Filmmaking Stuff Filmmaking Stuff provides resources for independent filmmakers. The website includes articles on how to take a story idea from script to screen, including articles on scriptwriting, producing, finance, shooting, editing, directing, marketing, distribution and how to build an audience. Filmmaking Stuff also has articles detailing how to make money making movies – including interviews with Hollywood Producers, Directors, writers and other filmmaking professionals.

I know what you’re thinking – Why is this filmmaking, modern moviemaking advocate of internet VOD distribution talking to you about how to design a DVD cover?

Because…

Regardless of distribution technology, your audience still values the visual representation of your movie as a tangible product. And in ways akin to marketing an eBook via Amazon Kindle, you still need a killer design to represent your movie.

To help explain this further, I reached out to my buddy Ian Hannin. If the name sounds familiar, it means you probably read popular comic books. Over the past decade, Ian is responsible for coloring some of the most popular comic books in existence for Marvel Comics and DC Comics.

But in addition to Ian Hannin’s comic book coloring experience, he also designs movie marketing materials, such as movie posters, virtual covers, DVD covers and the actual artwork that goes on a DVD disc to make it look pro.

Jason Brubaker
How important is having good movie art for filmmakers?

Ian Hannin
People judge a book by the cover. Same with DVD or virtual DVD. You need to have high end, awesome illustration.

Jason Brubaker
What components of movie marketing art are most important?

Ian Hannin
Make sure the design complements the subject matter and tone of the movie. A lot of filmmakers fail to think about their target audience when designing movie marketing collateral.

Jason Brubaker
What’s the biggest mistake filmmakers make in their design?

Ian Hannin
The craftsmanship of the DVD cover often leaves a lot to be desired. In the popular marketplaces, such as Amazon and iTunes, your movie will be competing for virtual shelf space with expensive studio titles. Your job is to create high resolution, easy to read and enticing movie marketing materials… Does the movie artwork draw you in and make you want to see the movie?

Jason Brubaker
A lot of filmmakers try to do this themselves. What is your advice there?

Ian Hannin
If you have someone in your team good at graphic art, awesome. Just make sure your art complements the movie and helps you attract your target audience. But if you don’t have a good guy on your team, you can always email me. Maybe I know someone.

Jason Brubaker
You mean like you?

Ian Hannin
Maybe. HaHa!

Jason Brubaker
How can filmmakers hire you?

Ian Hannin
Go to www.IanHannin.com and contact me through the contact page.

Jason Brubaker
How much do you charge?

Ian Hannin
Depends on the package. Just email me at www.IanHannin.com. Let me know what you’re looking for.

Jason Brubaker
Thanks for stopping by Filmmaking Stuff!

Ian Hannin
Thanks. Happy to help filmmakers in need of art!

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Next time you need to make your filmmaking stuff look awesome, reach out to Ian Hannin and see if he can help you. Oh, also, in full disclosure, I am friends with Ian. He will probably buy me a burrito for any business I throw his way.

Happy Filmmaking!

Posted under INTERVIEWS

Like it or not, many social networking sites run the risk of going out of vogue. So as a filmmaker, if you are working to build a relationship with your audience – From day one, you will want to migrate your fans off the social networking sites and get them into your own email, mailing list.

For this, I recommend using a reputable third-party email marketing service such as www.AudienceList.com.

In full disclosure, the company does pay me to promote, but it is the company I utilize for my own business.

With this tool, as soon as you sign up for one of their inexpensive accounts, you can easily create ways for your movie fans to connect with you. For an example of how this works, STOP: If you would like over $47 dollars in useful filmmaking tools for FREE, sign up below:

If you just clicked that link, you probably got an email asking you to confirm your subscription. Assuming you clicked, you were then redirected to a “Thank You Page.” And on that page you were able to download all sorts of premium filmmaking tools, for free. This is what legitimate email marketers call the “double-opt-in” process.

While I am obviously utilizing list-building to create a more meaningful relationship with filmmakers (and YOU), this model can be (and should be) applied to your own movie business.

The major difference between email marketing and traditional movie marketing methods is that members of your target audience find you, and give YOU permission to email them. This is important, because unlike traditional movie marketing methods, with email marketing, you will only communicate with people actually interested in your movie.

