphazard kind of way, they would not have had the same form of communication, and to me that’s really interesting, and with Loida being two years old when we started filming, it’s really interesting watching her first of all grow up in the film, but then also how she’s responding to the camera now is very different than how she responded to it when she was younger, and I’m equally interested five years from now, how she’s going to respond because she’s also a child and her parents are giving us consent to film her, but is she going to reject us, is she going to say, why have you been filming me all these years, I really don’t understand this, and it actually makes me film uncomfortable, maybe when she gets to be a teenager, or something, so it’s a dialog: them having a camera, us having a camera, and being able to communicate through the cameras.

Tamés: So they’ve seen the completed film, what was that experience like, showing them a film in which they were both subjects in and co-authors of?

Redmon: We showed them the finished film [in February], and they loved the film, and it meant a lot to us for them to love the film, but at the same time, like Asley said during the Q & A after the screening, if they would have had conflict, and arguments, we definitely would have showed that, but the way in which they resolve their conflicts was through conversations, and there’s a little bit of that in the film as well, but Cecy said, as Ashley said, “why don’t you have Loida’s birthday in there,” “why don’t you have this in the film,” but in a very charming way, and so she is now is requesting that we give her all of the footage that we shot of Loida so they they can put together a home video about Loida, and this is something we have absolutely no hesitancy in doing, in fact there was one time when the electricity went out, and we were in the middle of editing a little short story about Cecy’s dad (you know what happened in the film) and the electricity went out, so we carried our little computer over with their hard drive and hooked it up to their neighbors wall and we’re sitting here on the ground in the middle of the yard editing on Final Cut and they are doing it as well, they are learning to use Final Cut, and it was just this remarkable way of us telling the story but at the same time they are using Final Cut to tell a home video story, but what they cut never made it into the final version, but that’s not to say it won’t make it into the next film.

Tamés: So are you going to continue following them?

Redmon: Yes, we’re going to continue following them, I have some ideas on a hybrid, and I’ve already shot some footage of Camilo selling piñatas, human looking piñatas and animals, gigantic piñatas, but at the same time Ashely came up with the idea of filming Loida, but we don’t know how, she’s seven years old, how can a seven year old give consent? It’s easy when a mother and a father give us consent to film their two year old daughter, their three year old daughter, their four year old daughter, but what happens when she turns fourteen or fifteen? And we’re just outsiders coming in filming her life, for why? Observational purposes? What’s the real reason going on here of why are we filming her? In addition, Cecy and Camilo want to continue filming, but they want to film not only because they love her, we love her too, but also they just want to look back at these memories and see what Loida how she grew up, who she is, and I’m sure they want Loida to see this footage fifteen years from now as well, and we have common interests, but we also want to impose a story on it somehow, it’s jumbled right now because we don’t know what to do, the only reference we have is Seven Up, but I think we’re going to do it in a much different way than Seven Up, if we decide to do it.

Tamés: Clearly when you started making the film Cecy and Camilo had no idea what your financial arrangement with them might be, but now it’s probably pretty clear, what is your arrangement with them, and how do you think that might influence your relationship and subsequent films?

Redmon: It’s funny, at one time Camilo asked us, “hey, if you give me a camera can you pay me to be a cinematographer,” and that was interesting, they still are filming, so I think it’s only wise and fair that we pay them for the footage that they shoot.

Sabin: I don’t think it’s even us paying them for the footage, we’re filming together, so I think it’s very much them earning it as much as we have, because they are capturing moments that I don’t think we could even capture, they are really comfortable with each other, and there’s some footage of them in the shower that they shot of each other, and moments that are really sort of dark, where the top of the house is caving in on itself because of the wind and Camilo has to sort of jam it out, and if you looked at that it would be disturbing, why aren’t we trying to help them to prepare them for this oncoming storm, but they filmed it of each other so it has a different kind of context, but I think it’s really important to have the film be a tool to provide [for their] needs that they want because Loida has this high aspiration of becoming a doctor, and if Cecy and Camilo continue to do the same work they are doing, though it provides for everyday needs, [however, in the] long term [for what] Loida [wants it] will not provide that. If the film could do that, then it would make me think how films makes change in a different way.

Redmon: At the same time I don’t want them, or us, to think about the footage as just a commodity, “oh I’m going to go film this now and that’s a way for me to make money,” once we introduce the concept of money, then it introduces another variable, it becomes much more difficult, now we’re talking about commodification, of people, of footage, of lives, and are they filming now because it’s money? Are we filming now because we’re thinking of money? But of course we never ever make money from our films, we always pay ourselves back, but if we sell this film, we’re splitting the money with Cecy and Camilo, but we only told them after we sold the film. The issue [of money brings about all] kinds of problems, there’s no handbook on how to to address it, on how to do it, but it’s good that we’re conscious of it, but none of that has happened yet, they are filming because they love their daughter, and filming each other.

Sabin: It’s also this awkwardness when we go down there, people tonight donated $40.00 so that Loida could get a month’s worth of taking a bus to her school, it’s really this awkward feeling of OK, going down there and giving them that money, it’s this awkward moment, but I never feel that they expect it, they are much more excited to see that we’re down there and to talk, and cook food, and spend time with each other, it’s an afterthought, so I think that’s really important too.

Redmon: We’re selling their Jewelry for them, so I mean, they are making the Jewelry and we’re selling it and people want it, and it’s fair trade at it’s maximum effect,

Tamés: Your film is a beautiful and interesting hybrid of cinéma vérité observation and intimate home movie footage, how do you think documentaries are going to change over the next ten years, I think your film represents two dimension of change, first, an evolution of the relationship between filmmaker and subject, and second, a change in how you find your audience, from what I know from Mardis Gras: Made in China, you’ve done the film festival and college circuit promoting and distributing the film on your own rather than depending on a traditional distributor, so it seems to me with Intimidad that it points in two directions that documentary filmmaking is moving.

Redmon: I don’t think we did it out of a conscious choice to make our film different from other people’s films, but it’s just something that occurred by accident, knowing that we couldn’t financially live in Mexico the entire time, so we bought cameras for Cecy and Camilo, and it turned out the footage they shot was absolutely warm and intimate, even though it was shaky, who cares, and so I don’t know, it’s a really interesting question, I don’t know, I love the question more than the response.

David Redmon and Ashley Sabin
(view full-size on Flickr)

Sabin: As being an audience member that goes and watches documentary films, I’m getting tired with thesis driven films that seem far removed from their subjects and seem more like this sort of soap box that the director can get up and say that “this is my point, I’m going to make my point and then I’m going to make a conclusion,” I’m talking about films like Michael Moore’s films, or these political diatribes that go on, I like Michael Moore’s films, but to me it’s becoming too popular of a style, and it’s like speaking to the masses, it’s trying to get people to become converted but in reality it’s not even doing that, it’s just speaking to an audience that already is going to go see Michael Moore’s films, so they can walk away and be patted on the back and say “I believe the same thing,” and for me what’s more interesting is having these screenings that are about people, so that other people can connect to them, this may sound vague, but it’s about people that other people can connect to that doesn’t overtly have a traditional sense of politics, it has everyday sense of politics: water, electricity, these things you want everyday, it allows the audience to experience that and then in the end I feel that’s more moving and that’s going to stay with an audience member, cause I know it stays with me longer, when it’s a much more personal film, so you feel that you’re there, so that these these people in the film carry over into days, weeks, months later, where you’re thinking about that person.

Tamés: The title of your film is the Spanish word “intimidad,” which translates to english as intimacy, and in some ways it’s a love story, and the two of you met here in Boston, why don’t you tell me a little bit about that?

Redmon: Well even though the title of our film is translated to “intimacy”, there’s no way we captured every intimate moment between the family, nor would we want to, and therefore I’m going to say, the same thing about us, we’ll leave it up to mystery.

Sabin: I think that’s a good position, I think it’s much more interesting that way.

Redmon: Absolutely, we met in Boston, the idea of going to Mexico was created in Boston, our collaboration, love interest, professional interest, business interest, began in Boston, the first film festival we ever attended was this film festival, the Independent Film Festival of Boston, the first time we showed any of our films in this region was at this festival, everything just keeps returning to this festival and this region, the only exception was Kamp Katrina, but even Miss Pearl we met in Mardi Gras: Made in China, so it keeps coming to Boston, who knows what is going to happen next.

