http://sundance.org/artistservices en Copyright 2014 2014-10-28T21:53:27+00:00 Oliver Ike is the founder of First Pond Entertainment. After working in independent film distribution for three years, Oliver founded First Pond Entertainment in 2012. The idea behind First Pond was to provide flexible release options for socially driven documentaries, American indies and underrepresented communities in film. The History Not so long ago in a galaxy not so far away, there was the ugly term, “self-release”. Filmmakers were unable to attract a distributor to release their film and with nowhere left to turn and all other roads more travelled, decided to put it out on their own. It was an act of desperation. The movie business was booming and there was a plethora of distribution companies doing solid business. Couple that with an enlivened home video market and you had all the makings of distribution companies making their money back at the very least and possibly having a certified hit on their hands at any moment. If the film bombed in theatrical release, there was always DVD. Flash forward to now. The DVD market is virtually non-existent, VOD numbers are nowhere near picking up the slack and many of the above-mentioned distribution companies are now converted luxury spas. With the state of things, times have changed and the industry’s perception of “self-release” needs to as well. The Reality As an independent filmmaker, how do you get distributors to look at your film when there are so many other options? Aside from playing at a top-tier festival such as Sundance or TIFF, it is extremely difficult. Even if you do get that golden invitation, it doesn’t necessarily secure your odds of getting distributed either. From the distributor’s perspective, why should they spend money and take a risk on your film when they have to fight tooth to nail against all these others?  There are also a slew of distribution companies that will not release your film theatrically or explore the non-theatrical realm at all. Their main goal is just to use the theatrical engagements as publicity and make their money back on the VOD side. A much safer bet. If you are okay with this, then of course that is fine but if your reality for your film doesn’t match up with your distributor’s, then you will both end up unhappy. All production budgets and business plans have to have distribution folded into the mix. Now, if you do this correctly, I believe you have a shot to stand out against all of the content out there. The key is to not make a self-release the exit strategy. The Options There are also a slew of new companies that are out there to make this all easier. VHX, Pivotshare, Yekra, and Distrify all allow you to reach your audience directly. Vimeo On Demand announced their $10,000 advance initiative at the Toronto International Film Festival where they offered films world premiering there a $10,000 advance for an exclusive VOD window for their platform. Couple that with Tugg and Gathr, companies that allow consumers to “demand” screenings in their neighborhoods and you have some of the tools you need to put together a release. To further that, projects that are funded through crowdfunding campaigns via Kickstarter or Indiegogo, already have support built-in to their release; which is often the most difficult thing to do. People who fund crowdfunding campaigns want to see these films succeed. Instant supporters and avid promoters are absolutely invaluable. Most distribution companies don’t have built-in fans who are waiting for the next Weinstein release. Case Studies Case in point is the Kirk Cameron starrer, Unstoppable; which grossed a walloping $2 million from only one night, on a Tuesday nevertheless, and only on 700 screens. The key reasons attributed to the success of the film were Cameron’s devout support for the film, his strong built-in fanbase, the niche market for the topic (religion), other events packaged in conjunction with the film (several musical acts were featured) and some good luck. This came about when both YouTube and Facebook briefly banned the film’s trailer when users complained that it was “spam”. Cameron took immediate advantage of this snafu as promotion for the film. A banned film always piques interest in the digital age and gives the supporters of the film a chance to band together against their oppressors. Now, obviously most independent films don’t have the star-power of a Kirk Cameron or other actors in the same vein. However, ALL of the other key factors can be replicated (except good luck) and used towards a successful self-release. One example of this is the indie drama I had the pleasure of working on called, In The Family. The film was written, produced, directed by and stars Patrick Wang. At first glance, the film has everything you could imagine going against it. No stars, a modest budget, and an unthinkable 169 minute runtime.The fact that it was an independent production free from studio or distributor notes allowed it to be what it ultimately became.  Wang submitted the film and was swiftly rejected by 30 film festivals before being accepted to the Hawaii International Film Festival. Wang decided to self-release the film and after opening in Manhattan on a single screen, the film steamrolled through the independent film world. Couple this with an abundance of awards and accolades and you can see why the film now sits comfortably on Rotten Tomatoes with a 96% fresh score. The Takeaway Of course you can’t do this on your own but you can recruit the team that you want, all while retaining rights to your film and plotting out the exact course you want your film to take. Having this power can be a double-edged sword though and you need to consider if you want to dedicate at least another year to this stage of distribution. All this being said, having a self-release plan can work and shouldn’t be a sign that your film failed to secure distribution. It should be seen more of as a choice. And having a “choice” is something we can all relate to and should be celebrated more than ever.]]> Artist Services, Independent Film, Independent Filmmaker, Opinion, Artist Services, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Oliver Ike 2013-11-01T17:41:51+00:00 Last Tuesday, the gang at Sundance Institute's #ArtistServices program helped release BURN into the marketplace. This thrilling and timely documentary, executive produced by Denis Leary, tells the story of Detroit through the lens of one of the country's busiest Fire Departments. The film quickly became the #1 Documentary and #1 Independent Film on iTunes, despite lacking many of the conventional features and distribution resources of previous #1 films. In my six years in digital distribution, I've worked on hundreds of movies, yet I've rarely met filmmakers more successful at capturing their audience than Tom Putnam and Brenna Sanchez, the filmmakers behind BURN. A case study the filmmakers gave at a recent Film Independent seminar ably details their audience engagement methods. Their goals were clear. Sanchez said, "Every firehouse we've been to in touring the film has a poster of BACKDRAFT on the wall. Our goal is to ultimately have a BURN poster right next to it". With these two filmmakers, it's definitely possible.]]> Artist Services, Case Studies, Creative Funding, Documentary, Featured News, Grants and Fellowships for Filmmakers, Latest News, Online Videos, Premieres, Now Playing, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Chris Horton, Associate Director, #ArtistServices 2013-06-26T18:57:51+00:00 Annie Roney is Managing Director and founder of ro*co films. After nine years working with a top industry distributor, Annie founded ro*co films in 2000 with two complimentary ideas: the belief that a well-told, well-researched and emotionally-driven documentary can challenge the way people think about issues in every corner of the globe; and, to be entrusted with the distribution of these stories, ro*co needed to be in service to the filmmaker first and foremost. Still from "How to Survive a Plague". Your company launched an educational division in 2009. What led you to focus on this market and what did your first efforts look like? For many years, I was repeatedly asked if we would act as a sales agent for films in the US market, in addition to our work outside the US. The answer was always "no - it's an entirely different beast". I would refer the films to the usual suspects - the sales agents everybody knows. But two situations caused me to pivot: 1) There were a couple of films that I absolutely loved that were not getting picked-up by the usual suspects for domestic representation. Those films weren't resonating with them, and I felt called to help in any way I could. With expectations managed, I jumped in and started pounding the pavement for domestic deals - pitching to theatrical distributors, home video distributors, broadcasters and educational distributors. 2) In the course of that new endeavor, I met with the owner of a well-known and revered theatrical distributor to pitch one of these films. He asked me if I considered partnering with one of the other known (male) sales agents. I replied that while I liked and respected them, the reality was we all chose to work with films we cared about and that resonated with us. And while often we shared the same sensibility around film, I came with more of a female sensibility about what films worked and what films didn't. The unnamed owner of this US theatrical company looked like he had just been punched. For a moment he was breathless. He said "My God, I only see films at film festivals with a sales agent attached, and they are all men!" He recognized in that moment that films that might better appeal to a female audience weren't even being considered. That was another calling -- one I hadn't asked for or wanted - but I felt I needed to do what I could for films that were important to me. So after signing on as the foreign distributor for Abigail Disney and Gini Reticker's film "Pray the Devil Back to Hell", I learned they had no US sales agent - and offered to help. We were looking at a myriad of opportunities for the film. In the course of that, a few offers for educational distribution came in. Still from "Pray the Devil Back to Hell". I was astonished at how bleak the terms were for the filmmakers, as well as disappointed with the catalog approach to marketing them. I suggested to Abigail that we could probably do a better job for the film and with better terms if we collaborated and focused on an educational campaign. I was right. Abigail and her producing partner Gini Reticker had done a fantastic job of building a community with the film since their first premiere at Tribeca. We already had a great base to work with; we began researching every possible educator who could use this film on their campus. In some cases we bought data that we thought would serve the film. We also knew