To make this easy, your audience list is simply a collection of email addresses. Most filmmakers will also collect the person’s first name with the email address so that they can personalize the email. So instead of saying “Hello Zombie Movie Lover”, you can say “Hey, Jason!”

While I usually stick to just collecting a name and email address, www.AudienceList.com also makes it easy to collect information such as the address and phone number of your site visitor. While this extra information may help refine your  marketing strategy – the truth is, most of your movie website visitors will not take time to fill out an extensive opt-in form.

An opt-in form is a little box that asks visitors to provide you with their name and email address. Here is an example:

With services like www.AudienceList.com, as soon as your visitor opts-in, the contact information is added to your database and managed for you, automatically! These subscribers are now part of your “list,” and you can email them with updates, deals and movie festival screening times – to name a few examples.

The other week I gave a talk at the UCLA film school. And someone asked me why I emphasize audience list building so much – So this is important. Given the disruption to traditional distribution sales channels, building an audience list for your movie and your career might be one of the most important decisions you ever make. Why? Because regardless of how the independent movie industry changes, one constant will always hold true. YOU will need to get people to sit down and watch your movie, and hopefully pay you for this privilege. www.AudienceList.com can help you get started.

Posted under DISTRIBUTION

Image via Wikipedia

The other night, I spoke at the UCLA film school about how to make, market and sell your movie without the middle-man. And while most of the UCLA film students in attendance agreed that my way of making a movie may not be fully inline with the studio ideal – many of these filmmakers agreed that getting a movie made is better than merely just talking about making a movie.

Thanks to familiarity with YouTube as well as access to affordable production equipment, many film school students, as well as modern filmmakers are embracing accessible, non-discriminatory distribution channels without hesitation or excuses.  And this experience is changing the ways in which filmmakers think about making a movie.

While it’s still true that making a movie can be a pain in the butt, the barriers of industry entry are down.  As a result, filmmakers are now empowered to go out and make their movie. And just in case you are not attending film school, I’ll share the BIG question you need to ask yourself as a filmmaker:

“Given the resources that you have now, what is the movie that you can make this year?”

Posted under FILMMAKING

I’m pretty skeptical about script contests as a way to further your career. There are success stories but I think they’re the exception. So I was interested to read the view of Chad Gervich on the Script website. He says that winning a script rarely gives you the edge. He’s been a judge in script contests and says winning only shows your script was the best, but that the standard is generally atrocious.

How bad are these scripts? Out of 500 he estimates that ten to fifteen “have some semblance of real voice, character, or storytelling. That doesn’t mean they’re good…” On the one hand that’s good news because it means if you have a good script you have a reasonable chance of winning. On the other hand, if people in the business know that these contests have a low standard, they may not pay much attention to them.

Listen, having won a contest is better than nothing and there have been some successes, but it’s good to have a realistic view, especially when some contests have a hefty entry fee. Here are a few specific tips:

Look at the ratio of the entry fee to the prize–if it costs $50 to enter, and the prize is only $500, I figure somebody’s making money on this.

Of course it may be access to important people in Hollywood that you’re after, in which case you need to check whether the contest is specific about who will see the winning entries. Simply being told that “the winner will be sent to important Hollywood producers and agents and directors” isn’t good enough. First, who are these people? Second, have they actually agreed to look at the winners, or are they just going to get them sent to them and throw them away or hit the delete key?

Finally, does the contest list previous winners? If so, why not email a couple of them and ask them what their experience was–did it help them? If so, how? You should be able to Google them or find them on Facebook or you can write them a letter c/o the Writers Guild if they’re members.

Good luck!

(Jurgen Wolff offers screenwriting tips here every Tuesday as well as on his site, www.ScreenwritingSuccess.com. Also see his book, “Your Writing Coach,” available from Amazon and other online and offline booksellers.)

Posted under SCREENWRITING

Image via Wikipedia

I love Kevin Smith’s attitude towards modern movie distribution. If you’re like most independent filmmakers, what Kevin was able to accomplish from his days of Clerks has been amazing. Back then, he not only dreamed the Sundance Dream, but he realized the dream.

The Sundance dream is the idea that you will make your movie, get into Sundance, sell your movie and live happily ever after. As I have been telling you all along, the demise of DVD sales channels, replaced by ever evolving VOD marketplaces are impacting Filmmakers everywhere.