Sabin: We’re pretty big on those sort of connections and how all things are connected like putting one foot in front of the other and moving forward and that last step connects to the first step.

Redmon: It’s like the end of Intimidad, when you see Camilo walking, he’s going for a walk, and he’s putting one foot in front of the other, and that’s what they do and it continues throughout the film.

Tamés: Ashley and David, thanks for talking with me again, it’s a really beautiful film and thanks for sharing it with the audience and the world.

Redmon: Thanks for making time again, we hope our film will open up space for conversation.

###

The film is currently screening in festivals and is available for purchase online. Visit the Intimidad web page for purchase information and upcoming screening information which includes: University of Southern California, LA (October 28-29, 2008), Leeds International Film Festival, Leeds, UK (November 4-16, 2008), Museum of Modern Art, NY (November 14 & 19, 2008), East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, Tennessee (November 18-19, 2008), International Latino Film Festival, San Francisco Bay Area (November 7-23, 2008), Cinema Latino, (Fort Worth, TX), (Aurora, CO), (Pasadena, TX), (Phoenix, AZ) Dates TBA, Skyland Arts Center, Hendersonville, NC (TBA) and Mobile, AL (TBA).

Navigating The Distribution Divide

Lance Weiler (filmmaker and DIY Days co-organizer) gave a presentation comparing traditional independent film distribution and a hybrid DIY model. Much has been written about the erosion of the independent film distribution business over the past year, including the widely circulated and discussed “Yes, The Sky Really Is Falling” message delivered by Mark Gill at the Los Angeles Film Festival’s Financing Conference.

Many distribution companies have closed, specialty films are experiencing lackluster box office results, and with the replacement of video stores with big-box retailers, shelf space for independent films is shrinking. And all of this is happening at the same time the supply of independent films is skyrocketing due to the democratization of production, post-production, and distribution. Here’s a juicy quote from Mark Gill’s piece in IndieWire:

Here’s how bad the odds are: of the 5000 films submitted to Sundance each year– generally with budgets under $10 million–maybe 100 of them got a US theatrical release three years ago. And it used to be that 20 of those would make money. Now maybe five do. That’s one-tenth of one percent.

Put another way, if you decide to make a movie budgeted under $10 million on your own tomorrow, you have a 99.9% chance of failure.

OK, so we have a problem, but where are the new business models? What models can independent filmmakers use to get their film in front of an audience?

Lance’s presentation slides are available as a PDF download: diydaysBoston.pdf (the two charts in this post are from the presentation).

Lance began his discussion with an explanation of current release windows, which is rapidly compressing due to changes in the marketplace. Right now, mainstream distributors think in terms of the following windows and in this order for the most part:

1. Festivals: indie filmmakers have traditionally seen this as a gateway to a distribution deal and did not have to worry about the other windows, I think a classic example of the old way is Darren Aronofsky’s Pi, the film premiered at Sundance where it picked up an award and the producers quickly sealed a distribution deal, however, this is rarely the case for independent filmmakers, these stories are exceptions to the rule, and it’s becoming more and more rare with the decline of speciality film distributors. Arin Crumley and Susan Buice’s Four Eyes Monsters, provides a classic example of the more realistic and difficult DIY model, none of the specialty distributors saw a way to make money with the film, however, the film did indeed find an audience, but the filmmakers had to take distribution into their own hands (which at this point has been written about widely, it has become an excellent case study).
2. Theatrical: classically this has been the window after festivals, but a lot of studios now start with a single festival and go right into wide release, classically the independent filmmaker’s goal was to get a distribution deal that included a theatrical release, and this “builds value in the ancillaries” and is an effective marketing campaign for for all the other forms of release of the film (home video, pay-per-view, etc), but this is becoming more and more expensive to do, and independent specialty films are being shut out as the number of screens for specialty films dwindles, distributors are taking less risks, and audiences for specialty films are increasingly watching them at home rather than in a theater.
3. Pay-Per-View: 90 to 100 days, only a few ways to get into cable and telcos, only a few players here, pay-per-view has been good for Lance, he’s managed to negotiate deals for this, his suggestion is to carve out each release window and negotiate rights separately, this can be very complicated, but worth it in the end, as you retain control of the destiny of your film.
4. Home video and DVD.
5. Pay cable, black-out deal, no competitive releases are allowed.
6. Basic cable.
7. Network TV.
8. Internet. Right now this is seen as the last window, but this is certainly on the verge of change with a growing number of aggregators and online distributors experimenting with direct distribution models. There is lots of room for innovation and experimentation in this window.

This multi-tiered strategy offers exclusivity to each exhibition and distribution entity in the value chain during its particular stage of release. In essence, each tier operates as an exclusive window in which an exhibitor or distributor may screen the film. Day and date, on the other hand, eliminates exhibition and distribution exclusivity, as more than one entity in the value chain (e.g. theater chain, DVD distributor, internet aggregator) is allows to show the film at the same time. Historically theatrical releases have had the largest advertising budget because it clearly helps create value in all of the other tiers down the chain

As release windows shrink, theatrical release no longer operates as effectively as an advertising campaign for releases in other formats and therefore this may have a serious impact on the viability of theaters, who have depended on the traditional model for their survival. As the release window model is undergoes change, traditionalists feel it’s a problem to move the Internet window sooner in the process, however, this perception is changing among some people, you can do an internet release sooner, in fact, why not consider doing it immediately after a successful festival screening that might have gotten you buzz and press for your film (as Scott suggested in his session)?

Lance urges filmmakers to make sure that in any distribution deal you make, negotiate caps on expenses, marketing, and promotion. Otherwise you provide the distributor with a way they can have a creative accounting loop.

Lance stressed that it’s very important to make a deal with an exit strategy, this is critical, you need to be able to walk away with your rights if the distributor does not perform, otherwise they might shelve your and you can’t exploit it. The moment a distributor thinks they are not going to make lots of money on your film, or think they will lose money, they will abandon it, they are in a portfolio management business, you film is just one of many assets they are exploiting at any one time, and often good films get shelved and end up in distribution limbo. Sometimes distributors do this to take a competitive title off the market.

If the contract does not have the distributor releasing the distribution rights to you after a certain amount of time, you can’t exploit your own film, so make sure you negotiate an exit strategy. I know of several films which ended up stuck in distribution limbo and the only DVDs that have been released after the theatrical run are bootleg DVDs made by the director himself, this is a horrible situation to be in, unable to distribute your own film and giving away bootlegs which in theory the distributor could sue you for releasing.

Lance thinks it’s essential when dealing with a distributor that you look and see what other films have gone through the process with them and ask the filmmakers what it was like to work with a distributor. I would add to this you need to find a good entertainment lawyer with experience negotiating with distributors. Some even will take a percentage of their fee now and the rest when a deal is made. It’s always good when your critical partners have skin in the game. Share the risk and reward. Lance also discussed what has become a horrible stumbling for many independent filmmakers: the average $15K to $20K cost to prepare all of the deliverables for a distributor (these figures are for small films in the under $1M budget category). I suggest looking over a couple of deliverable contracts to see what kinds of things are expected. They vary from distributor to distributor, what Lions Gate expects is very different from what ITVS expects. Sometimes you might get an advance to cover the cost of the deliverables, but this is not always the case.

Lance reminded us that if you give something away, you get nothing below it, therefore Lance’s strategy is to carve it all up and break it down, multiple deals across and have movie revert back to him and this allows him to repackage his work again and again. Lance provided some ranges of figures you can expect from distributors for specialty films:

• Overall global rights: $0 to $450K
• General domestic rights: $0 to $250K
• Home video rights: $0 to $60K
• Video on demand rights: $0 to 40K
• Pay cable rights: $45K and up
• Basic cable rights: $5K and up
• Internet rights: $0 to $5K

Try to cut a deal with at lease a $15K advance towards delivery costs, which can kill you. You will spend between $8K to $12K for E&O Insurance. Get E&O rolled into the deal is an option, so try to negotiate for that. Transfers can run you $3K to $1K for HD, DigiBeta masters etc. Music and effects tracks can run you $1 to $2.5K. Clearances and title search, music clearances and release forms and contracts could cost you $1K to $100,000K for this. Legal fees $2K to $30K. In other words, many first-time filmmakers fail to account for the cost of finishing their film from a legal and distribution perspective. If you want to get your film out into the world, you need to know what it costs, in summary, traditional delivery averages around $15K, with a wide variance depending on your specific film. Original music, for example, is much cheaper than negotiating music rights and clearances. Look at a sample deliverables contract, all sorts of arcane requirements, you typically get paid for all of this at delivery.