there was great potential for community screenings. We weren't ready to support those at the time, so we worked with Caitlin Boyle at FilmSprout who did a phenomenal job of booking the community screenings for the film. In the end we did thousands of screenings and sales. But that's really not the end, because despite the home video being available, the educational DVD continues to be licensed to educational institutions and non-profit organizations -- with no sign of stopping. I didn't want to take another film until I felt satisfied our success wasn't a fluke and that we had the infrastructure built to accommodate more films. This was very different from what ro*co had done in the world of foreign distribution -- we had entered a retail landscape with manufacturing costs, inventory, shipping, sales tax and customer service. We focused on the infrastructure and about a year and a half later we were ready to take on more films. It should be noted that we no longer act as sales agents for films in the US - it really is a whole other animal. What is the size of the US educational market, or to put it another way, how much can a documentary film make in this market if it does really well? Is it $100,000, $500,000 or more? When we refer to the educational market, we are referring to more than just the sale of the public performance rights to colleges and universities. We also include the sale of the public performance rights to any community that might want to host a screening. That includes non-profits, corporations, NGOs, churches, mosques, military bases, learning centers, etc. So, really, the possibilities are limitless. There is always more that can be done. That's why we believe that having a focused campaign that identifies organizations that might want to host screenings is so important. In general, we'd like to see a film we take-on produce 50-100K in sales. Our most successful film to date has nearly reached a million dollars, including speaking fees. Why so successful? Largely, it is the right topic at the right time. It is a topic that truly affects us all: young and old, student, teacher, business owner, minister, man or woman. It is also consistently supported by an excellent social media campaign that engages on a daily basis. Your company has steadily increased its capabilities in the educational market, most recently with the launch of a new web site. Explain what led you to create this new site and what it provides to filmmakers and audiences. Over the past four years, we have seen the educational/semi-theatrical market grow and diversify, which has been tremendously exciting to watch. While the market used to mainly consist of visual media librarians at educational institutions, we have seen the semi-theatrical audience demographic grow significantly to include student groups, corporations, non-profit organizations, government orgs, religious groups, public libraries, community film series…the list could go on and on. So, after observing this shift, we wanted to update our site to reflect this new audience that was seeking out our films. ro*co films educational website. While the previous site was easy to understand and navigate for a very niche audience of buyers, we knew that it could be confusing and complicated for an average citizen wanting to show one of our films for their community. So, with the new site, we make it much easier for people to learn about hosting a screening, find answers to questions, and to purchase the proper licensing to host an event. We have found that many people still think the only way to see or show a film is either in a commercial theater or in their home, so this new website helps us to empower people to take action, host an event of their own, and engage their community. And the great thing is that our new website also includes highly sophisticated event planning and management tools, so once a public performance license is purchased, people can use our website to promote, organize, and execute their event as well as track rsvps. And because they use our website, it allows us to keep better track of where screenings are happening and also to stay in touch with screening attendees, keep them engaged, and possibly encourage them to host additional screenings in the future. The new site also allows for a much higher level of content and contact management. We can now more effectively control each film's page, which allows for easy manipulation of pricing, posting new information, and linking to current campaigns, articles, videos, etc related to the film's message. Also, because we talk to so many different types of people each day related to so many different films or topics, we love that the new website allows us to better target, track, organize, and communicate with potential and current buyers for our films. We can now, in one place (our website) communicate with people via email, Facebook, twitter, texting, and we can also encourage our supporters to recruit their friends and colleagues to host screenings of our films and get involved. So, our communication can now have this ripple effect, where we are able to reach people and communities in our periphery that we never would've reached before. We know that our success lies in our ability to activate, broaden, and respect the growing community of people who take interest in our films, and the new website helps us to do just that. I encourage your readers to take a look at www.rocoeducational.com.]]> Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Annie Roney, interviewed by Chris Dorr 2013-05-10T16:00:31+00:00 Julia Bacha is the director, producer, and writer of Budrus, which received a Sundance Documentary Film Grant in 2009. The past few years have brought tremendous achievements to documentary films focused on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. From Academy Award nominations (5 Broken Cameras and The Gatekeepers) to top prizes at Sundance (The Law in These Parts) to a Peabody Award (My Neighbourhood, which I co-directed with Rebekah Wingert-Jabi), films on this issue are clearly in the midst of an exciting period of recognition and success. But amidst the celebrations, it’s worth asking what this success means in the long run. Regardless of how many accolades they stack up, or how many viewers they reach, what guarantee is there that these films are doing any more than generating buzz and drawing short-lived press attention? Put differently, how can documentary filmmakers working on long-standing social and political issues ensure that their work is well poised to move the needle on their chosen topic in a significant way? These have been some of the central questions we’ve been asking ourselves at Just Vision since we began our work nearly ten years ago. As a nonprofit committed to increasing the power and legitimacy of Palestinians and Israelis involved in nonviolent efforts to end the occupation and the conflict, we recognized the advantages of film early on: as an immersive storytelling medium, it has the rare capacity to allow large numbers of people to briefly suspend disbelief, and invest themselves in a particular narrative, even if it happens to fall beyond the confines of their traditional political perspectives. It also takes viewers beyond the platitudes that often dominate discourse on controversial issues, and allows them to examine the implications of a particular topic on a human scale. But while recognizing these benefits, we also knew that without a targeted, strategic outreach plan that went beyond initial distribution, film would fall short as an effective tool for change. Our feature-length documentary, Budrus,tells the story of a Palestinian community organizer who succeeded in uniting Palestinians of all factions together with Israelis in a nonviolent movement to save his village of Budrus from destruction by Israel’s Separation Barrier. We made the film with the explicit goals of putting Palestinian and Israeli nonviolence efforts at the center of local and international discourse about the conflict, as well as building the capacity of nonviolent activists in the field by ensuring they gain traction within their own societies and abroad. Since Budrus’s release just over three years ago, we have learnt valuable lessons about the ways in which socially and politically oriented films can be designed to have a lasting impact, from early production stages, through more advanced phases of distribution, outreach and evaluation. Here are some of the central guiding principles we took away from that process, and which now stand at the core of our work at Just Vision: Before production, research and analyze the field thoroughly. In the case of Budrus, we began planning the film after several years of studying the needs and challenges faced by hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian peacebuilders and nonviolence activists. In over 400 interviews, these activists identified their main challenge as “invisibility” and a lack of attention from their own societies and the international community. It also became clear to us that for fair, honest and effective negotiations to take place, the imbalance of power between Israelis and Palestinians would have to be addressed, and that the best way for that to be achieved would be through a Palestinian-led grassroots nonviolent movement. We also recognized that there was a common misconception amongst Israeli and international audiences that Palestinians had never tried using nonviolence, and a parallel misconception amongst Palestinians that based on past experience, nonviolence has no chance of ending occupation and guaranteeing their freedom. Clearly define the change you’re trying to make with your film, and the impact you’re uniquely positioned to create on your issue. As we were making Budrus, we knew we weren’t immediately going to change government policy in the US or in the Middle East vis-à-vis the conflict, nor did we expect that a film would catalyze a mass grassroots nonviolent movement overnight. But we did believe we could, for the first time, provide a model of successful local nonviolent resistance that Palestinians and Israelis could relate to and draw lessons from. We also believed we could change the narrative in the international community from one that was saying, “If only the Palestinians tried nonviolence, there would be peace.” to one that asks “What can we do to support those Palestinians and Israelis who are engaged in nonviolent resistance right now?” Find a compelling story. At the heart of any successful film is a powerful story. And a story should be just that: a narrative with a beginning, middle, and end, powerful protagonists that audiences can identify with, and a dramatic arc that is able to capture and hold viewers’ intellectual and emotional attention. A film seeking to create change on a difficult issue should not try to provide a definitive historical overview, nor present an