Selling your work

November 5, 2004

When you have finally made your film, it's looking great and ready to win dozens of awards, you must sell it to regain the money it cost to make it, and more.

But, who actually buys it? It's not going to hit the cinemas, nor TV. So where is it going to go?

Any ideas?

The reason why I ask is that I am planning quite a big film, and it's going to cost a fair bit to make it, so I would like to know how I'm going to make this money back.

Tnx,

Dan.

Edited November 5, 2004 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith

November 5, 2004

And with 16mm, is it only single perf and double-perf? What exactly is a perf, a measurement? If so then how many milimeters does it work out as?

And I take it double-perf is designed for shooting 1.33, and single perf is for anything wider than 1.76, right?

zrszach · November 5, 2004

Well, you may get a distribution deal with some one.

Self-funded films are usually not the best way to make the big bucks.

If you think it is a great film, try and sell it to a studio before you finish the film.

My view is that the self-funded films are the ones you use to get work.

By self-funded I mean your own money or money from investors.

It is always best to find out where the film is going before you start.

Don?t worry about making a huge feature film that may not work.

I say now and I have said this before.

You can shoot quit a few short films that are very well done.

Or you can shoot a barley get by feature.

I strongly urge you to read Short films 101.

It talks about all the stuff related to the business side of filmmaking.

November 5, 2004

Yeh, I would obviously pass the job of selling it to the sales agent, but it would interesting to know where it goes from then on. Who are they actually selling it to, I mean no ones going be interested in buying some film they've never heard of or even got released in the cinemas. I suppose you might get the sale here and there but not enough to regain spent money, let alone make a profit.

What nutters pay to watch these films?

David Mullen ASC · November 5, 2004

"Perf" is short for perforation, the sprocket holes that run along one (as in Super-16) or both sides of the film (35mm is always double-perfed.)

They occur in regularly-spaced intervals. The standard 35mm frame is 4-perfs tall. The standard 35mm still camera frame is 8-perfs wide, since the film travels sideways in a still camera.

The 16mm/Super-16 frame has a perf at the top and bottom corners of the frame -- I don't know if you'd call that "1-perf tall".

Movies are sold in many ways; one distributor may buy the international theatrical rights, one may just own the North American theatrical rights, another the North American television and home video rights (all this means that they in turn sell or rent the prints to exhibitors, or broadcast rights to a cable channel, etc.) Some foreign markets are sold one territory at a time (hence why sales agents are used), both to the theatrical exhibitors (theater chain owners) and to TV stations, cable channels, etc. A movie is sold piecemeal in so many ways you need lawyers and accountants to keep it straight. Assuming you can collect...

Sometimes a project is "pre-sold" -- i.e. it is sold to some market (let's say, German TV broadcast) before it is even made, just based on the track record of the producer and the name actors involved. In this case, often the buyer will indicate what they require in the movie in terms of graphic content (nudity, violence, etc.) or what actors they will approve based on what they think their audience wants to see, hence why you see so many mid-range ex-TV actors in low-budget straight-to-video movies sold mainly for foreign television.

Phil Rhodes · November 6, 2004

Hi,

> When you have finally made your film... not going to hit the cinemas, nor

> TV....So where is it going to go?

Nowhere! That's exactly the issue. Unless you're in a stupendously powerful position or incredibly lucky, independent movies don't get sold. Nobody makes any money. End of story.

Phil

zrszach · November 6, 2004

Hi,

Nowhere! That's exactly the issue. Unless you're in a stupendously powerful position or incredibly lucky, independent movies don't get sold. Nobody makes any money. End of story.

Phil

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

thats what i wanted to say B)

im going to stick to cheap shorts for now.

Thanks Mr. Rhodes :)

Edited November 6, 2004 by zrszach

Bob Hayes · November 6, 2004

You ask a good question. It?s amazing the number of people who invest millions of dollars making a film but don?t know the answer to that question. If you have an independent film with decent production values you have a chance of making a direct to video deal to outlets like Blockbuster and Amazon.com. This is true even if you shot on 16mm, HD, or even smaller digital format. A television deal like the Sundance channel is also possible. You might make a small amount upfront for the rights to distribute and a percentage of the sales. However, it is really difficult for a novice to track the sales and structure the deal so you ever see much money.