In the traditional distribution model, there are lots of players taking a piece of the pie, which is why in the traditional model the filmmaker get a very small percentage of the retail DVD price. Along the chain you have: Consumer DVD « Retailer/Rental (Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Netflix, etc.) « Distributors (e.g. Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Studio Labels, entities large enough to talk with major retailers) « Sub-distributor (with enough volume to talk with the big distributors) « Filmmakers. It costs $20K for endcap placement in a large retailer, lots of pressure in the marketplace to sell mainstream, not specialty, titles. So what’s an independent filmmaker with an excellent specialty film to do?

Lance showed a digital distribution version of the chart, with iTunes, Voodo, Amazon, aggretors, studio labels, sub-aggregators, indie distributors, and with the exact number of steps, the same number of gatekeepers as before. So there remains lots of layers in the “value chain” between filmmaker and audience, each step extracting value at each stage and leaving very little for the filmmaker at the end of the chain, which reminds me that there are some similarities with the specialty coffee business, with retailers taking a larger percentage of premium prices so the coffee growers don’t see as much additional revenue as they should for their premium crops.

A new model may be evolving, from Festivals to Home Video DVD + VOD/Streaming, cable/sattelite/online + Pay or Basic TV. Shrinking release windows. Retailers might have issue with you being online, but From Here to Awesome is experimenting with this approach. Head Trauma started out as a virtual reality game before the film came out, then did the festival circuit, Lance did theatrical on his own. Lance also mentioned how Four Eyed Monsters did a podcast on their distribution saga. These have all been attempts to invert the model. DIY is flexible. Lance talked about 50/50 split vs. four-walling (you take all the risk) for doing theatrical screenings.

There’s lots of experimentation with new models going on right now. With Brave New Films Robert Greenwald has changed his style and distribution techniques based on political needs, clear calls to action, spreads the political message, he’s building a strong relationship with his audience, in contrast to Hollywood which has a hollow relationship with their audience, most of the interesting stuff that comes out of Hollywood properties like fan fiction are things that the Hollywood studios have nothing to do with, at least traditionally. I think the studios are getting smart and understand the value of storytelling across multiple media forms (known as transmedia storytelling), but so far, they’ve only controlled the movie and commercial tie-ins, not fan-generated media, however, in the near future I’m sure you will see some serious attempts to create new transmedia experiences by the studios, but but what makes fan fiction and fan media special is that it is NOT commodified media production, it’s all labor of love, so it will be interesting to see what happens when the studios try to step into this world. Some researchers at MIT are providing guidance in this area.

Lance believes that Audiience 1.0 was about traditional “broadcast” one to many marketing and distribution. Now with the emergence of Audience 2.0 the audience becomes part of the distribution network, they can amplify the message and become distribution hubs, all the people who help make a movie can become distribution points for the film. Examples of this include Wreck a Movie which provides a way to creating a film through connecting people and spreading information which was born from the film Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning. The producers of the film worked with people across the Internet to make and distribute the film. Lance reported that 3,000 people worked on the movie for 7 years, there’s real value in “crowd-sourcing” and all of those people can become distribution hubs. Another example is Swarm of Angels, driven by creative crowdsourcing and peer production, essentially a people-powered film studio.

Lance provided an excellent list of things to think about in terms of how to build an audience for your future:

1. Consider your own viewing habits
2. Who is you audience and why do they care?
3. Spend time thinking like your audience, how do they consume media?
4. Create a two-way conversation
5. Be prepared to spend time responding, this is huge, and time consuming
6. Build trust
7. Think of your audience as collaborators, never think you are smarter than them, they can revolt at any time
8. Have a clear call to action, consider the Dr. Horrible example, let your audience (collaborators) know “this is what I’m doing and why, help us spread this was the message,” this turns out to be one of the things people click on the most, consider why the Obama campaign has done well online, they offer people need simple steps in a call to action
9. Reward and respect the audience
10. The audience can not be controlled, can’t be stressed enough
11. Some tools are not for everyone, social media, it will not build the audience for you
12. Creating accounts won’t build the audience for you
13. Be willing to experiment
14. Share your findings openly with other filmmakers, this is the most important part and what DIY Days is about, this will help everyone in the community, this is about cross-pollinating audiences, and this can lead to real numbers

Lance also suggested five web tools that every filmmaker should understand:

1. Blogging with WordPress: blogging tool, make active, not static sites, updating constantly, people can subscribe, repost your content, other blogging tools include Blogger, Typepad, and Moveable Type (I think WordPress is the best among them), see wordpress.org if you want to host the blog on your own server
2. Sharing updates with Twitter: Lance uses it as an update tool, now CNN is twittering, lots of people are getting into this wonderful “micro-blogging” tool which is excellent for timely updates known as “tweets”
3. Content syndication with Feedburner: let people pull, easy to have blog posts sent as email to people, people can get your blog via RSS or Email
4. Social bookmarking with Delicious: share the things you enjoy, share with others, the more you share, the better, actively engage with the community, be conscious how you use these communities, sharing bookmarks is wonderful
5. Photo sharing with Flickr: this has helped Lance for high-res photos on presskit, prepared to link for photos, different versions of images, etc. document your work

I would add a sixth item to to this list, any one of the popular video sharing site like blip.tv, Vimeo, or YouTube, provides excellent way to embed trailers of your film on your web site or blog without dealing with any video hosting or bandwidth fees, also a good way to give away free shorts and behind-the-scenes materials.

Members of the audience suggested other sites that filmmakers should be aware of: Exposure Room for sharing your work and/or reel online for exposure and Seesmic for asynchronous visual conversation kind of a Twitter meets Video kind of thing, which was used successfully at Cannes. There’s also direct distribution start-ups doing interesting work like Caachi and Super Indie Films. All of these tools are a new part of the distribution and publicity mechanism available to independent filmmakers. There is a tipping point, the more you use it, the more people will help to amplify, many people think the filmmaking process is glamorous, tap into that using social networking tools.

Lance believes that “audience direct” is the future, especially for international distribution, some DIY solution providers worth looking into include:

• IndieFlix is a one-stop shop for non-exclusive distribution with a focus on community and discovery. They provide multiple revenue streams via PPV, sponsored streaming, download and DVD delivery direct from IndieFlix.com, and via third party delivery partners all at no cost to the filmmaker.
• B-Side is a technology company that provides acquisition, marketing, and distribution services to filmmakers, festivals, and distributors. Their mission is to find great films at festivals that fall through the cracks of the traditional distribution system and connect them with distribution opportunities.
• Breakthrough Distribution helps content creators maximize their distribution possibilities via online, retail, theatrical, broadcast, and other channels. Its independent producer platform provides rights holders with services, tools, and strategic frameworks to leverage new business models, technologies, and marketing approaches on a global basis.
• Neoflix is an integrated e-commerce, fulfillment, and customer support platform created specifically for self-distributing independent films.
• E-Junkie provides you shopping cart and buy now buttons to let you sell downloads and tangible goods on your website, eBay, MySpace, Google Base, Craigslist and other websites using PayPal, PayPal Pro, Google Checkout, Authorize.Net, 2CheckOut, ClickBank and TrialPay.
• CreateSpace, formerly CustomFlix, acquired by Amazon in 2005, allows you to sell directly through Amazon,and now Without a Box has become an Amazon company, they are buying lots of movie companies, interesting huh?

From Here To Awesome Filmmakers Roundtable

Arin Crumley led a discussion with From Here to Awesome filmmakers Matt Von Manahan, Zeke Zelker, Raffi Asdourian, Javier Prato, and Fritz Donnelly on how social media is working for them, how has the festival experiment changed the ways they think about making and releasing their films, and what they learned from “day and dating” their films.