op-ed style argument. With Budrus, we were lucky to find a textbook example of a story that was compelling on multiple counts: the central protagonists were a charismatic father and daughter who spearheaded a successful nonviolent campaign in their village, while the campaign itself included the leadership and participation of women, unity across Palestinian factional divides, and the participation of Israelis in a Palestinian-led nonviolent resistance movement. Before releasing your film, build a detailed outreach strategy that allows you to be proactive in bringing the message to your key target audiences. For any filmmaker who has just released a film and who is experiencing some measure of success, the temptation can be great to respond to every screening request that comes in. While bringing the film to a wide variety of audiences is important, those seeking to create social and political change with their film should carefully consider which audiences are most crucial to shifting deep-seated beliefs and narratives. Likewise, trusted messengers for these key communities should be brought on board early in the filmmaking process, and consulted even before production is complete. Given that our goals with Budrus were to build the capacity of activists in the field, and increase public awareness in Palestinian, Israeli and American society about the existence of successful nonviolence initiatives on the ground, we defined our key target audiences as local and international media, Palestinians facing similar challenges to the residents of the village of Budrus, public intellectuals, educators and community leaders in Palestinian, Israeli and American societies. With these audiences in mind, we determined that leveraging a high-profile festival and theatrical release of the film, and the widespread media coverage that comes with it, would be the best way to gain the attention of the key influencers we were hoping to reach. Find an effective way to measure your film’s impact, and draw the necessary lessons for your next project. This is perhaps the most crucial part of the documentary filmmaking process, and one that is too often overlooked. With Budrus, we measured success both by soliciting qualitative feedback from the range of audiences we came into contact with (hearing, for example, from a Palestinian village that was so galvanized after watching the film that they had one of their most organized and spirited protests ever the following day, or from an Israeli-American for whom the film served as a central catalyst to become more involved as an activist living in Jerusalem), and by allowing a major public relations firm to conduct an independent audit on the media impact of the film: Strategy One, a daughter company of Edelman, the world’s largest public relations firm, analyzed all of the English-language media coverage relating to the village of Budrus before and after the film’s release. The results showed that while there had been some limited media coverage of events in Budrus prior to the release of the film, nearly all of that coverage was conducted through a law and order lens, treating the protests in Budrus as disturbances of the peace. On the other hand, after the release of the film, most of the media items incorporated the key message we had laid out early in the production process: that the people of Budrus were engaged in a nonviolent struggle to save their lands and olive trees. The study showed conclusively that beyond putting Budrus on the map, the film successfully shifted the media narrative about events in the village from one about chaotic riots to one about a strategic nonviolent campaign. - Few moments are more powerful than those when a film manages to shift the way a person looks at the world. But for that shift to translate into broader political and social change, the planned trajectory of a film must go well beyond initial release stages. For filmmakers to bring their audiences along on a particular issue, they must first know very clearly where they are trying to go.]]> Artist Services, Case Studies, Documentary, Independent Film, Producing, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Stories of Change, Stories of Change Home Page, Stories of Change Indexes, Marketing Julia Bacha 2013-04-13T01:05:45+00:00 Today’s Google+ Hangout featured Topspin Media Senior Vice President of Marketing Bob Moczydlowsky, filmmaker and founder of The Webby Awards Tiffany Shlain, and Sundance's Chris Horton and Joseph Beyer. It was educational and entertaining discussion on the evolution and explosion of Direct-to-Fan Distribution (D2F). The D2F model allows artists to create interest in their work directly with fans, develop relationships with their fans, and sell directly to them through various platforms. In case you missed it, here is a quick review: For the past few years, Sundance’s Chris Horton and Joseph Beyer have developed Sundance’s amazing Artist Services program that offers direct-to-fan marketing and distribution tools for filmmakers. Explore all of Artist Services’ resources and helpful articles. Artist Services has supported a number of films including the 2012 Award Winning Sundance Film Festival Documentary Detropia and Indie Game - The Movie. Bob Moczydlowsky, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Topspin Media, offered useful advice for filmmakers. His article on Stacy Peralta’s Bones Brigade: An Autobiography explains why Peralta embraced the new direct-to-fan model by retaining his rights and distributing the film himself. Read it here. Tiffany Shlain, who was named by Newsweek as one of the “Women Shaping the 21st Century,” provided valuable tips on marketing films and building relationships with fans through social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Shlain’s website is a great resource for any independent filmmaker. During the Google+ Hangout, Sundance’s featured guests recommended a number of film case studies including 2013 Sundance Film Festival Selection Sound City and 2012 Sundance Audience Award Winning film Sleepwalk With Me that can help filmmakers build a successful direct-to-fan distribution campaign. If you’re an independent filmmaker, their talk on direct-to-fan distribution provided valuable insight on the process of distributing films outside of the traditional model. Watch today’s Google+ Hangout on Youtube.]]> Artist Services, Entertainment Industry, Artist Services, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution, Partners, Topspin Media Sundance Institute 2013-01-21T01:29:50+00:00 Sundance hosted its first Google+ Hangout that was broadcasted live earlier today featuring four of the New Frontier artists. It was the first hangout in a series of eight Google+ Hangouts happening live at 2 pm throughout the festival. The hangout guests today were Jigar Mehta, Yung Jake, Gregory Bayne, and Brigitte Dale. In addition to discussing the evolving landscape of transmedia art and tools for artists, they explained their various projects. Rap artist Yung Jake has two installments called E.m-bed.de/d and Augmented Real at the New Frontier gallery in this year’s Festival. Yung Jake has become an Internet sensation thanks to his website http://e.m-bed.de/d/ and intriguing style. He also has his own iTunes App (http://bit.ly/YungJake) Jigar Mehta and Brigitte Dale participated in Sundance Institute’s first ever New Frontier Story Lab at the Sundance Resort in 2011. Robert Redford, President & Founder of Sundance Institute, said, “The New Frontier Story Lab is a rare opportunity for these artists to explore their concepts and consider the impact they may have on how stories are experienced in the future.” At the 2011 New Frontier Story Lab, Jigar Mehta worked on his interactive documentary project that tells the story of the first 18 days of the Egyptian revolution through various media generated by users on the front line.  During the hangout, Mehta explained that he created a platform that, “built a community of young Egyptian activists and journalists who are going to work with us to go out there and talk to people to capture their stories and then get them on the site.” You can explore his project here: http://beta.18daysinegypt.com/ Brigitte Dale is a New Frontier Story Lab alumni. She has written/produced/hosted content for AOL, ABC Family, Ford Motor Company, Rogue/Relativity Media and NASA. Currently, she has been working on a hardcover book that has been funded online by hundreds of people. Click out this link to explore her project: http://www.indiegogo.com/bedtimebook Gregory Bayne who attended the 2012 New Frontier Story Lab talked about the amazing project he did with Cory McAbee called “Captain Ahab’s Motorcycle Club”. New Frontier at Sundance is a social and creative space that showcases media installations, multimedia performances, transmedia experiences, panel discussions, and more. If your in Park City during the Sundance Film Festival, stop by The Yard to check out the New Frontier installments. Don’t miss the Google+ Hangout tomorrow- Kickstarter School (Experts Analyze $100 Million Bucks of Film Funding. RSVP for the event here: http://bit.ly/SundanceHangout2 For more information about the New Frontier Artists and Sundance Institute’s New Frontier Story Lab, take a look at these Sundance articles: http://www.sundance.org/stories/article/transmedia-in-the-mountains-sundance-launches-new-frontier-lab/ http://www.sundance.org/press-center/release/sundance-institute-announces-first-ever-new-frontier-story-lab-october-23-2/]]> Artist Services, New Frontier, Sundance Institute Lab, Artist Services, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Marketing Sundance Institute 2013-01-19T02:50:18+00:00 Indie Game: The Movie has quickly developed a name not just as a must-see documentary but also as a film pioneer in the world of distribution. Recently, I had a Skype chat with Co-directors James Swirsky and Lisanne Pajot . The documentary darlings talked about their indie film and its truly indie journey to audiences. Swirsky and Pajot did corporate commercial work together for five years and that eventually blossomed into doing their first feature. "We thought it would take one year, but it ended up taking two. I can't imagine working another way, we have a wonderful overlapping and complimentary skill set, " said Pajot. "We both edited this film, we both shot this film. It creates this really fluid organic way of working. It's kind of the result of 5 or 6 years of working together. I don't think you could get a two person team doing an independent film working like we did on day one. It's stressful at times but the benefits are absolutely fantastic, " said Swirsky. According to Swirsky, Kickstarter covered 40% of the budget. "We used it to 'kickstart', we asked for $15000 on our first campaign which we knew would not make the film, but it really got things going. The rest of the budget was us, personal savings."  