These days, if you are going to make movies and profit, you must now view your independent movie business in ways akin to how any business owner handles their business. You must source and grow your own audience list.

In the following video Kevin Smith shares his perspective on modern movie distribution and how the brave new world is impacting indie filmmakers.

Please feel free to comment.

Posted under INTERVIEWS

Bloody nose Image via Wikipedia

As a filmmaker, sometimes life sucks. Sometimes deals fall apart. Sometimes what you thought was a sure-thing becomes a no-thing.

When I was in NYC, we were going into production on a 1.5 million dollar movie. Then all-a-sudden the entire project fell apart. Something about the investors getting cold feet… Something about the actor’s mom… Dunno. Truth is, the reason the project fell apart does not matter.

But what I do know is this – I suddenly found myself in New York with no job and no money. That SUCKED. Truly. I remember calling my friend and mentor Joe Surges on the phone. I thought he would be encouraging. Instead he said something I never forgot… He said, “Get UP!”

ME: What?

JOE: Get UP! You just experienced your first knock-out in life. You have two choices, you can quit – or you can get up, wipe your bloody nose and push forward.

I chose to push forward. I had no other choice. Eventually found work at the Maine Media Workshops – which eventually led to my move to California, where I was able to produce a few features thus far.

Since that time, I have been rejected, fired, heart broken and dumped. I have had a gazillion business projects and movie projects fall apart. But this is the price of success folks. There will be good times and bad times. There will be red and black.

And I gotta tell ya – each time life tries to throw a sucky punch (intentionally spelled that way), I take the punch. Block it if I can – but when I get hit, I get up. I don’t stop. Neither should you.

See you at the TOP!

Posted under FILMMAKING

For Los Angeles based fimmakers looking to take their show to business, I recommend checking out the next  Norman Berns workshop.  In this full-day, hands-on instruction, you will gain experience on the following:

MATCHING SCRIPT and BUDGET – SCHEDULING – BUDGETING

BUSINESS PLANS – PITCHING – FUNDRAISING

DEVELOPING THE DECK

MARKETING – DISTRIBUTION – SALES

Your day will begin with an overview of the basics. Then you’ll spend A FULL DAY working with YOUR script, YOUR schedule, YOUR plan, YOUR pitch. You’ll gain valuable insight needed to dissect the logic of a shooting schedule, review production budget cost savings and craft business plans to meet investors needs. And you’ll also discover how to allocate state film incentives correctly.

Oh. And as a highlight, I’m going to stop by and share some tips on how to market and sell your movie without the middleman. I’m told this one day event is filling up fast. So reserve your spot.

When: Monday, May 9th

Where: Showbiz Software Store

500 S. Sepulveda, Los Angeles

9am – 6pm

Posted under FILMMAKING

Filmmakers often utilize film festivals as a way to get their work seen and hopefully sold. And while acceptance to top-tier festivals is super exciting – the reality is, many filmmakers do not get in.

As a result, many of these semi-dejected filmmakers take a shotgun approach to their festival strategy. They start applying for most every regional and local film festival, everywhere. And aside from outlandish application fees, upon arrival to these festivals – instead of  meeting a bunch of VIP acquisitions executives, most second tier festivals are populated by a bunch of other desperate filmmakers shoving postcards in your face, eagerly advertising their screening times to, well, other filmmakers.

Sometimes this includes free beer. (Most times not.)

While having delusions of distribution grandeur is still part of the film festival fun – with the demise of DVD distribution, and the odds that you won’t get into Sundance – it is vitally important that you create a film festival strategy PLAN B.

What is a film festival strategy PLAN B?

Simply put, if you are serious about making your movie profitable, YOU are now responsible for marketing, promotion and distribution of your movie. And inline with this strategy, you must view regional and second tier festivals as an opportunity to build your audience list. But instead of handing out postcards to other filmmakers, your marketing strategy will be smarter.