Day and date is a release strategy in which a film is screened theatrically on the same day it goes into home video and/or broadcast (cable, broadcast, video-on-demand) distribution. This strategy been tried with films like Steven Soderbergh’s Bubble and Ten Items or Less. One reason for the day and date strategy is to maximize economies of scale in marketing and distribution expenses for films that are not expected to have a long theatrical run. Given current distribution trends and shrinking release windows, many experts predict more and more films will be released theatrically, on the internet and on home video formats at the same time. The day and date strategy diverges dramatically from the traditional release window model that Lance discussed in his presentation.

For Javier, From Here to Awesome was “the only festival” he submitted to (presumably because as a short film his piece has it’s best chance to find an audience online). Raffi said, “the results has been amazing.” Zeke said it was good for his film since it was “too controversial [for traditional distribution]” and people are “afraid of the [sexual] content.” Matt shot his film on 35mm and made in his parent’s basement. From Here to Awesome is a “user generated film festival,” viewers curate what films come in, filmmakers do their own social networking and see what opportunities are available, and they can get other filmmakers in this pool of opportunities. Javier said, “I had no idea of all these tools,” for him the “experience [was] amazing,” and he said, “I think this is a revolution and it’s happening, it’s just the beginning, it’s basically a school, a little bit of effort in learning all this amazing tools to get your work out there.” The panel also mentioned tools like Hulu and Our Stage for getting your work out there. Matt said that “YouTube was a good fit for us, 170,000 subscribers,” so he plugs his movies through videos on YouTube, which he said was a “creative way to market the film [that] does not cost anything.” Fritz said he sold his film To The Hills the on the streets of New York one on one and sold 3,000 copies that way, a lot for him, his perspective coming into this, screenings in little venues, movies in the hallway. When Matt was asked why in this day and age an indie filmmaker would shoot 35mm, he replied, “I wanted to it to look like a real movie,” but lamented that it involved, “dealing with the sacrifices, so much of the film was one or two takes” and apparently he would not do that again, because “the medium should not dictate the story that you tell.”

The panel spoke of a need to start establishing standards and best practices for DIY distribution and to get the word out how important it is to clear rights before putting the film online, especially if you worked with SAG, who starts chasing you after you start with making money with your film. It would be good to have more resources on DIY and the law, another example is that filmmakers need to establish best practices for brand inclusion as that has gotten several filmmakers in trouble. Some brands see inclusion as free product placement, others see it as trademark infringement.

There is a strong need to broaden the community, we’re not watching each other’s films, why not? We should be watching each others films and helping each other out in terms of distribution. My take on this has always been, people watch lots of movies, the competition is not really among indie filmmakers, it’s between the majors with the large advertising budgets and indies that have to vie for attention, but people have time to watch more than one indie film, so cooperation in this endeavor of distribution can go a long way in floating everyone’s boat.

An Open Conversation About Workflow

Andy Williams (Executive Producer, DIVE division of Shooters Post & Transfer) discussed the workflow involved in making and releasing a film and preparing deliverables that digital and traditional outlets require. The process of making and releasing a film can be a complicated process but a clear workflow path can ease the pain and reduce anticipated costs. In this session Andy took questions and comments from the audience and provided advice and suggestions. There were several questions about the new Digital Cinema Initiative (DCI) specification for digital theaters and Andy said mastering for this is a pain in the ass, it adds significantly to delivery costs, and you should do whatever you can to have the distributor pick up the cost if they want to release your film to an emerging number of digital theaters that are using this standard. So much of the DCI standard is about piracy protection rather than digital distribution, so it’s complex as a result. Standardizing on your video and audio formats for finishing your film in post and knowing what your deliverables are going to be will help you streamline your workflow and reduce costs.

Related post

On a related note, take a look at my post Distribution in the Digital Age for various lists of interest: Resources for independent filmmakers, Good blogs to read, Organizations, and start-ups doing interesting things, Related articles and interviews, and a list of industry publications.

Modern Filmmaking

Arin Crumley presented an indie filmmakers perspective on recent technological changes and how it has changed the creative process. In spirit the presentation was in the context of the possibility of a two way conversation between filmmakers and their audience (or better yet, community). It’s a recurring theme: create a dialog around your film, what does something like that look like? Arin talked about his Four Eyed Monsters experience and his travel around the world of conferences and filmmaking seminars (the case study has been covered extensively so I will not repeat here) and it’s a fine example of finding a community (rather than an audience) for your film which fits in nicely with the theme of DIY Days.

Arin had just returned from Burning Man where he was collaborating with Mike Hedge on a documentary about the event titled As the Dust Settles, that’s been his focus for the past few months, now in post. They shot with the Red camera and it’s a participatory documentary project designed to allow any individual who attended Burning Man to contribute their photos, videos and edited segments to the project as well as share in any proceeds from the project as well. Given the journey Arin has been on with Four Eyed Monsters, I’m looking forward to see what happens with As the Dust Settles.

Arin asked the audience about examples of interesting use of new technology and techniques in filmmaking, lots of examples were provided, including:

• _Cellular_ Cinema, a cellphone film festival;
• Todd Verow’s Hooks To The Left, a feature-length film shot on a cellphone
• David Redmond and Ashley Sabin’s documentary Intimidad, the film mixes cinéma-vérité footage the filmmakers shot and home-movie footage their subjects shot with a camera the filmmakers gave them in order to shoot their lives when the filmmakers were not around
• Awesome; I Fuckin’ Shot That a Beastie Boys concert film shot at a concert in which the band distributed fifty camcorders to the audience with the instruction, “keep the tape running” and the result is a ninety-three minute film with over six thousand cuts
• This is What Democracy Looks Like, a film shot by over a hundred cameras in the streets of the Seattle WTO protests providing multiple perspectives that could not have been created prior to the introduction of the consumer camcorder.

Film becomes more subjective, rather than objective, what does an individual see? There are an increasing number of participatory filmmaking projects starting up, the idea of a community participating in making a film is exciting, film is inherently a creative and collaborative experience and new tools are making this easier to do. From the old model of “Filmmaker, Subject, Audience” we are moving towards “Collaborators in Conversation.” Is it still “filmmaking” or is it something new? I’m reminded of Janet Murray’s list of characteristics that make computers an ideal medium for literary expression: they are Procedural, Participatory, Spatial, and Encyclopedic, which she discusses in her book Hamlet on the Holodeck.

Some of the “cool new tools” that were discussed includes the new Scarlett from Red (what the Red One Digital Cinema camera is to 35mm the Scarlett will be to Super16, small, hand-holdable, etc). And a new generation of D-SLR cameras that can shoot video, nice form factor, optics with cinematic depth of field, things are leaping in terms of technology. Apple Final Cut Pro has made non-linear editing easy and affordable, cheap hard drives you can record to directly, disposable cameras, give cameras to your subjects, you can now take crazy risks with cheap cameras, and things like Google Docs support internet-based collaboration, project planning, writing and more. And let’s not forget LED lighting, and portable digital audio recorders like the Zoom from Samson. Cheap hard drives. And Media Indexer Software allows you to browse indexes of your removable media as if they were inserted in your computer. This makes the process of finding your archived files fast and supports indexes export.

Some tools Arin is using on As The Dust Settles includes the Red camera (great for interviews, hard drive, long interview times, straight to a hard drive is a lot better, yet the camera is so heavy, it can be a pain in the ass to shoot with cause of the weight of the camera, but there’s a quality trade-off to be made), the community around the Red camera is a cult bordering on the insane, an amazing open source community around the camera, lots of feedback, corrections, you don’t get that from Sony or Panasonic (I think you get something like it but not as intense from Panasonic), Red really gets the concept of community.

Arin talked about collaboration at a distance and explained the process of emailing FCP project files (each person has a copy of the media files on identical hard drives) and using Google Docs for collaboration (this is how I collaborated with my editor Elissa Mitz while editing Smile Boston Project in order to avoid Boston cross-town traffic). It’s not up to the filmmaker how the audience experiences the film, viewers will do what they want, give full control to the audience in this case, a way they can experience it the best waty and have then decide the scaled down experience. From Here to Awesome is making a list of digital screen 600 movie theater database, so people know where they can show their films, an environment where filmmaker taps into a network. Arin is supportive of open codecs, DIY Filmmakers should be using open source codecs.