The team used Kickstarter twice; the first in 2010 asking for $15,000 and ended up with $23,341 with 297 backers. On the second campaign in 2011, they asked for $35,000 and raised $71,335 with 1,559 backers. The hard work, dedication, and talent paid off. Indie Game: The Movie was selected to premiere in the World Documentary Competition section at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival winning Pajot and Swirsky the World Cinema Documentary Film Editing Award . "[Sundance] speaks to the independent spirit. It's kind of the best fit, the dream fit for the film. Just being a filmmaker you want to premiere your film at Sundance. That's where you hear about your heroes," noted Swirsky. "Never before in our entire careers have we felt so incredibly supported...They know how to treat you right and not just logistics, it's more 'we want to help you with this project and help you next time.' It was overwhelming because we've never had that. We've just never been exposed that," interjected Pajot They hired a sales agent upon their acceptance into Sundance and the film generated tons of buzz before it arrived at the festival resulting in a sales frenzy. The filmmakers wanted a simultaneous worldwide digital release,  but theatrical distributors weren't willing to give up digital rights so they opted for a self release. "There were a lot of offers, they approached us to purchase various rights. We felt we needed to get it out fairly quickly and in the digital way. A lot of the deals we turned down were in a little more of the traditional route. None of them ended up being a great fit," said Pajot. Several people were stunned when this indie doc about indie videogame developers opted to sell their film for remake rights to Scott Rudin and HBO. Pajot explained, "He saw the trailer and reached out a week or so before Sundance. That was sort of out of left field because it wasn't something we were pursuing." Swirsky added, "They optioned to potentially turn the concept into a TV show about game development...As a person who watches stuff on TV, I want this to exist. I want to see what these guys do with it." The deal still left the door open for a more typical theatrical release. However that was only the start of their plan. "We had spoken to Gary Hustwit (Helvetica). We sort of have an understanding of how he organized his own tours. We had to make our decision whether that was something we wanted to utilize. Five days after Sundance, we decided we would and were on the road 2 weeks after... Before Sundance this was how we envisioned rolling out...[We looked at] Kevin Smith and Louis C.K. and what they're doing. We are not those guys and we don't have that audience, but knowing core audience is out there, doing this made sense," said Swirsky. They proceeded to go on a multi-city promotional tour starting with seven dates and so far they have had 15 special events screenings of which 13 were sold out! This is separate from 37 theaters across Canada doing a one night only event. They also settled on a small theatrical release in NYC and LA.  When talking about the theaters and booking, they said theaters saw the sellout screenings and that prompted interest despite the fact that the film was in digital release. They accomplish all of this with a thrifty mindset. "P&A was not a budgetary item we put aside and if an investment was required, we would dip into pre orders. We didn't put aside a marketing budget for it," said Swirsky. Regarding the pre order revenue, they sold a cool $150,000 in DVD pre-orders in the lead up to release of the film. From this money, they funded their theatrical tour. While the theatrical release was small, it generated solid enough numbers to get held over in multiple cities and provided for vital word of mouth that will ultimately make the film profitable. The grosses were only reported for their opening weekend, but they continued to pack the houses in later weeks."I don't look back at the box office. The tour was more profitable than the theatrical...They both have the benefits, having theatrical it gets a broader audience. It was more a commercial thing than box office," said Swirsky. "We are still getting inquiries from theaters. They still want to book it despite the fact it's out there digitally," said Pajot. "We had this sort of hype machine happening. We didn't put out advertising. Everything was through our mailing that started with the 300 on our first Kickstarter and through Twitter," said Swirsky. Now the team has over 20,000 people on their mailing list and over 10,000 Twitter followers.  In order to keep this word of mouth and enthusiasm going, the filmmakers released 88 minutes of exclusive content - most of which didn't make the final cut - to their funders, took creative suggestions from their online forum and sent out updates on the games the subjects of their film were developing over the course of the two years the film was in production. Following the success the film has enjoyed in various settings, Indie Game: The Movie premiered on three different digital distribution platforms. If you were to try and guess what they were though, you would most likely only get one right. While, it is available on the standard iTunes, the other two means of access are much more experimental and particularly appropriate for this doc. It is only the second film to be distributed by VHX as a direct DRM-free download courtesy of their, 'VHX For Artists' platform. Finally, this film is reaching gamers directly through Steam which is a video game distribution platform run by Valve. This sterling doc is also only the second film to be sold through the video game service, where it was able to be pre-ordered for $8.99 as opposed to the $9.99 it costs across all platforms. This is perhaps the perfect example of the changing landscape of independent film distribution. Every film has a potential niche and most of these can arguably be reached more effectively through means outside the standard distribution model. Why should a fan of couponing have to go through hundreds of films on Netflix before even finding out a documentary about couponing exists, when it could be promoted on a couponing website? As they are going into uncharted territory, both Pajot and Swirsky avoided making any bold predictions."It's just wait and see. It's an experiment because we're the first movie on Steam. We're really interested to look at and talk about in the future. I don't want to make predictions...I do think documentary lends itself to that kind of marketing though. We're trying to not just be niche but there is power in that core audience. They are very easy to find online," said Swirsky. Just because they are pursuing a bold strategy doesn't mean they were any less cost conscious. "The VHX stuff, it was a collaboration, so there were no huge costs. Basically subtitles, a little publicity costs from Von Murphy PR and Strategy PR who helped us with theatrical. Those guys made sense to bring on," said Pajot. "A lot of our costs were taken up by volunteers. If they help us do subtitles, they can have a ticket event, a screening in their country," added Swirsky. They also note that a large amount of their profit has been in pre-orders. 10,000 people have pre-ordered one of their three DVD options priced at $9.99, $24.99 and a special edition DVD for $69.99 tied with digital. While the film focused on a select few indie game developers, they interviewed 20 different developers and the additional footage is part of the Special Edition DVD/Blu-Ray. That might explain why it's their highest seller. All this doesn't mean that any of the dozens of other options are no longer usable. Quite the contrary,  they have also taken advantage of the Sundance Artist Services affiliations to go on a number of more traditional digital sites. Increased views of a film even if on non traditional platforms can mean increased web searches and awareness and could be used to drive up sales on mainstay platforms. The real winner though is ultimately the audience. For the majority of the world that doesn't go to Sundance or Cannes each year, this is how they can discover small films that were made with them in mind. The HBO deal aside, this is bound to be one incredibly profitable documentary that introduces a whole new crowd to quality art-house cinema. "We are still booking community screenings. If people want to book, they can contact us...We are thinking maybe we might do another shorter tour at some point," said Pajot. Here's to the independent film spirit, alive and well.]]> Artist Services, Case Studies, Artist Services, Distribution Orly Ravid, Bryan Glick and Sheri Candler 2012-08-13T18:49:13+00:00 An African Election illuminates a beacon of hope for Africa and for the value and vitality of democracy today." - Sundance Film Festival My first memory about politics in Africa began with the execution of former heads of state in Ghana, live on television in 1979. I remember the dimly lit shack, a flickering black and white television, which my friends and I were glued to and the sound of the shots as the bodies went limp. Thirty-three years later, I am still searching for the footage, not very successfully, since the archives have burnt down and all the material have been destroyed, so I am told. All I am left with are these memories, snapshots of a time when corruption was rampant amongst the military leadership and a young Lt. Jerry Rawlings was about to rewrite Ghana’s political history. Rawlings, a charismatic lieutenant was instrumental in the uprising against the leadership and its overthrow. Time flies and it is 4 years since I began filming An African Election, a feature documentary about the 2008 presidential elections in Ghana. Here I am sitting on a plane from Los Angeles to Ghana where I am planning to take An African Election back on the road with a truck and a movie screen to show this film to my fellow Ghanaians. I never thought I would end up doing this - A Political Safari - a mobile cinema outreach campaign to support Africans in democracy building. Was I completely out of my mind?! This kind of work was for the various organizations that flood Africa, claiming they can save it! But save it from whom? A friend once said to me he felt Africa was the cemetery of NGO’s. So why on earth did I think Africa was waiting for another project like mine? If in all these years there had been so little development, comparatively speaking, why should I dare believe that I, with my film, would make a difference? On March 4th of this year we held the Ghana premier of An African Election in a theater in the capital city of Accra with a thousand people watching their 2008 presidential elections through MY eyes. The audience was charged as they compared their recollection of the events with what was unfolding on the screen. At times you could hear a pin drop and then suddenly, a thunder of voices would comment in