Recently, Kevin Smith took to Reddit to do an AMA, and because people were already going to ask whether or not he’d use Kickstarter, he had this to say in the introduction:
As for funding the flick – we nearly Kickstarted the budget back in November (talked about at great length here: http://smodcast.com/episodes/giant-sized-annual-1-clerks-iii-audience-0/). But now I’m feeling like that’s not fair to real indie filmmakers who need the help. Unlike back when I made CLERKS in ’91, I’ve GOT access to money now – so I should use that money and not suck any loot out of the crowd-funding marketplace that might otherwise go to some first-timer who can really use it. So if I can get away with it, I’m gonna try to pay for CLERKS III myself. As much as I love the crowd-funding model (and almost did it myself in early 2009 with RedStateGreen.com), that’s an advancement in indie film that belongs to the next generation of artists. I started on my own dime, and if I’m allowed, I should finish on my own dime.
Fair enough. He’s (mostly) wrong about crowdfunding’s dynamics and macro-economics, but it’s not like this is his job. He’s an indie filmmaker (sort of). And being an indie filmmaker means that you get to make your movie however you see fit, whether you’re a kid in Montana or Neil Young. That’s what “indie” means. So when fellow filmmakers rail on someone like Zach Braff, it strikes me as incredibly selfish and hypocritical. Anyway, if he wants to finish the Clerks trilogy on his own dime, that’s 100% his call. (more…)
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We're going to scale things back a little bit on this edition of "Crowdfunding 201" and do kind of a remedial refresher course on how not to run a crowdfunding campaign, or how to avoid basic issues on your crowdfunding campaign.
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It was inevitable.
After the Veronica Mars folks raised their $2 million in record time, you knew a similar project would come along. Hollywood, after all, is pretty good at taking what works and doing it over and over and over again until everyone is sick of it. So you just knew that some multi-millionaire from TV would launch a campaign for their own dream project. And you even knew they’d go for the same goal. Because, hey, that’s how these things work.
And the outrage–oh the outrage! Why can’t they fund it themselves? They’re rich and stuff. How dare they??
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Imagine you’re a filmmaker staring into the great abyss of attempting to get your next film made. You’ve had some success in the past, but oddly no one is offering to write a blank check for your next film, even though you’re pretty sure it’ll be amazing. You’ve heard of Kickstarter, mostly on your Facebook feed, but it all seems kind of daunting. Where to start? There’s so much information.
It’s not just the funding that’s changing by the minute. Distribution, publicity, social media: it’s kind of exhausting to keep track of it all. Scratch that, it’s incredibly exhausting.
Enter Artist Services, a wing of the Sundance Institute. I had the opportunity at the Sundance festival to sit down with Joseph Beyer, the point person for Sundance’s Creative Funding & Partnerships team. Beyer and his team are the folks responsible for bringing the Kickstarter campaigns for dozens of Sundance-branded films to fruition. Beyer laid out the idea behind his work: (more…)
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It’s a familiar scene to many filmmakers: they budget out their film, calling in favors left and right, then they launch their crowdfunding campaign and someone sends them an email that says, “Hey, I don’t have any money to give, but I’d love to help.” Invariably, that help can lower the budget. Maybe they have a location you can use for free. Or extra lenses they can loan you. Or they can edit the film for you. Suddenly, you don’t need $X.
Only, you still do.
Kickstarter doesn’t care that you suddenly found an editor that can knock a chunk off your budget. The target goal won’t change.
Enter Seed & Spark, a (very) new entrant in the crowdfunding space. I met up with them at Sundance, via mutual friends. (more…)
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True story: I’ve never in my life seen a 3D movie. They always look terrible. I almost had my first time with Ang Lee, but Life of Pi left theaters before I could get around to it. So I’ve been intrigued by Charlie Victor Romeo, the 3D film that ran a Kickstarter campaign to raise $25k.
At a party designed to put filmmakers and press people in the same room (i.e. a room with a bar), I ran into one of the producers of Charlie Victor Romeo, who invited me to a screening that had been added to the schedule. I didn’t end up making it, sadly (there’s a lot of that at Sundance), but it looks interesting. (more…)
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Everyone has an expectation of privacy, right? But for different people that means different things. We all live in varying degrees of public. The Unabomber had a ton of privacy. Brad Pitt does not. The rest of us are in the middle. Naturally, the internet has shifted that profoundly–whereas fifteen years ago it was virtually impossible to know where someone was, you could probably figure out where I am right now within a 50 foot radius, just by looking at my Foursquare checkins and my Twitter feed.
As a result, these companies know a lot about me. I’m ok with that. It’s the trade-off for being able to use services that make my work infinitely easier. But what exactly am I trading?
Cullen Hoback‘s documentary Terms and Conditions May Apply attempts to shed some light on exactly what’s in those Terms and Conditions we click with nary a thought to what’s in them. After all, who has the time? I don’t. Neither does anyone else. (more…)
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Our own crowdfunding columnist Lucas McNelly is on assignment in Park City, Utah for the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.
By mid-week Sundance is in transition. People start flying home a lot on Wednesday and others fly in for the second half. Almost everything has premiered and schedules open up while you scramble to catch up with people before they leave. Or before you leave. The number of friends who I didn’t see before they flew out gets bigger every year. At the same time, I’ve seen Morgan Spurlock more than I’ve seen my bunkmate. Go figure.
But in that transition, you catch people. I was able to do two interviews that we’ll be bringing you later and lay some groundwork for the rest of our coverage. We’ve talked to someone from Sundance’s Artist Services program and will take a look at a new crowdfunding model that’s merely weeks old and does quite a few interesting things. (more…)
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Our own crowdfunding columnist Lucas McNelly is on assignment in Park City, Utah for the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.
I have this button on my lanyard now with a picture of a rock on it. Exciting, right? Except that it kind of is. See, I also have an app on my phone that when I look at the rock, turns the rock into something else, into a 3D experience. These rock images are all over Park City–on postcards and stickers and buttons–but their genesis is at New Frontier, where the artist Yung Jake has created something called a “Augmented Reality 3D Rap Video“. It’s the kind of thing that they specialize in at New Frontier, or as I like to call it, the thing that Noah is really, really upset about missing. (more…)
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Our own crowdfunding columnist Lucas McNelly is on assignment in Park City, Utah for the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.
The easiest way to get the attention of a frazzled filmmaker at Sundance is to introduce yourself as one of their Kickstarter backers. Suddenly, you have their attention. After all, they couldn’t have done it without you, even if your $5 went towards coffee and it probably wasn’t a make or break thing, people are generally in a good mood. But more than that, it brings back memories of that time when every backer felt like a gift from God and now here you are in the flesh, like some long-lost friend, and I really really hope you liked the movie.
There’s an element of chaos to Sundance, and by that I mean it’s almost completely chaos, so to find something familiar, be it a friend or someone who worked on your film or even a backer, it resonates.
Marty Lang even got a hug after the screening of a film he backed. You can’t beat that for a perk.
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As you all undoubtedly already know, Google Glass is finally here.
Sponsors
Now streaming: the archive of our Google Hangout On-Air with Jesse Vigil of Psychic Bunny, one of the designers of the new audio adventure game FREEQ (iOS/Android).
We’ve featured dancer Matt Luck’s work before.
I first encountered Sifteo Cubes back at IndieCade last October, and spent some time playing around with the little blocks which I first mistook for iPod Nanos.
Over the weekend I was having a conversation about the new Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Museum that’s been announced.
