Adam Cosco is a American Film Institute graduate with mission. His vision: to make a his debut feature Personal Demons–a film about "two neighbors with haunted pasts" who'd "kill for a second chance–through Kickstarter, all while taking the crowdfunding site back for indie filmmakers.
The crowdfunding goal: $100,000.
The hashtag: #takeindieback
Cosco's concept trailer and directing reel showcase polished, confident work. The premise of the feature looks rock solid. Yet has he bitten off more than he can chew? Is the story really indie vs. celebrity?
We aim to find out tomorrow in a LIVE Google Hangout, right here at this very URL.
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…)
Film financing is a really complicated beast. Somewhere just south of whole animal butchery on the squick scale.
Those who don't have the stomach for such things are advised to either look away and be happy, or stick to user generated YouTube videos for all their entertainment needs.
Olsen is an entrepreneur in the emerging and discomfiting field of Kickstarter consultancy, an intermediary industry operating in an online arena that really has no need for middlemen. The ever-popular crowdfunding service was created in 2009 as an open space where independent artists can ask the internet at large to help fund projects, free from the overhead and machinations of big business. Generally speaking, Kickstarter campaigns aren’t intended to turn a profit, but to attract a pool of backers who’ll put a little money down in exchange for an altruistic boost to their ego and a copy of the finished product. Regardless, a lot of money ($319 million in pledges in 2012) has traded hands, which is like blood in the water.
The gist of Johnson's article: game makers don't need crowdfunding consultants.
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.
There has been a lot, and I mean a LOT of digital ink spilled on the issue of "who Kickstarter is for" in the past few weeks. Ever since actor-director Zack Braff turned to the crowdfunding site looking to fund his followup to the indie hit Garden State.
The essential complaint: that Kickstarter was created with the specific intent of being for unknowns to rise up from obscurity and get their work funded.
Today no less than the founders of Kickstarter have finally weighed in with a gentle "you don't know what you're talking about".
Before we get into their peace, let's look at the other side of the argument.
More to the point: how are they managing to be so forward thinking as to make author/comedian/entrepreneur/Twitter wit extraordinaire Baratunde Thurston the front man for a show about crowdfunding?
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?? (more…)
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).
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.