disbelief or excitement. We had touched a nerve. We had captured footage that revealed the behind-the-scenes intrigue of electioneering, the intensity of the vote counting process, and the political battle. This was something no cameras had ever been able to do in Africa. Yes, I documented events that almost brought down our country. But, it also showed how we were able to steer Ghana through this political storm. For the audience to see this clearly portrayed - this was the most powerful example of democracy. Given the recent tragic death of president Atta Mills the country is facing a new reshuffling of power, which might threaten democratic stability and may adversely affect the upcoming presidential elections in December 2012. Now, more than ever, it is time to take An African Election back home to Ghana so I can share the story of an election that made history. In an age where we have seen too many failures, this project exemplifies an African success story. Help us take this story on the road by supporting our Political Safari Kickstarter campaign. If we can raise enough money and support, we will be touring the entire country, including the remotest places, for two solid months, bringing the film in 5 local languages to inspire and support Africans in democracy building. Please join us. Akwaaba! About the author: Jarreth Merz - Director/Producer Jarreth Merz is an award-winning director, producer and actor. He grew up in Ghana, Germany and Switzerland and speaks five languages fluently. Merz has been making documentaries since 2007. His film An African Election premiered in the world cinema documentary competition at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for the Film Independent Spirit Awards in 2012. He is winner of the Etat D¹Esprit at the Visions Du Reel Film Festival, winner of the Grand Jury Award at the Atlanta Film Festival and most recently won the 2012 Africa Movie Academy Awards for best African documentary. He was invited to speak at TEDGlobal in 2011. In 1996 Merz co-founded the non-profit organization GTA - GERMAN THEATER ABROAD and for six years produced theater festivals, productions and staged readings on both sides of the Atlantic. He is also known for his portrayal of Simon of Cyrene in Mel Gibson¹s The Passion of the Christ and his recurring role as Charles Baruani in ER. He is currently working on a follow up documentary on the 2012 presidential elections in Ghana. Websites http://anafricanelection.com http://politicalsafari.org]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Documentary Film Program, Sundance Film Festival, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Jarreth Merz, director, An African Election 2012-07-25T03:51:54+00:00 Jessica Oreck is a filmmaker whose work focuses on issues of ethnobiology. Her first feature, "Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo" was released in the US and UK in 2009. Her short film "Venus" played the Sundance Film Festival in 2011. We have 9 days left on Kickstarter and $20,000 to go. We also have some crazy great rewards and an amazing film that we want to get out to audiences like you. This little piece was written to give you a sense of how personal the project is and how it got started – but now the film is in your hands, and it can only be finished with your help. Your help, your friend’s help, your mom’s help. Make a pledge, spread the word, and help us reach our goal! I love old Westerns. The character of the cowboy is infinitely appealing to me. I love the idea of a man alone in a great expanse of space, in tune with the weather and the needs of his animals. He knows the stars and the landscape almost innately. He is separate from the driving rush of civilization, his time exists for daylight and moonlight. He doesn’t have a Blackberry. I wanted to find that type of man (or woman!) – a modern cowboy. When my parents moved to Helsinki, I spent about three weeks traveling around the north of Finland, searching for the manifestation of this idealized concept of the modern cowboy, but I was consistently disappointed. Knowing that I was getting frustrated, my mom, helpful as always, said something along the lines of, “Well, there’s this really nice man down at the farmer’s market who sells reindeer meat, I’m sure he knows a family of herders you could get in touch with…” I was skeptical, but I did end up meeting “the nice man from the farmer’s market,” Jari Etelälahti, in April 2010. Before I could even open my mouth, he said, “I know just the family. You’ll love them. I’ll meet you in Rovaniemi in two weeks.” Two weeks and plenty of indecision later, I meet Jari in the parking lot of a hotel in Rovaniemi, the largest town in Lapland, more than thirteen hours from Helsinki by train. We get into his car, almost total strangers. A few hours later we arrive at the house of a man named Hannu. Hannu says something in Finnish. The three of us climb into his car and continue north. An hour later we are in the middle of the woods. We switch to snowmobiles. An hour later we are at a tiny cabin even deeper in the woods. There is no electricity and no running water. Hannu lights a fire. I shiver. And then I hear the sound of a snowmobile approaching. Moments later, Aarne Aatsinki saunters in. The three men sip coffee and speak Finnish. Without a word of explanation, I am loaded onto the back of Aarne’s snowmobile. I don’t know where to put my hands. His snowmobile is obviously for hard riding, not carrying tourists. I wrap my arms around him in the most polite way I can figure. We zip across frozen lakes, up mountainsides, take in vistas. We reach a giant fence, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. “Russia,” Aarne says, pointing to the other side. Later in our ride, we are stopped by some border guards who greet Aarne and skeptically study my papers. More mountains, more vistas. And then, without warning, Aarne stands up quickly, leaving me dangling on the back of his snowmobile with nothing to hold onto. I hear Aarne say quietly, “O-ho” and then we are falling down an incredibly steep, though thankfully short, cliff. We land and Aarne turns off the snowmobile. I dismount ungracefully, shaking. He laughs at me, but in a protective way, while he checks his engine. As I stand there, trembling, something catches Aarne’s eye and he hikes a short distance up the cliff. He waves me over, points to a track in the snow, and follows the trail to a tiny opening I hadn’t even noticed. Producing a flashlight from within his thick clothing, he peers into a cave and says to me, “Ahma.” I nod, mystified. It starts to snow. Thickly. Aarne turns his snowmobile and we meet up with Jari and Hannu at a nearby hut. Aarne lights a fire and someone fills a kettle with water. In a few minutes we are all drinking coffee. Jari explains to me that, on our way off the cliff, we must have startled a wolverine (one of my first Finnish words: ahma) leaving his lair. In Finland, wolverines are highly protected animals and it is illegal even track them. Jari expresses his concern for Aarne should the border guards see his footprints. I ask Jari how long we’ll be here. Jari ask Aarne. Aarne pulls open the door a few inches, looks into the blank, white sky and shrugs his answer in Finnish. “Two hours,” Jari translates. Two hours later, nearly to the minute, the snow stops, the sky clears, and I am back on Aarne’s snowmobile, Jari and Hannu behind us. Aarne stops several times simply to listen. It always sounds silent to me, but at one point he turns off the path and we crest a hill. Dozens of reindeer are spread out below us – my first sighting of the animals in the wild. Aarne eventually takes me back to the tiny cabin where we met and shakes my hand goodbye. I tell him I will return in September to meet his family and follow them for a year. He seems to think this is a good idea, and smiles – though I am pretty sure he had no idea what he was getting himself into...]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Film Festival News, Partners, Kickstarter, Artist Alumni, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Jessica Oreck 2012-05-02T17:30:55+00:00 Can you imagine spending 12 years shooting one film about your own family?  Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson, a Brooklyn-based husband and wife filmmaking team, have been doing just that since 1999. Their film, American Promise, is about race, education, and achievement; it will air on POV in 2013. Michèle and Joe participated in the 2010 and Documentary Composers Lab and the Documentary Edit Lab. Visit the American Promise Kickstarter page today to help support post-production. When people first learn that we’ve been filming our son, Idris, and his best friend, Seun, since they entered kindergarten in 1999, reactions usually range from sympathy tinged with judgment (“I would never have the courage to put my family through that!”) to admiring disbelief – usually from other filmmakers (“I can’t believe you have the endurance and tenacity to go through it. You guys are brave”).  Well, we can’t believe we put our families through this and we also can’t believe we’ve had the endurance to get through 12 years of filming. It has been truly difficult balancing our filmmaker hat with the responsibilities of parenthood. That said, our biggest concern has always been about our son’s own agency in this project. Our film is about Idris and Seun’s experience as African American boys attending a prestigious, predominantly white prep school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. This is not another Waiting for Superman; access to opportunity is not the issue. American Promise opens with Idris and Seun beginning their education at one of New York’s finest schools, but over 12 years, their educational journey proves to be more complicated than any of us had anticipated. And it’s all caught on camera.  In an attempt to chronicle the coming of age of these boys, we’ve been challenged as filmmakers, and as parents. We often wanted to turn off the camera and spare the boys during times of discomfort, pain, and uncertainty - from fights over homework and times of personal tragedy to every day teenage awkwardness. But we committed ourselves to this challenging filmmaking process, and now after 12 years, we are finally going to give audiences a never-before-seen look into the lives of two boys growing up over the span of two hours. Airing on POV in 2013, American Promise will be the central pillar of a transmedia campaign that will use film and other media as tools to bring together forward-thinking nonprofits, foundations and leaders dedicated to empowering black males—creating change in young men and in the public consciousness. Help us finish American Promise. Five bucks is all we’re asking (that’s one latté). We have two more weeks to raise $40,000. If you can’t donate, please spread the word and let your network know about the film. Thank you.]