The higher the production values the more chance of making a sale. A name actor who hasn?t appeared in too many small films can really help. If your film happens to be a currently hot subject matter that can really help. I think it would really be worth your time to look at the video stores and see if there are independent films that are similar to what you were hopping to make. See who distributed them. Distribution is really the key to making films. There is the growing possibility of selling the product yourself through the Internet. This is truer of genre films like action and horror where there is a lot of electronic word of the mouth. A good solid web site and some positive fan buzz who knows. But realize you make the money selling the product not making it.

November 6, 2004

Oh... Damn...

Oh well, just have to advertise it like mad and perhaps some nomad will buy it.

I suppose if I gave permission to play it in public places that may increase the sales, people could show it and not get done for it.

I dunnow, I guess now I know that, it just comes down to researching way's in flogging it e.t.c.

Edited November 7, 2004 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith

Christian Appelt · November 7, 2004

The most important thing about independent films is that some aspect of each film has to excite people. Something has to be personal and unique, you have to care for the characters and be desperate to know what's going to happen to them.

That sounds simple, but check how many independent feature films succeed reaching that goal. I always try to catch small indie features, but to be honest, if I were not to look at most with a kind of filmmakers solidarity, I surely would walk out of most of them.

Either they have such a low level of visual storytelling that they fail, and there is no good acting or dialogue to disguise it, or the good acting is wasted on a boring, self-conscious, mostly autobiographical script usually written by the director.

Interesting characters and a decent story, mated with good visual style (which is not entirely a matter of budget) will give your film the best possible chance to be shown on festivals and distributed.

Sounds easy, but isn't. :rolleyes:

November 8, 2004

Sounds easy, but isn't.

It's good when you can trust the cast and crew though. A friend of mine acts professionally in a theatre, I've used him in my films before. He's never let me down. I wouldn't get anyone else, because I KNOW he can deliver a good performance.

And no however much I'd like to, I'm not going to act, I'm the poor sod behind the camera that get's about, roughly, 0, credit.

Interesting characters and a decent story

COULD'NT AGREE MORE WITH THAT. I think Lucas may benefit if he just took a look at that post.....

Here's an example.

Star Wars Episode 2 : Good effects yeh, but seriously boring story, my Dad fell asleep in the cinemas.....

Dodgeball : One of the most funniest films I've seen in a long time, and there's barely any effects. (Apart from the spanners, wrenches e.t.c. being thrown at their heads, heheh)

And no, I'm not biased towards comedy, infact I don't really take an interest in comedy. I find most of the films to contain pathetic humour. (e.g. American Pie)

From what I can spot in Star Wars, the characters are too serious, it's more like watching a Macbeth play. In the originals the characters were fun, interesting, and no where near as complex.

Even a lot of the cast didn't like Georges direction with technology. In an interview with Anthony Daniels (C3-PO), even he said that he preferred the originals. In shooting his LAST EVER Star Wars scene, it consisted of walking down a long narrow blue corridor.

Wow.. What a way to end it...

Edited November 8, 2004 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith

November 9, 2004

I'm sorry to say I have to go with Phil Rhodes on this one, your film will not make any money nor will it be picked up for distribution. If you want to make money you would be better off using the money to buy lottery tickets, you would have a higher statistical chance of making your money back.

Go into the video store and look at the hundreds of movies that you never saw in the theatres and have never even heard of. These are the lucky few that end up in the video store, there are thousands more that never make it that far. The vast majority of those "no names" you see in the video store are also all "in the red."

I am speaking from personal experience and the experience of others. From my side...I had a great deal of luck selling my instructional videos that I financed myself and set up the distribution for myself. I made a video in university on researching your family tree, it became one of the best selling videos in the US library market in history! I made it for less than $3,000.00 and shot it on BetaSP. Every one told me it would flop, but, after they saw me driving around campus in my new Mercedes they quickly changed their views. Remember I was just a second year film student! All of the distributors where shocked when they found out I was just a student :-)

I used some of the money I made from my video to finance a documentary on the British/Zulu War. I was convinced I could make a half hour doc and sell it to PBS or History Channel etc. I spent BIG and I lost BIG :-) My documentary won the gold award for best documentary that year from the Utah Broadcasters Association. All the papers carried my story..."Student Filmmaker Beats Out The Pros." Then I won a first place Telly award with the doc as well!