The Era Of Digital Creativity: Opportunities & Challenges

Scott Kirsner talked about living in the era of digital creativity: ideas can take shape and reach audiences with an ease that was not possible one generation ago. Now the tools of production and the channels of distribution have been democratized. The old forms like half-hour TV shows, hour-long dramas, 90 to 120 minute feature films don’t seem to work as well in the new environment. So Scott asks: What forms and storytelling strategies might replace them? What will evolve on the internet? And most importantly to everyone who was at the confernece, how are we going to build audiences for our work and earn a living?

One problem, however, is a glut of independent movies competing for audience attention. Scott shared an interesting statistic: in 2000 973 independent films were submitted to Sundance, in 2007 the number grew to 3,624. There’s a lot of noise out there, and I’m always reminded of this sobering point: viewers still have the same number of hours each week for their leisure activities, and not only are there more movies to choose from, there are many new media forms. In spite of this, Scott suggests that “this is the best time ever to be a storyteller” and he presented the audience with five challenges and five opportunities.

The opportunities are:

1. Collaboration and Participation. The approach of “I have my crew, I have my vision, it’s my project” is being replaced with “everyone can help me.” For example, consider the model being used by Robert Greenwald and his collaborators, using field producers to conduct interviews remotely, collaboration, new ways to make films, an example of this is Iraq for Sale, anyone can contribute to a wiki, films cam be made by more than you and your team, it’s tapping into the “society of audience” to borrow a phrase from the MIT Media Lab used a long time ago before the web changed everything.

2. New Forms and Formats. Much of what we talk about when we say “I’m making a film” is the traditional 90 to 120 minute program designed to watch in one sitting, it’s crazy not to work in new forms and new formats, right now we see growing ways to distribute and not a lot of experimentation in forms. Joss Whedon, during the writer’s strike, made his own project, explores new forms and formats, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog is well done video in the $100,000 to $150,000 budget range, 7 minute segments, what is the movie musical going to look like on the internet? Here’s an interesting example. New Forms and Formats are where it’s at. Try it.

3. New Tools and Software. Two examples are machinima going mainstream with things like the Red vs. Blue series in which the producers used video game software to render characters for their film. Another example of this is the wonderful new Red digital cinema camera that provides 90% of 35mm quality to independent filmmakers at a cost that’s at or lower the cost of shooting on High Definition video.

4. New Distribution Channels. A mix of established and new generation aggregators are getting films onto iTunes, for example, Michael Buckley satirizes American celebrity culture on his vlog What the Buck, one of the most popular shows on YouTube. He has makes more from YouTube than from his Day Job, which he recently quit, since he got a development deal with HBO. These new channels should not be overlooked by independent filmmakers. Theatrical has always been the holy grail, but in terms of what’s really practical, new channels are opening up much more interesting opportunities for filmmakers.

5. New Marketing Modalities. Lance Weiler developed a game around Head Trauma, his new film, a game is a way to market a movie, another example is the way the King Korn documentary has been marketed with online activities for fans.

And the challenges are:

1. Giving up control. Indie filmmakers might have to get used to being a ringmaster rather than an auteur, a good example is Brett Gaylor’s Open Source Cinema, a collaborative project with the goal to produce Basement Tapes, a documentary film. The site was launched in 2004 and serves as a repository for all of the footage for the film licensed under a Creative Commons license, which the audience is free to remix. The site also hosts user-generated remixes that have subsequently been edited into the final film.

2. Experimentation is really hard. It’s hard enough to make an independent film. It’s even harder to do it in an experimental manner and try new things. It’s a challenge, and at the same time an opportunity.

3. Rights and Windows Conflicts. It’s time to take advantage of the instant gratification culture of the internet. Sundance will get your film know, why not sell the film right then and there, release window conflict with home video or theater downloads, conflict one example is the film 10 Items or Less, tried to release 2 weeks after theaters on clickstar, the problem is no movie theater wanted to show it for that reason, Mark Cuban and Todd Wagner are into experimenting with WIndows

4. Getting Paid is still a pain. This is a problem that will not go away, there have been various cases of aggregators not paying filmmakers, for example, Sundance recently ended its relationship with Mediastile, a new media aggregator, after the company failed to send royalty payments and traffic reports to the festival directors who screened films online through iTunes and Netflix. No matter what you do, you should always have rights revert back to you if an aggregator fails to properly distribute your film and pay you. This was good advice with traditional distributors (I know several filmmakers whose films ended up in limbo when the distributor decided to shelf the film) and it’s double good advice with new media distributors who may or may not be here tomorrow.

5. Being a filmmaker is really hard work. It’s a big job and add to that being an entrepreneur, which is also a big job. You have to ask what is the business model, what is the strategy, what is the target market for the film, this is a producer’s job, and if you’re lucky you will partner with a good producer, but for many of us, it’s hard to be an independent filmmaker doing it all ourselves. Two good examples of filmmakers taking matter into their own hands successfully include first-time filmmakers Josh Caldwell and Hunter Weeks’ 10 MPH, Tiffany Shlain’s The Tribe, and We Are The Strange by M dot Strange. All of these projects point to new ways to distribute to the market and it takes a lot of work.

So here’s a thought for filmmakers to consider. The whole world knows about movies when they play at their first festival, “you have to wait until we distribute it” then wait longer to get into DVD, Scott suggests that it is becoming absurd to wait, you need lots of time to market, the first time someone hears about it they want to buy it then, you can’t tell someone “coming in June” unless you have a serious marketing campaign, you have maybe 500 people see you film at a festival, 2,000 festival audience, still millions out there, lots of movies that play at top tier festivals are never picked up for distribution, no DIY strategy, no sugar daddy distributor, Scott’s point is for 80% of films that are not picked up, creating another moment like the SXSW premiere is not going to happen again. Holding out for theatrical, playing roulette at the festival, reality the odds are against you, the odds are not great, no money for festival screenings, sometimes you can get screening fees but it’s rare.

A Sundance premiere can get you the leverage to demand a screening fee from second tier festivals, but it’s very rare, festivals run break-even or at a loss (as Anna Feder, Director of the Boston Underground Film Festival was quick to point out), not a good source of money for your film, though there are exceptions as some filmmakers in the audience pointed out. Scott Kirsner a little while ago asked the folks at Sundance, is there any rule to prevent from selling during the festival, no rule against it, Sundance does want premieres, however, Sundance said no one had done an online release at the same time as a festival, use the big festival thing to be there you can see it on my web site, if you think about it, use a film festival as a launching point for an online release. I think this might become an emerging pattern. iTunes does not deal with indies at this time, but their top shorts have come through festivals.

My notes continue in this post:
DIY Days Boston, October 4, 2008 (conference notes, part 3) (added 13-Oct-08)

Who should attend? Anyone who makes creative work: film, video, music, games, especially if you would describe yourself as an independent filmmaker. The day consists of both structured and free form activities to encourage open discussion and the opportunity to break into groups and get everyone talking to each other. Register now, the event is free but space is limited due to the size of the venue, designed to encourage an active and participatory discussion among participants.

This conference, inspired by the success of “unconferences” in other professions, is quite special because it’s being organized by filmmakers and supported by generous sponsors, hosts, and volunteers, rather than driven by vendors. It started last year when filmmaker Lance Weiler (Head Trauma, The Last Broadcast) reached out to Arin Crumley (Four Eyed Monsters) and Mike Belmont (We Are the Strange) with the idea to create a virtual conference and festival. After a series of discussions they decided that the virtual event would be a way to connect filmmakers directly with audiences and the event itself could become a model for open content distribution, one which allowed filmmakers to have a say in how their films were reaching audiences. It also enabled them to take concepts from the Workbook Project (an open source project for content creators) and to put them into practice. To make a long story short, the virtual event evolved into an online and real world event in two parts: (1) The From Here to Awesome festival which is playing out in theaters, living rooms, online and via mobile devices and (2) a series of live conferences with participatory discussion know as DIY DAYS.

The organizer’s goal is to create an open discussion and debate that will evolve as the conference travels around to several cities. At the end of the process, the organizers intend to share the results and then go back to the drawing board to plan for year two. I’m excited that this conference is coming to Boston, and being hosted in such a wonderful location. See you there!