Here are five tips on making film festivals relevant to your movie business:

1. Write a press release specific to the festival and then distribute to the local press. This also involves picking up the phone and personally inviting the press to attend your screening. Many festivals will have a press list. You can use this – but I would also advise conducting additional internet searches for other press outlets.
2. Many local towns have a filmmaker community. Reach out to them. If you are traveling, it’s great to have someone to pal around with. The secondary benefit to this is, many of these same people will have relationships with the festival staff – always good to know people on the staff.
3. If the festival allows it, see if you can take several clipboards into your screening. You’ll want to collect the names and email addresses of each viewer and get their permission to email them. Later you will enter this data into your audience list.
4. If your film website does not include a blog component, add one. Then update frequently. Add pictures and video. Let the world know your movie is screening. People like this stuff.
5. And finally, most regional festivals have panel discussions with industry experts. Make sure you attend these. Take your business cards. And then try to build relationships with whomever is on the panel. (And as a side note, if you know anybody looking for a panelist – I suggest inviting Jason Brubaker from Filmmaking Stuff? Just sayin’)

Out of everthing I mentioned, the most important strategy for your movie and your modern moviemaking career is grow your own fan base. This way, when you focus on building your audience list, you stress a lot less about the traditional distribution deal you may or may not have received at one of the notorious festivals.

So yes. Film festivals are still relevant. They offer a great way to source an audience for a minimal marketing investment.

Also, I’d like to thank one of our filmmaking stuff readers named Michael for this question. If you would like to get on the filmmaking stuff VIP list, click here >>

Posted under DISTRIBUTION

I did it again. I refined a concept and wrote a business plan. I made the pitch. I got a warm reception and now months have gone by with radio silence. If you’re into filmmaking and you’re also trying to get projects off the ground – I understand what you’re going through.

The ongoing question I get: “How will this make money?”

While it’s safe to provide projections – any investor with any business experience will understand that each project carries it’s own risk to reward ratio. Your goal as a filmmaker is to help mitigate these risks as best you can.

But the reality is, you can only push so hard. You can only be patient for so long. And then one day you have to pack your proverbial filmmaking bags and move on to the next project… Or the next opportunity.

One of the biggest filmmaking (and life success lessons) I’ve learned is this – asking permission sucks. Try to avoid it – if you can.

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Also, if you’re new here, you might want to watch my video   >>

Posted under FILM FINANCING

Because of an eroding DVD market, the modern moviemaking model dictates that you (as a filmmaker) must treat your independent movie business just like any other small business.

YOU have a product (your movie) and YOU must sell your product. In order to sell your product, you must find a customer and convince them that your movie is worth more than their money. Obvious right?

But most filmmakers have no idea how to find a customer.  It’s not your fault. I blame the STUPID notion that filmmakers should concentrate solely on making movies without considering how to source their target audience.  Think about it. Filmmakers traditionally depended on some sort of middle-man distributor to come in deus ex machina style to provide a big fat cash advance. But that was then…

Now, as a result of DSLR technology, you have a whole world of filmmakers flooding the market with awesomely good-looking backyard indies.  It’s an example of supply and demand. There are too many movies! And there are too few traditional deals. And sadly, most filmmakers have no idea how to get their movies seen and selling. As a result, the entire world of indie filmmaking is belly-up.

The only way modern moviemakers can compete and succeed is to learn from traditional small businesses. Filmmakers must focus on finding creative ways to produce movies inexpensively and spend tremendous effort (and little money) sourcing an audience. Which, when you compare the filmmaker’s need for customer acquisition to other businesses, it’s really the same thing.

Welcome to the new movie business!

So who wins? Filmmakers who can source an audience for their movies are in better shape than those who can not. Period.

How do your source an audience: In two words – Internet marketing.

I got news for you. Selling a movie online is no different than selling an eBook! But not everybody knows how to sell things online. That is OK. I explain this in my book. And for those of you not ready to get my book (so you can discover my mad movie marketing methods) – here is a tip as well as an actionable item: Crowdfunding.

By now you’ve heard of crowdfunding. But the little secret that nobody is talking about is this – Not all movie projects will get fully funded by the crowd. BUT, by creating a campaign, you essentially get the word out about your movie. You increase your YouTube hits (because you presumably embed your trailer into your campaign)… And even if your campaign is not successfully funded, anybody who did donate is now part of your future audience. Hmmm.

I know I’m on a bit of a rant today. So I’m going to slow-my-roll. If you like this filmmaking stuff, make sure you click here   >>

And if you want to see me speak or attend any of my workshops, telephone your local film festival and leave this message on their answering machines –> I WANT TO SEE Jason Brubaker LIVE.

Feel free to comment below.

Posted under DISTRIBUTION