I was un-stoppable, right? Wrong, I could not give my doc away to PBS or History Channel. They would not touch it with a ten foot pole! The insulting thing was that it was much better than a lot of the stuff they where already airing, so why wouldn't they buy it? Simple, it was not pre-sold and developed with the PBS or History Channel execs and I had no prior relationship with them. It wouldn't matter how good my show was, they didn't pre-order it, so it was not going to appear on their air, and that was it end of story.

Ok, so I learned my lesson about the TV biz and selling shows, or had I?

In 2002 I began work on a stop-motion animation Christmas special that I would make on spec and sell to broadcast TV. That was my theory. Once again I would use 100% of my own money.

18 months later...my crew and I completed the show, it wasn't Wallace and Gromit, but it was pretty good we all thought. There wasn't a whole lot of competition out there for this genre.

I took my little show off to NATPE with dreams of landing 15-20 territories, in which case I would make a killing! Not to mention the fact that these stop-motion Christmas specials can air for 10-15 years every Christmas.

So I got a distributor right off the bat, they loved the show. Plus they specialized in selling stop motion product all over the world. Well six months went by and no deals :-(

I made one sale to a Canadian broadcaster myself, so at least it airs in Canada every year. But it was a very low license fee, and that has been it for broadcast sales.

This year I made a deal with a US firm to carry it on DVD as part of their DVD of the month club for kids, but again low fees. So my great show sits firmly in the red to this day. Maybe that will change? But the outlook is not good, and my story is very common place out there. If I had a pre-sale from ABC it would not have been a problem, but I didn't, so once again I learn a painful lesson.

You want to know who does it right? A Utah based company called Feature Films for Families. They make their own films using 100% of their own money, and then sell them on video via telemarketing. Every thing is done in-house from top to bottom, they DO NOT rely on any distributors or Hollywood execs, they go around all these people, and reach the consumer directly. There's nothing the Hollywood people can do to stop them, not even Disney with all their power can muscle them out of the market.

Feature Films For Families sells about 100,000 videos a month in the USA, and the owner has more money than he can spend in a hundred life times.

As for me now? Well I'm not going to shoot any more shows on spec, I have learned my lesson the hard way. For several years now I have been heavily involved in the stock footage business as a shooter on 35mm and distributor. I made a discovery...you can make a lot more money selling people the parts they need to make a film, rather than making a film your self. Stock footage is amazing, every dollar you put in spits 20 back out! Plus I get to see the world and I OWN my finished work and collect the royalties from it. One day I hope to sell the entire library for a few bucks :-) I've already been approached twice by major players in the US industry, but, I need a big pay day to go out and it's not there yet.

I haven't quit the actual making of films though :-) Now I make one short film after another and put them into festivals. I shoot them all on 35mm so I get more of a filmmaking experience and it's a lot of fun. My last film has premiered in some major festivals and it's always great to see your work on the big screen with an audience. Even though I am technically paying for the privledge, weird eh?

So now I'll just keep making the shorts and keeping them on the festival circuit in the faint hope that some one big will want to finance one of my features. But my head is not in the clouds, there are tens of thousands of others like me out there, and it really is a lottery of sorts.

In closing you know what they say....

How do you make a small fortune in the film industry?

Start with a large fortune.

DC

November 9, 2004

Oh I should clarify two things re-my previous post:

1) My family tree video was a success because it was not an "entertainment piece." It was an instructional video and marketing one of these is quite different than a feature film.

2) Yes I shoot stock footage on spec as well with no specific buyer in mind at the time of production. But, the end user is only buying 3-10 seconds of neg from me that they put into their film. Which is much different from trying to sell a completed two hour feature.

Just wanted to make that clear, ok end of rant :-)

DC

Alex Opdam · November 10, 2004

DC im curious about a couple of things you have said.

When you talk about the films on the shelf of your video store which you've never heard of but are 'lucky enough' to be in the marketplace... would you say these films are on average better or worse quality than those which you make? I'm not talking about technical specifications here and i obviously you are going to be unintentionally biased but im trying to get an idea of general viewer enjoyment.

I'm just trying to get an idea of whether or not it is actually 'luck' as you say that gets these films where they are. Are you saying that every film there is there because of a lucky break of some sort? I just can't understand why film distributors wouldn't jump at the chance to take on an original low budget film idea over the same 3rd rate straight-to-video garbage that seems to continually be made. Is it a case of short sighted marketing or are quality independant films just not being made? OR is it that distributors want to be in the driving seat of a young idea rather than buy a completed product?