 Play Video

In the video Slava mentions Mark Gill’s statement, “The Sky is Falling,” see the article Gill wrote, Yes, The Sky Really Is Falling, which appeared on June 22, 2008 in for IndieWIRE. At the Los Angeles Film Festival’s Financing Conference, Mark Gill, CEO of The Film Department (and former President of Miramax Films) declared provocatively, “Yes, The Sky Really Is Falling.” He detailed many challenges currently facing independent film. Here’s a quote from the article: “If you want to survive in this brutal climate, you’re going to have to work a lot harder, be a lot smarter, know a lot more, move a lot faster, sell a lot better, pay attention to the data, be a little nicer (ok, a lot nicer), trust your gut, read everything and never, ever give up. If you’re looking for a cool lifestyle, you’re in the wrong business. If you want work-life balance, go get a government job. But if you really want to make movies–even after all the unvarnished bad news I’ve dumped on you today–then by all means do it.”

Theme music by Colin Owens.

I spoke with Philip Hodgetts at the New Media Expo in Las Vegas and asked him about his new venture, the Open Television Network which I blogged about several weeks ago.

 Play Video

Music by Colin Owens.

This post is a follow-up with related links and references to my participation as a panelist on “Distribution in the Digital Age” at the Roxbury Film Festival. My fellow panelists were Cynthia Close (Executive Director of Documentary Educational Resources), Nettrice Gaskins (Computer Arts and Community Liaison, Massachusetts College of Art and Design), and William Murrell (BlackSoftware.com, Smallwall.net). The panel was moderated by Lisa Simmons (Director, Color of Film Collaborative).

Below are links and notes related to the topics I presented, divided into six sections: 0. Independent Film Distribution Economics 101; 1. Resources for independent filmmakers; 2. Good blogs to read; 3. Distributors, organizations, and start-ups doing interesting things; 4. Articles, interviews, books, etc.; and 5. Industry Publications.

0. Independent Film Distribution Economics 101

Consider this, with a typical home DVD release, the economics look like something like this:

Retail price: $19.95
Wholesale price: $9.95 (price to retailer)
Royalty to you: 20% of wholesale: $1.99 per DVD
Distributor takes care of marketing and advertising expenses
Profit to distributor: Mysterious accounting

The distributor is taking care of management, marketing, prints, replication, fulfillment, advertising, etc. costs. Any theatrical release, becoming more and more rare for independent films, is likely to lose money, but it is a marketing activity to create value in the DVD segment which does help sell more DVDs. So the theatrical factors into the economics as a marketing and promotional cost. Any money comes from DVD sales for all but the largest grossing films. Look at the box office figures for small indie films, they pale in comparison to the cost of marketing, managing, and advertising a theatrical release.

In a self-distribution scenario, the economics of selling DVDs from your website would be:

DVD price: $20 + $5 shipping and handling: $25 revenue
Cost of replication, shipping, handling, and e-commerce transactions: $7.00
Gross evenue to you: $18.00
YOU take care of marketing and advertising expenses on your own.
Net: you know your own numbers.

This is about disintermediation, and even if traditional distributors get out of the way and you have direct access to you audience, someone still has to do the hard work. Attention is the scarce resource today. Viewers have so many options, so many screens, so many things competing for their attention. Then it was the distributor, now it’s you and your partners. There is no panacea. The difference with the DIY scenario is you can build a fanbase that you control, you can build relationships with organizations that have compatible agendas around a cause, and everything you do to build relationships you are in control of. This relationship can be very similar to the time-honored relationship of artist and their supporters and patrons. There is a trend towards an increasing number of filmmakers who are developing fanbases numbering thousands, if not tens of thousands, to whom they can sell DVDs and other items. While DVD will be the staple for some time, I expect a dramatic increase in direct digital distribution. There is a huge intangible value in creating this relationship.

There is a huge tectonic shift occurring in independent film distribution. Today it looks nothing like it did when I was in film school, and in ten years I’m sure it will be different from today. It’s a wild, wild west out there. What follows are some of the resources, blogs, and articles (some of which I mentioned during the panel) that will help you better understand alternative distribution models and to navigate this rapidly changing environment. If you’re in a hurry, start with some of the articles I link to.

1. Resources for independent filmmakers

• The Workbook Project
  A resource for content creators that will become a user contributed repository of information. The concept is part of an open source social experiment, the workbook is meant to be spread and edited. This means that content creators can add their own info, war stories, advice etc. We’re hoping that the workbook can grow as a resource. It’s being built with an open source client side wiki called tiddlywiki that can be saved to the desktop, edited and then uploaded again. Contributors include Lance Weiler, Alex Afterman, Arin Crumley, M dot Strange, and many others. The site offers great stories, tips on building an audience, information on tools and techniques, and pointers to the best resources on the web for DIY filmmakers.
• Independent Feature Project
  Now almost three decades old, the Independent Feature Project (IFP) is a non-profit membership and advocacy organization that has evolved into a vibrant organization that supports and serves the independent film community by connecting creative talent and the film industry. The IFP has grown to informing and supporting a network of 10,000 filmmakers in New York City and around the world.
• The D-Word
  A leading worldwide community of documentary filmmakers that hosts discussions about the art, craft, business, and social impact of documentary film. Public Topics are open to all, professionals can become Members of The D-Word and access a wide range of ongoing discussions in our Business, Creative, Social, and Technical Topics. The online community has grown to over 2,000 documentary professionals from around the world.
• DOCULINK
  The DOCULINK community, consists of an active email mailing list providing a forum for quickly shareing information and engage in ongoing discussion about documentary filmmaking; a website providing information and resources for documentary filmmakers; and monthly meetings in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Vancouver, BC and occasionally in New York, which alternate between guest speakers, work-in-progress screenings and socials. The community, launched in 2002, now boasts over 2,000 members.

2. Good blogs to read

• Cinematech
  Scott Kirsner, a journalist, writes about making movies in the digital age. CinemaTech focuses on how new technologies are changing cinema – the way movies get made, discovered, marketed, distributed, shown, and seen. He attends a lot of events and meets many people along the way and he shares his insights in this blog.
• Springboard Media
  Comments on the future of the media arts field by Brian Newman, CEO of the Tribeca Film Institute.
• All These Wonderful Things
  AJ Schnack’s widely read blog focused on documentaries and nonfiction, he is a filmmaker and writer based in Los Angeles.
• DIY Filmmaker Sujewa
  A blog written by DIY, ultra-low budget, self-distributing, Washington, DC area & NYC based independent filmmaker Sujewa Ekanayake. Recent projects: Indie Film Blogger Road Trip (’08), Date Number One (’08, ‘06), Magnus & The Air Quotes Woman (’07), Rock Collection (’07).
• Self-Reliant Film
  Paul Harrill’s blog that champions small-crew, low-budget, and regional filmmaking.
• Kino-Eye.com
  Yours truly writes about digital filmmaking, new media, and more.
• Resources
  A blog project of Tribeca Film Institute.