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Documentary Film Program, Independent Film, New Movie, Partners, Kickstarter, Race, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson 2012-02-27T00:57:46+00:00 Simon Pulman works for Starlight Runner Entertainment in New York City, specializing in digital strategy and business development. He explores the emerging world of transmedia storytelling and digital business models on his blog at Transmythology.com, and can be followed on twitter at @simonpulman. If you follow the video game industry, you’ll doubtless have seen news of Double Fine’s outstandingly successful Kickstarter campaign. Seeking to raise $400,000 for a new adventure game, Double Fine has so far raised $520,000 (from almost 12,000 backers) in less than two days. With 33 days of the campaign to go, it’s not unforeseeable that it could exceed a million dollars in total donations by its end. Part of the reason that Double Fine’s campaign is so exceptional is because it is the first major games studio to finance a game (a new IP at that) through Kickstarter. As such, it sets the stage for an entirely new paradigm in the industry that eschews traditional publishers almost entirely. As Double Fine puts it: Big games cost big money. Even something as “simple” as an Xbox LIVE Arcade title can cost upwards of two or three million dollars. For disc-based games, it can be over ten times that amount. To finance the production, promotion, and distribution of these massive undertakings, companies like Double Fine have to rely on external sources like publishers, investment firms, or loans. And while they fulfill an important role in the process, their involvement also comes with significant strings attached that can pull the game in the wrong directions or even cancel its production altogether. Crowd-sourced fundraising sites like Kickstarter have been an incredible boon to the independent development community. They democratize the process by allowing consumers to support the games they want to see developed and give the developers the freedom to experiment, take risks, and design without anyone else compromising their vision. It’s the kind of creative luxury that most major, established studios simply can’t afford. At least, not until now. A Bonus for Fans It is important to note that Double Fine is not merely pre-selling copies of its game at $15 a pop. It’s selling something critically important in the digital age: intimacy. When players donate to the project, they are granted access to an unprecedented “behind-the-scenes” experience: 2 Player Productions will be documenting the creative process and releasing monthly video updates exclusively to the Kickstarter backers. This documentary series will strive to make the viewer as much a part of the process as possible by showing a game grow from start to finish, with all the passion, humor, and heartbreak that happens along the way. Double Fine is committed to total transparency with this project, ensuring it is one of the most honest depictions of game development ever conceived. This level of increased transparency through the development process is something I’ve been in favor of for some time, across all parts of the entertainment industry. I applaud Double Fine wholeheartedly for understanding that, in an age of instant feedback and fan communities, the relationship you have with your audience is the most important asset you possess. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the video Double Fine produced to accompany its campaign is both refreshingly candid and – crucially – consistent with the established humorous tone of the company’s games. Building a Community The other important element here is the relationship that fans have with each other. In the age of social media, people who like things will immediately and automatically seek out others who like it. This is no longer a niche activity – look at the communities around creative content that have been generated by tools like Pinterest. Again, Double Fine does not merely acknowledge the importance of fan community – it embraces it: There will be a private online community set up for the backers to discuss the project with the devs and submit their thoughts and feelings about the game’s content and direction, sometimes even voting on decisions when the dev team can’t decide. Backers will also have access to help test the game once a beta is available. Once the game is finished, backers will receive the completed version in the available format of their choice. This is a staggering development that blows the traditional testing/focus group model to pieces. In the past, I’ve admired the willingness of companies like Naughty Dog to acknowledge fan feedback. However, this takes it to a new level by empowering fans to exchange ideas with each other during the development process and even weigh in with valuable feedback. Kudos to Double Fine for understanding that when fans feel appreciated and listened to, their loyalty to the underlying brand and creator grows exponentially. The Power of Pedigree Of course, it’s impossible to look at the success of the Double Fine campaign in isolation from the company’s long-term pedigree. Double Fine and its employees have spent an enormous amount of time creating a first-class reputation and body of work that encourages fans to react instantly like this. Double Fine principle Tim Schafer created Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango – three of the most beloved adventure games of all time – while the company’s game Psychonauts is now widely considered one of the most underrated games of all time. Of course, Double Fine will have to ensure that the product they release fulfills fans’ expectations. Thus, there can be no denying that tools such as Kickstarter currently benefit established creators and brands most. While we have seen some fantastic successes by emerging artists on the platform, none have touched the immediacy of Double Fine’s campaign. Thus, it could be considered that the optimal long-term plan for success for most artists and creative teams currently looks like something like this: Establish reputation through products championed by traditional media and distribution. Nurture fan community and build relationship with fans. Leverage reputation and relationships into a direct distribution paradigm with managed costs and greater control of IP and revenue streams. The Next Questions I have two principle questions for the future of services like Kickstarter and IndieGoGo (notwithstanding the issue of allowing small investment/equity participation, which is another can of worms). The first is whether Kickstarter could be used to fund something with a much bigger budget, escalating into the millions. Could you fund a “mini-major” feeling feature film of the kind Miramax used to specialize in the ’90s? (although you could argue that with falling production costs, you shouldn’t need to). Or would attempting something so big effectively destroy the spirit of what makes Kickstarter unique? As Double Fine says: Keeping the scale of the project this small accomplishes two things. First and foremost, Double Fine gets to make the game they want to make, promote it in whatever manner they deem appropriate, and release the finished product on their own terms. Secondly, since they’re only accountable to themselves, there’s an unprecedented opportunity to show the public what game development of this caliber looks like from the inside. Not the sanitized commercials-posing-as-interviews that marketing teams only value for their ability to boost sales, but an honest, in-depth insight into a modern art form that will both entertain and educate gamers and non-gamers alike. The second question is more important. While an established company like Double Fine understandably sees fans immediately flocking to donate, things become much more difficult for an emerging artist working on his or her first project. While you could argue that it is the responsibility of that artist to earn his or her reputation over time, I can’t help but wonder what kinds of tools Kickstarter could introduce to facilitate discovery and fundraising for less visible names. This will become increasingly important as more established names and studios see the success of the platform and begin migrating to it. So, I suppose, my second question is this: How can Kickstarter ensure that it remains a platform for the best ideas and projects, not merely the biggest names? I’m fascinating to see what the next couple of years brings. Link: Double Fine Adventure Kickstarter UPDATE: The Double Fine Kickstarter campaign just passed $1 million, becoming a phenomenon in its own right. A true watershed moment for Kickstarter, although it will surely spawn debate about to what degree it’s replicable by other projects. Originally published on Transmythology.com]]> Artist Services, Creative Funding, Artist Services, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Simon Pulman 2012-02-10T03:04:57+00:00 Jigar Mehta is a digital entrepreneur and video journalist. He is the co-founder of the collaborative storytelling platform GroupStream which powers his documentary project 18 Days in Egypt. Visit the 18 Days in Egypt Kickstarter page to help fund the hiring of young Egyptian journalists and students to travel throughout Egypt to collect stories from the last year. This project was part of the inaugural Sundance Institute New Frontier Story Lab. The entire 18 Days in Egypt team is in Cairo for the first anniversary of the Revolution. Little did we know that a major event would occur while we were here. One year exactly after the Battle of the Camels, when mounted thugs stormed into Cairo’s Tahrir Square and beat protesters, a soccer match erupted in violence leaving 74 dead. 18 Days in Egypt is an interactive documentary project that tells the story of the Egyptian Revolution, using the personal media created by Egyptians in the midst of their ongoing struggle. We want Egyptians to tell this story themselves, with their footage, their photos, their e-mails, their texts, even their Tweets and Facebook status updates, all created during the revolution. 18 Days in Egypt, which planned to deploy a team of young Egyptian journalists to collect stories and media fragments created around the events of the past year for an interactive documentary, changed course. Since the Egyptian freedom struggle continues today, 18 Days in Egypt is a living documentary—capturing the events of the revolution as it spirals forward. The fellows at 18 Days in Egypt have been in the field documenting the latest clashes between protesters and security forces. They have been collecting social media from protesters, and using it to create distinct story streams at www.18DaysinEgypt.com Events took a turn for the dramatic on February 1, when a soccer match between the al-Masry and al-Ahly teams turned deadly. In a matter of minutes, the death toll climbed from 5 to 20 to over 70. Our fellows gathered personal interviews and firsthand footage from on the ground to create a stream capturing little known details of the Ahly Massacre. The die hard soccer fans, known as Ultras, retaliated with marches against the military council, which they believe orchestrated the attacks on the pro-revolution Ultras. A funeral for the youngest killed in the attack—a 14-year-old!