I know that was a lot of questions but i'm just trying to get an idea of the situation.

November 10, 2004

Well first off, the product in the video stores are features, I have not made a feature and therefore have nothing to compare to. I have made the half hour stop-motion Christmas special that I mentioned. I would have to say that it IS better than about half of the kids Christmas shows I see on the air every year. The US company that took it for their DVD of the month club was shocked when I told them it had not aired any place in the USA or been produced for a specific broadcaster. So there's an un-biased opinion as to it's quality. Like I said it's not Wallace and Gromitt, but it is better than a lot of product out there.

Getting back to selling the features....no I don't believe distributors will jump at the chance to distribute a "different" kind of indie feature. You probably are not aware of how many indies are made every year, and the HUGE number of them that get ZERO distribution. It's a two fold problem, 1) A glut of product on the market and 2) Distributors un-willing to take a chance un-known talent.

Want to get distribution? I'm very sorry to say this but T&A movies will be your best chance as a direct to video release. What about porn? The porn movie industry takes in more money than Hollywood films do every year, yes I repeat, the porn industry takes in more money than Hollywood. For porn you don't need big name actors and 35mm film. A DV camera and some un-knowns will do just fine. But who among us wants to make porn? Not me.

I think indie producers need to look more closely at the Feature Films For Families model I brought up. They have got it right, make the films your self and distribute them your self. Cut the gate keepers out of the process all together. Any filmmaker who proceeds without distribution already in place is making a HUGE mistake HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE!!!!!

The odds of your spec film making it's money back are a million to one. You're better off shooting a "sell scene" only and using this to shop around for a distributor along with story boards etc etc. Get the distributors involved early, if they like your project maybe they can find some money for you, then the odds of your film seeing the light of day go up sharply.

Here's another fact for you, Hollywood makes lots of films every year that are finished and never distributed! Why? Because when the film is done the execs look at it and decide they'll never make their money back on the promotion so they don't bother releasing the film in the theaters at least.

Many filmmakers seem to think that people will find out about their movie by telepathy. The only way people find out about movies is one way, PROMOTION! This is some thing most filmmakers are loathed to spend money on so their amazing movie sits on the shelf. In Hollywood the promotion budget for a big movie can be close to the budget of the movie. Do you know how much 30 second spots cost in a top rated prime time TV show? This is why a Hollywood feature needs to make three times its production cost to break even. Also keep in mind that theaters typically get 50% of the ticket price.

So when you hear that a 120 million dollar feature made 80 million in it's first week end at the box office you think....wow, they almost made all of their money back, right? Wrong, that 80 million is the gross ticket sales. So the theaters take 40 million of that, 50%. Then there is still the huge advertising bill to pay that may be another 60 million on top of the 120 million.

So while an 80 million dollar weekend is very good, it's a long way from break even.

Now let's get back to our indie model, some how you have raised $300,000.00 for your feature film. Your best bet is to make the film for $150,000.00 and hold back 150K for promotion.

With that 150K you can implement a small scale self promotion plan of attack that just might get Hollywood's attention. You can try some thing like this...contact a local theatre owner in a major city, ie New York or Hollywood. See if they will run your film in the theatre for at least 3-4 nights. If they are willing that will be a major coup, as they may tell you to take a hike. Let's say they are hesitant, now it's time to dip into the 150K war chest. Offer to buy half the seats in the theater each night. Yes you heard me correctly, do you want people to see this movie or not? Don't you believe in your film enough to gamble your money? If you don't, why should some distributor?

Now that you have a theatre it's time to committ more of your 150K marketing budget with newspaper ads in the mainstream print media. World's greatest movie!! Limited engagement only!!! Go on local talk shows, send out hundreds of press releases, work like youir life depends on people seeing your film.

Oh and make sure you put a big ad in the Hollywood reporter, with "for distribution information please call."

Then the moment of truth...will the people come? Will it be seen by the right people? I don't know? But I do know that this plan has a better chance of success than being 100% reliable on people like distributors to decide your films fate.

I have known filmmakers so poor after the production process they could not even afford to attend the festivals where their film was screening!!

Take my advice, if you are going to move forward with no distribution in place, leave money aside for promotion. You're gonna need it, or the cob webs will grow on your film.

DC