3. Distributors, organizations, and start-ups doing interesting things

• DIY Days
  A series of intimate roundtable-style filmmaker events covering the word of DIY filmmaking and distribution. Recently held in Los Angeles and coming to Boston on a Saturday in September (date to be arranged). Last year Lance Weiler (Head Trauma) reached out to Arin Crumley (Four Eyed Monsters) and Mike Belmont (We Are the Strange) with a concept to create a virtual conference and festival. The virtual event has evolved into an online and real world event. It is broken into two parts. The first is the festival From Here to Awesome (described below) which will play out in theaters, living rooms, online, and on mobile devices. The second part is this series of conferences happening in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, New York and London. Very cool, I’m looking forward to the event in Boston.
• From Here to Awesome
  An open-source discovery and distribution film festival that kicks off July 26th in Los Angeles and rollouts out over a six-month period with stops in New York, San Francisco, Boston and London. Filmmakers retain all the rights, see direct revenue from each of the outlets and enjoy access to global audiences. The festival’s goal is to create a direct connection between filmmaker and audience. There are no submission fees for filmmakers. They attempt to create multiple revenue opportunities for filmmakers by providing a platform that enables distribution across multiple outlets – mobile, online, living rooms and theaters. It’s not only distribution that is being re-envisioned and re-imagined, film festivals are also part of the old system and are thus also changing.
• Breakthrough Distribution
  Breakthrough Distribution was formed in April 2006 to connect content creators and fans in new ways, helping content creators take advantage of new distribution possibilities via online, retail, and other channels, beyond the traditional theatrical and broadcast options.
• Truly Indie
  They have a model to help you act as your own distributor, providing tools, guidance, and resources. Truly Indie has created a process to vet films from interested filmmakers who will then be able to choose which markets they wish to release their film in, and Truly Indie will dedicate customized marketing resources to the advertising and publicity of that film. Upcoming films include Fall to Grace, Cavite, and Tibet-A Buddhist Trilogy.
• IndieGoGo
  An online social marketplace launched in 2008 connecting filmmakers and fans. The platform provides filmmakers the tools for project funding, recruiting, and promotion, while enabling the audience to discover and connect directly with filmmakers and the causes they support. IndieGoGo enables a “filmocracy” by providing filmmakers an open platform to pitch their projects to the world, and giving the fans a vehicle to experience and influence the once inaccessible world of filmmaking. Filmmakers get new resources to build and engage a loyal fan base while fans get the opportunity to discover and impact new films while getting insider access and VIP perks for their contributions. Check out their blog as well.
• Mediastile
  A new service that provides broadcasters, film studios, and content owners with the tools necessary to manage their own digital distribution. They offer a royalty tracking systems for handling sales via a digital pipelines, and offer a way to get your media on you own store front as well as services like Apple iTunes, Microsoft Zune, Amazon Unbox, and more. They work with major media companies and small independents alike.
• Open Television Network
  A service launched with the goal of providing a distribution network the “middle class” of media publishers. It’s a framework that allows you to small media through iTunes using RSS feeds. Right now Apple will sell you media making tools, but they will not talk with you about getting your media on iTunes unless you are a established distributor. But OTN offers clever twist that does an end run around that, allowing viewers to access your video through iTunes with a technology called KlickTab. Now you viewers can watch your videos on their Mac, iPod, iPhone, or AppletV through iTunes. Read more about it on the OTN site. Some media makers may be concerned about no DRM, but OTM is perusing a positive model and counting on the goodwill of most viewers out there that want to support media makers doing good stuff. As Philip Hodgetts of OTN has said, “it’s about making it, easier than piracy and almost as cheap.”
• TubeMogul
  Helps you distribute videos to multiple sites and track analytics. Not for feature length distribution, but a good way to get short promo videos out there widely.
• Jaman
  An online community that helps viewers find and discuss world and independent cinema. Members can download films to watch on their computer or television. They offer a player download that manages downloads, provides a full screen experience, and handles DRM. The Jaman Cascade Network helps the player obtain movie files from the nearest source, so it’s like Bitorrent in that way. Rentals are for 7 days from when you download and viewers can watch as many times as they want. Their royalties to filmmakers are not as generous as many of their smaller competitors offering digital downloads (many without DRM which is problematic), but we’ll see what market pressure does to that. Watching Jaman films on the iPod or AppleTV is not available, since Jaman’s DRM is not compatible with Apple’s FairPlay DRM and Jaman does not offer a non DRM option for filmmakers who would like to spare their fans the hassle.

4. Articles, interviews, books, etc.

• Can the Internet Save Indie Film? by Fred Schruers, Wired, June 26, 2008
  There was a time in indie film when specialty houses from the major studios stalked the earth, reaching into deep pockets to acquire the rights to distribute the best films at the coolest festivals like Sundance, but that is changing. The statistics are startling, indie/speciality films are tanking at the box office, indie/specialty distributors are dying, and the growing role of the Web in consumer culture is part of the problem, can the Web be part of the answer?
• Yes, The Sky Really Is Falling by Mark Gill, FIRST PERSON: IndieWIRE, June 22, 2008
  At the Los Angeles Film Festival’s Financing Conference, Mark Gill, CEO of The Film Department (and former President of Miramax Films) declared provocatively, “Yes, The Sky Really Is Falling.” He detailed many challenges currently facing independent film. Here’s a quote from the article: “If you want to survive in this brutal climate, you’re going to have to work a lot harder, be a lot smarter, know a lot more, move a lot faster, sell a lot better, pay attention to the data, be a little nicer (ok, a lot nicer), trust your gut, read everything and never, ever give up. If you’re looking for a cool lifestyle, you’re in the wrong business. If you want work-life balance, go get a government job. But if you really want to make movies–even after all the unvarnished bad news I’ve dumped on you today–then by all means do it.”
• The Long Tail
  Chris Anderson’s seminal book explaining the “long tail” of digital distribution, an insightful big-picture look at the tectonic shifts changing our industry.
• Hollywood Has Finally Figured Out How to Make Web Video Pay by Frank Rose, Wired, July 21, 2008
  Scrambling to find new economic models that work is not just the challenge of indie artists and filmmakers. Here’s a key quote: “Sure, the YouTube explosion was fueled by amateurs, but it will be showbiz professionals who cash in on Web video. That’s because most big corporate advertisers want a safe, predictable environment — not the latest YouTube one-off, no matter how viral. Once the major brands get on board, millions of ad dollars will follow. Which is why when the writers’ strike idled most of Hollywood last winter, talent agents fielded calls from clients eager to try their hand. At the same time, the fact that a three-minute clip can be shot for as little as $2,000 means Web video will be more open to ambitious neophytes than television ever was — witness the guys behind Lonelygirl15, who now have a second hit Web series called KateModern and a deal to develop more for CBS.”
• Theatrical Docs Down, But Not Out by Agnes Varnum, IndieWIRE (July 30, 2008)
• No Film Distributor? Then D.I.Y. By John Anderson, New York Times, July 30, 2008
  Increasingly, indie filmmakers find themselves facing a flooded marketplace with too few theaters and too many movies. The basic laws of supply and demand have depressed the economic returns for independent film.
• Jon Moritsugu Interview by Sujewa Ekanayake
• Rethinking Film Distribution by Rebort, iofilm
  Peter Broderick, President of Paradigm Consulting, speaking about alternative distribution channels, he says filmmakers should consider new strategies for distributing their films to avoid future disappointment.
• An Annual State of the Industry Post and Some Festival Advice for Filmmakers, by AJ Shnack, June 2, 2008
  With all the hanges in the independent film world, it’s become necessary to take a yearly look at the state of film festivals and ask the question, are we are abiding by an old, outmoded system?
• DIY Film Projects: 6 Thoughts on DIY Projects, from Self Reliant Film
• Roll Your Own Docs by Rebort, iofilm
  As DVD projection costs come down, filmmakers are finding it more easy to connect directly with their core audience.
• Cinemocracy
  A platform for commentary and inspiration for citizen reporters, activists and filmmakers. he films which garnered the most praise, interest and online votes (will be) screened during the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
• Screenwriters strike back: ‘Dr. Horrible’ leads Web charge, by Cynthia Littleton, Variety

5. Industry Publications

• The Independent
  The Independent is a lively online magazine that was started with the intent of rescuing, re-envisioning, and re-launching the print publication, archival records, and online resources of The Independent Film & Video Monthly, an respected publication for the community of independent media-makers from 1978 through July 2006, at which point it ceased publication when its parent, a nonprofit organization called the Association of Independent Video and Filmmakers (AIVF), closed its doors.
• Moviemaker Magazine
  A print and online magazine founded in 1993 (web site was added in 1995) focused on the art and business of making movies directed at both the audience and filmmakers.
• Filmmaker Magazine
  A publication of the IFP covering independent filmmaking. Also check out Filmmaker Magazine’s blog.

It’s never been a more confusing time to be a filmmaker, nor has it every been more exciting than this.

Bold pronouncements, talk of the net and social networks, but it’s still a wild, wild world out there. A time of opportunity, we’re at a similar crossroads as when live theater was giving way to the cinema. I welcome the change, even though I’m not totally sure how this brave new world of distribution is going to look like, but I’m sure it rests in internet distribution and social networks, and I feel fine about that. Do indie filmmakers need theatrical distribution? Old wisdom said yes, new wisdom is evolving. The expense of theatrical distribution to a hand-full of art houses? The even more elusive national release? Art houses have for the most part tried to swim up-stream, these days showing very little local fare (with exceptions like The Coolidge Corner) and there are simply too few screens for all the great indie films out there. For now I think Netflix is doing a pretty good job of getting alternative films out there, they are my source for indie films and documentaries. But how do you find out about them? Social networking is certainly part of the answer.