—was captured through the words of his friends just minutes before and after his funeral service. As the clashes continued, our fellows focused on stories from the frontlines, including those about women, shopkeepers who stay open despite being surrounded by violence, motorcycle ambulances, and the tough task of negotiating a truce. We have 6 fellows who are funded for 6 weeks to focus on stories in Cairo. That’s why we are raising funds through our Kickstarter campaign to fund the work of the fellows for an additional 6 months and to expand the program to 20 fellows. Our fellows are: Sara Elkamel, an Egyptian journalist living in Cairo; Nesma El Shazly, a political science graduate of Cairo’s American University; Mostafaa Sheshtawy, an engineer and citizen photo journalist; Mohamed Abd El-Hamid, student and young revolutionary, and Carmel Delshad, a multimedia journalist. Our fellows are back out today covering the personal stories on the frontlines of these clashes. We publish first to our twitter account so be sure to follow @18daysinegypt.]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Artist Services, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Jigar Mehta 2012-02-06T21:49:38+00:00 John E. Warnock is Co-Chairman of the Board of Directors of Adobe Systems, Inc., a company he co-founded in 1982 with Charles Geschke. Dr. Warnock was President of Adobe for his first two years and Chairman and CEO for his remaining 16 years at Adobe. Warnock has pioneered the development of graphics, publishing, Web and electronic document technologies that have revolutionized the field of publishing and visual communication. He is also a member of the Sundance Institute Board of Trustees. Over the past 25 years, technology advances have dramatically changed the fundamental structure of all media businesses. All of these transformations have had a common thread: The high cost of capital equipment and complex distribution systems have kept competitors out of the traditional media businesses, and kept profits high. For instance, in the newspaper businesses there is reliance on massive printing presses, reporter networks, paper sources, and complex distribution systems. In the Movie business, there are large studios, expensive camera and lighting equipment, film and processing laboratories, and relationships with networks of theaters. In the world of publishing, there are dependencies on prepress, presses and complex distribution. The music business depended on extensive recording studios, and distribution networks. Technology developments have changed all those barriers to entry. It all started in the printing and publishing area with the invention of the personal computer, the inexpensive laser printer, and desktop publishing software. This drastically reduced the cost of entry into the publishing arena. The growth of the Internet, and electronic publishing brought down the barriers of distribution. The desktop software dramatically reduced the cost of creating magazines, books and all other printed material. The arrival of the ubiquitous use of the Internet, the iPod, and iTunes allowed the transformation of the music industry. Records, tapes, and CDs are becoming artifacts of the past. Now, young artists use the Internet, YouTube, and Facebook to gain exposure. Desktop software is replacing the complex mixing equipment of the past. The advent of low-cost memory, high quality video technology, and high-bandwidth communication has changed all the cost characteristics of the moving picture industry. The Internet is changing the fundamental distribution mechanisms. Since its inception, Sundance has always believed in supporting, and promoting the voice of independent story telling. Now the direction of Sundance and the direction of technology are completely aligned. We actually are entering an age of the democratization of all media. Sundance’s role in this new age, is to insure that the cream rises to the top - that the artists are educated through the labs, that quality films are produced, that they gain financial support and that they receive effective distribution of the message. Originally, Sundance supported artists only through the labs. It role was to teach acting, directing, producing, and composing to aspiring film makers. Over the last ten years Sundance has funded documentaries thereby extending its assistance to film makers. Over the last year and a half, several new initiatives called ‘Artist Services,' under the leadership of Keri Putman, have extended Sundance’s effectiveness in helping artists. In addition to our documentary funding through the Institute, Sundance has sponsored over fifty projects and raised $1.5 million through Kickstarter (a public funding website). Seventeen of the films at Sundance this year were partially funded through Kickstarter. Through partnerships with iTunes, Amazon, Hulu, Netflix, Sundance NOW and YouTube, Sundance has arranged for the digital premieres of 13 new films. Technology is reducing the economic barriers between the artist and the audience. Sundance is trying to exploit the new technologies in every way it can to allow all the new talented voices to be heard.]]> Creative Funding, Entertainment Industry, Independent Film, New Frontier, Opinion, Technology, Artist Alumni, Artist Services, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Dr. John E. Warnock, Chairman of the Board, Adobe Systems Incorporated 2012-02-02T05:03:28+00:00 Kyle Henry is filmmaker using Kickstarter to fund his project FOURPLAY, an anthology of shorts including Fourplay: Tampa which is in this year's Sundance Film Festival. Click here to join the push to complete production on the feature anthology. So we're at Sundance, about to screen Fourplay: Tampa, one of the shorts that comprise our anthology of shorts feature FOURPLAY, and suddenly I'm a bit nervous. How will the audience react to this challenging and outrageous short? Each of the shorts in FOURPLAY pushes screen sex to new emotional boundaries, and with Tampa we're seeing how an "NC-17" slapstick farce about public restroom sex will go over.    GLBT audiences at our Outfest American premiere howled and squealed with laughter, but queer audiences might be more comfortable with the subject matter. I wasn't able to see the world premiere screening at Cannes' Directors' Fortnight. What will straight audiences think, raised as this generation has been with sanitized and promotional advertisements of queer life seen in mass media entertainment? Will they connect and care for our desperate hero, looking for love in all the wrong places? I can only hope they will relate to the experience of humilitating oneself for the chance at connection and/or love, and doing so in a way that's personal, even if highly unusual. The second reason I'm nervous is that we're using this Sundance opportunity to launch one last Kickstarter to fund the feature anthology. FOURPLAY's funding thus far has nearly exhausted our intimate circle of supporters, and the project needs to reach a wider level of support that perhaps Sundance exposure can provide. So we're "working it," mentioning the Kickstarter in every interview and Q&A. A $10 donation allows you to see Tampa online once the fund drive ends. Call it an mini-advance distribution/fundraising gamble, with Kickstarter offering not only fundraising but the opportunity for us to get part of the product itself to our fans early.   So, here we go. Take a breath, keep drinking water, and remember to keep focused on the mission of making sure people have the opportunity to see a work that will hopefully create a conversation about what stories we can tell each other about sex and sexual expression. We have until Feb 20th to make that a reality. Check out the video below and consider a $10 donation to bring a bit of Sundance to the privacy of you own home for some sexually healing.   PS - Well, maybe I don't have to be too nervous after all! See this great review by Michael Tully in Ted Hope's HAMMER TO NAIL site below. Still, these short are meant to provoke discussion, so totally prepared to engage with potential hostile responses.]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Documentary Film Program, Artist Services, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Kyle Henry 2012-01-22T21:43:14+00:00 The Sundance Film Festival is the biggest cultural event of the year in Utah and we want to make sure that everyone is involved. Every year we get questions about what films are appropriate for families to take their kids too. It's exciting to get these questions because it means that parents are exposing their families to the arts at a young age and cultivating them to be future film lovers, as well as introducing them to different cultures and social issues of global concern. This year we have pulled together a list of family friendly films, the very same films we are showing to High School students in the Festival High School Screening Program. Below is a list of films, their descriptions, and flags on pieces of content you might want to be aware of. The Atomic States of America   Documentary 92 minutes *Mild Language *Two instances of strong language Based on Kelly McMasters's memoir about growing up in a nuclear-reactor community, this stirring film illustrates the dire health consequences for many residents in Shirley, her Long Island hometown. Yet despite the known risks of utilizing nuclear power, our country's rapidly increasing energy needs are fueling a nuclear renaissance. Acutely topical-given the recent Fukushima disaster in Japan, The Atomic States of America convincingly encapsulates both the history of this allegedly clean source of energy and our collective denial of a potentially looming disaster at our aging sites. Firsthand narratives from people connected to the nuclear industry blend with the behind-the-scenes debacle of maintaining legitimate regulation. Potent, emotionally powerful, and highly revealing, Don Argott and Sheena Joyce's film does an outstanding job of opening our eyes to the reality of nuclear power. "We all live downstream from something," McMasters reminds us in this cautionary call to action. Queen of Versailles   Documentary100 minutes*Mild Language With the epic dimensions of a Shakespearean tragedy, The Queen of Versailles follows billionaires Jackie and David's rags-to-riches story to uncover the innate virtues and flaws of the American dream. We open on the triumphant construction of the biggest house in