When we started out to do [quarterlife], and people heard it was going to go to NBC, we were sort of damned if we did and damned if we didn’t, because a lot of people said “oh, it’s just a television show in disguise, and these are old television guys, and they are just doing television,” in fact, the difference for me was I went back to my early days, I just recently looked at the pilot of thirtysomething, and I was not so brainwashed in those days in the world of television, and the pilot of thirtysomething is so raw, and so real, it doesn’t look anything like a television show, it’s not lit like a television show, they don’t sound like a television show, and that’s what I went back to, in other words, I didn’t say, “what is the internet, I have to do an internet thing,” I said, “let me let go of the shit that I’ve been doing that I’ve taken on over the years without knowing it,” these voices in my head saying, “oh, will they like this character, you know, will people understand when you say this, will they stick around,” all these kind of things that network executives are scared of I just said, “forget it, I’m just going to do my thing for this, that”s how I did it differently, and low and behold you know what? It ain’t a television show, and it was proven last night it was not a television show (laughter in the room), it’s too specific for a big network, and that’s fine, cause we’re going to find a home for it, that will work for what we do. But that’s the difference, is I went back to my own voice.

It’s ridiculous to call quarterlife a failure, it’s simply a proof point that crossover is not always a good idea, that the audience for broadcast television and internet episodics is different, and twenty-somethings are growing up in a vastly different media world. They are not going to watch broadcast television the way my generation did. And why are we even talking about online shows making the jump to television? As if this was somehow the holy grail? Why look at new media through the lens of old media? As Herskovitz said, quarterlife is not television, it’s something different. It does not belong on prime time, which is about mass audience and lowest common denominator, it belongs on a niche cable station if on broadcast at all. Why do so many broadcast industry people talk about the internet as a new breeding ground for television shows? They sure would like to outsource creative development. But the internet is not a new old thing, it’s a new new thing, and internet entertainment properties should be judged on their own terms as their own thing. The new media revolution will not be broadcast, nor will it be rebroadcast. It will be streamed, downloaded, and shared as part of a community experience as you see happening right now on the quarterlife site. When quarterlife first launched I did an interview with Marshall Herskovitz that you might find interesting.

Personally, I find quarterlife to be one of the more interesting pieces of entertainment to come out in 2007, and part of what I like about it is its rawness, the feeling that it’s a work in progress, something evolving, and that there’s a community around it. It’s in a very different “voice” as Herskovitz said. And that’s part of the appeal for me, and probably not right for mass audience appeal. But in the world of long tail media distribution, it’s about finding a niche, not the mass audience. What is being done with quarterlife may not translate to the model for the future of television, but it’s sure working by many metrics of success. Without spending time watching all of the episodes and spending time observing and/or participating in the community, you can’t really grok what quarterlife is. Innovators in entertainment have created some flops that have made cinema/television/new media history, but at the same time where would we be without the innovative projects that showed us that there are other forms that entertainment can take, and new ways of interacting with an audience? It’s too soon to call for a verdict on the quarterlife experiment and premature to make claims of it’s demise.

OTN lets viewers subscribe to an RSS feed so they can see the titles of new videos in iTunes. When the viewer clicks on a particular item to download it, their OTN account is debited the price of that video. This is done through a technology called KlickTab. Media makers can add buttons on their site that when users click on them it add their RSS feed to iTunes. Before viewers can buy content they will have to obtain an account with OTN (OTN starts new users off with a $5.00 credit as an incentive to try it) and then whenever they click on content in iTunes from an OTN publisher, their account is debited the price of the video. Like PayPal in the early days, people are going to be hesitant to give their credit card number to an unknown entity, but I think that if OTN can collect a critical mass of interesting content, viewers will start to see the value of being part of the network. What OTN needs is a killer hit that everyone will want to download, or some free content that requires opening an account, so viewers can see what’s in it for them.

There are many things I like about the OTN model. They provide small publishers a way to get paid for their media, they are putting it into iTunes, which offers a seamless user experience for getting media to iPods, iPhones, and AppleTV that most people can manage. There are no content gatekeepers (except for clearly inappropriate content like pornography). No DRM. OTN charges a reasonable 15% fee from the money they collect, unlike other services based on old media that want to take much higher percentages. Last time I checked internet transactions were super efficient, so the percentage distributors take should drop precipitously, not stay the same.

Some media makers may be concerned about no DRM, but OTM is perusing a positive model and counting on the goodwill of most viewers out there that want to support media makers doing good stuff. Rather than worry about protecting your media, small publishers should worry about getting their media out there and sold. User convencience should be the priority. Long tail publishing actual benefits from some sharing among viewers, for that spreads the word of mouth. And as Philip Hodgetts of OTN said at last week’s Final Cut Pro Users Group Meeting in Boston, it’s about making it, “easier than piracy and almost as cheap.”

The music industry made a big mistake when they introduced CDs at a price higher that LPs rather than lowering the price. That was the beginning of the end. The video industry was much smarter in the transition from VHS to DVD by lowering the wholesale price of DVDs, and the home video industry took off. Now Apple’s iTunes music store is selling videos for too much money, are they repeating the mistake of the music industry? I think the price of a video should be low enough as to constitute an impulse purchase. Only a small segment of the population is going to pay $1.99 for a TV show. There’s an untapped market out there. The long-tail content publishers that OTN is building their system for will have an open marketplace to sell their goods. Right now they have none. The democratization of production and post production is not enough. You need the democratization of distribution. OTN is trying to take care of that. So far advertising has not earned much for media makers distributing their video online, however, for specialized an niche content, OTN might help media makers make a decent living making videos for specific audiences who are not served by the major studios.

Renew Media is a not-for-profit organization established in 1990 by the Rockefeller Foundation with the goal of supporting the creation, distribution, and awareness of independent media in all forms and to connect those works to a broad audience and soon they will be launching Reframe, providing a platform that supports curatorial acitivities and digital distribution. Reframe will help independent filmmakers, artists, distributors and archives by digitizing their content in order to make independent media easier to find. Much of what Reframe is digitizing will be available to the public for the first time. They are doing this by talking small percentages of the transaction fees while offering generous royalties to media owners (specific details are available on their site).

Reframe is building a website that will help viewers easily find titles, filmmakers or distributors, as well as browse to discover new works and they will have collections that are curated. They are not a distributor per se, they plan is to make content available through multiple distribution and delivery channels. Their arrangement with filmmakers and collections is non-exclusive, you can continue distributing media directly or through other outlets. One thing independents will really benefit from is free (video) or low-cost (film) digitization, this is to help archvives that have precious assets that are sitting on shelves rotting away (videotapes, especially older formats, have rather short lifetimes).

At first, titles will be available through Amazon’s DVD on Demand and Unbox digital download services, allowing users to purchase or rent titles. For each title you can set various purchase and rental prices to accommodate, for example, the educational market and personal purchases. consumers. This all sounds good on the surface, but lurking under the shiny surface is the world of DRM (Digital Rights Management).

Thus the partnership with Amazon Unbox is problematic. The terms-of-service of this video-on-demand service are among the worst that unwitting consumers have been suckered into, in which you’ll surrender your rights to privacy, the integrity of your personal data, and control over your own computer. If you’ve not already read it, now would be a good time to read “Amazon Unbox to customers: Eat shit and die” by Cory Doctorow.

Fortunatelly, Brian said they are also talking with other digital media distribution entities, like the Participatory Culture Foundation, whose Miro player just came out of beta. The idea is that if you place your content with Renew, you can opt in to each of the media distribution options. Nothing is “forced” upon you in terms of how your media gets out there. If you don’t want to help bring forth a DRM-induced Orwellian media nightmare, you’ll probably opt out of things like Amazon Unbox and go with a more rational distribution option. Why is DRM a problem for independent filmmakers? Does it not prevent theft of intellectual property? The movie studios are using it, why shouldn’t independent filmmakers do the same? I’ll try to provide my answer that question in a future post. Stay tuned.