America, a sprawling, 90,000-square-foot mansion inspired by Versailles. Since a booming time-share business built on the real-estate bubble is financing it, the economic crisis brings progress to a halt and seals the fate of its owners. We witness the impact of this turn of fortune over the next two years in a riveting film fraught with delusion, denial, and self-effacing humor. Lauren Greenfield instinctively knows what questions to ask, when to ask them, and, more importantly, where to put her camera to mine this overflowing treasure of events. She constructs a series of glowing metaphors to concoct a fascinating character study of parents, children, pets, and household employees as their privileged existence turns upside down. The end result is a portrait of a couple who dared to dream big but lose, still maintaining their unique brand of humility. Finding North   80 minutesDocumentary*One instance of mild language America has lost its way in taking care of its own. The shocking fact is that one in six Americans doesn't get enough to eat on a regular basis. Even more disturbing is the fact that this new face of hunger is largely invisible. There are no breadlines in the streets, but increasing numbers of soup kitchens and food banks are feeding people who-though employed full-time-can't make ends meet. Finding North unveils the human stories behind the statistics: a rancher juggling two jobs and a small-town policeman rely on food pantries to survive between paychecks; a single working mom can't afford consistent meals for her children; a short-order cook must travel more than an hour to purchase fruits and vegetables. As it unravels the real societal costs and applies transparency to the causes of this hunger crisis in the richest country in the world, Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush's bracing film explores ways that we as a nation can correct this alarming and unnecessary state of affairs. We're Not Broke   81 minutes *Mild Language With the United States in the grip of the worst economic recession since the Great Depression and an unprecedented budget deficit, the conclusion that our country is broke seems unquestionable. At least that's what politicians and pundits want ordinary citizens to believe. Karin Hayes and Victoria Bruce's searing exposé reveals that, strangely absent from this rhetoric, is the infuriating fact that multibillion-dollar corporations are based in the U.S., make money from American consumers, and often even receive lucrative contracts from the government, yet pay nothing in U.S. income taxes. By exploiting tax-law loopholes and spending millions on lobbyists to pressure politicians to protect their interests, corporations pocket billions while the less-connected middle class disappears, and the poor get poorer. We're Not Broke explores how the government has allowed this inequality to develop and the growing wave of discontent that it has fostered. Presaging the larger wave of protests from the international Occupy movement, the film follows a number of activists who have had enough and are demanding that corporations finally pay their fair share. Chasing Ice   Documentary 74 minutes *Mild language *Two instances of strong lauguage When National Geographic photographer James Balog asked, "How can one take a picture of climate change?" his attention was immediately drawn to ice. Soon he was asked to do a cover story on glaciers that became the most popular and well-read piece in the magazine during the last five years. But for Balog, that story marked the beginning of a much larger and longer-term project that would reach epic proportions. In this breathtakingly beautiful documentary, filmmaker Jeff Orlowski follows the indomitable photographer as he brings to life the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS)-a massive photography project that placed 30 cameras across three continents to gather visual evidence of the Earth's melting ice. Chasing Ice tells the story of a visionary artist who, in facing his own mortality, bequeaths the magic of photography and the adventure of the expedition to a new generation and captures the most visible sign of climate change on the planet today. The Other Dream Team   Documentary 88 minutes English and Lithuanian with English subtitles *Mild language *Archival footage of USSR violence against Lithuanians In 1992 the United States sent the Dream Team to the Olympic Games in Barcelona. Considered the greatest basketball team ever assembled, these players were expected to dominate and win the gold-and that's exactly what they did. Meanwhile, on another court, a basketball team from the newly independent nation of Lithuania was chasing a different kind of dream. A tiny country of three million people, Lithuania won the bronze medal, beating Russia, its former oppressor. Filmmaker Marius Markevicius skillfully crafts an inspirational David-versus-Goliath story, bouncing from the personal struggles of players living behind the iron curtain to their astonishing journey out of the clutches of communism into their unlikely partnership with the Grateful Dead and the glory of the summer Olympics in Barcelona. The Other Dream Team is a triumphant tale of freedom, guts, and pride-a rousing testament to the power of sports as a catalyst for cultural identity. The D Word: Understanding Dyslexia   Documentary 51 minutes *Mild language The D Word: Understanding Dyslexia skillfully explores the complex and often challenging world faced by those who have this disability. The film focuses on high-school senior Dylan as he shares his early struggles in school and prepares to begin studies at the college of his choice. Interviews with other young dyslexics, as well as highly accomplished businesspeople diagnosed with the learning disability, including Richard Branson, Charles Schwab, and California's Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom, are seamlessly incorporated into the story. Two prominent doctors in the field at the Yale Center for Dyslexia & Creativity help demystify and mitigate the stigma surrounding this syndrome. Focusing on the positive aspects of dyslexia and incorporating creative animation sequences, James Redford's film emphasizes specific areas where dyslexics excel and suggests thoughtful strategies for their academic success in our often-rigid educational system. ESCAPE FIRE: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare   Documentary 95 minutes *Mild language Our healthcare system is broken. Potent forces fight to maintain the status quo in a medical industry created for quick fixes, rather than prevention; for profit-driven, rather than patient-driven, care. Healthcare is at the center of an intense political firestorm in our nation's capitol. But the current battle over cost and access does not ultimately address the root of the problem: we have a disease-care system, not a healthcare one. After decades of opposition, a movement to introduce innovative high-touch, low-cost methods of prevention and healing is finally gaining ground. With consummate skill, filmmakers Matthew Heineman and Susan Froemke interweave dramatic personal stories with the efforts of leaders battling to transform healthcare at the highest levels of medicine, industry, government, and even the U.S. military. Destined to be hailed as the definitive film on American healthcare, ESCAPE FIRE offers a way out-a primer on how to save the health of a nation. 5 Broken Cameras   Documentary 85 minutes Arabic/Hebrew with English subtitles *Mild language *One instance of strong language *Footage of violence between Palestinians and Israeli army Five broken cameras-and each one has a powerful tale to tell. Embedded in the bullet-ridden remains of digital technology is the story of Emad Burnat, a farmer from the Palestinian village of Bil'in, which famously chose nonviolent resistance when the Israeli army encroached upon its land to make room for Jewish colonists. Emad buys his first camera in 2005 to document the birth of his fourth son, Gibreel. Over the course of the film, he becomes the peaceful archivist of an escalating struggle as olive trees are bulldozed, lives are lost, and a wall is built to segregate burgeoning Israeli settlements. Gibreel's loss of innocence and the destruction of each camera are potent metaphors in a deeply personal documentary that vividly portrays a conflict many of us think we know. Emad Burnat, a Palestinian, joins forces with Guy Davidi, an Israeli, and-from the wreckage of five broken cameras-two filmmakers create one extraordinary work of art. Putin's Kiss   Documentary 82 minutes Russian with English subtitles *Mild language *Two instances of strong language Masha Drokova is a rising star in Russia's popular nationalistic youth movement, Nashi. A smart, ambitious teenager who-literally-embraced Vladimir Putin and his promise of a greater Russia, her dedication as an organizer is rewarded with a university scholarship, an apartment, and a job as a spokesperson. But her bright political future falters when she befriends a group of liberal journalists who are critical of the government, including blogger Oleg Kashin, who calls Nashi a "group of hooligans," and she's forced to confront the group's dirty-even violent-tactics. In her first feature, Danish filmmaker Lise Birk Pedersen offers a chilling view of modern Russia, its fragile-perhaps illusory-democracy, and Nashi's alarmingly fascist tendencies (mass rallies, book burnings, "patriotic education," and vilification of opponents). But, distinguished by an artful, cinematic aesthetic and astonishing intimacy, the film's emotional weight lies in the evolution of Masha's political consciousness. Putin's Kiss reminds us that all politics are deeply personal. China Heavyweight   Documentary 89 minutes Chinese/Sichuanese with English subtitles *Mild language *Two instances of strong language In southwestern China, state athletic coaches scour the countryside to recruit poor, rural teenagers who demonstrate a natural ability to throw a good punch. Moved into boxing training centers, these boys and girls undergo a rigorous regimen that grooms them to be China's next Olympic heroes but also prepares them for life outside the ring. As these young boxers develop, the allure of turning professional for personal gain and glory competes with the main philosophy behind their training-to represent their country. Interconnected with their story is that of their charismatic coach, Qi Moxiang, who-now in his late thirties and determined to win back lost honor-trains for a significant fight. China Heavyweight artfully captures the playfulness among the trainees, their grueling conditioning, and the guiding principle that athletic achievement is for their country, rather than themselves. Director Yung Chang returns to the Sundance Film Festival (Up the Yangtze screened in 2008) with an intimately observed film that both explores and reflects social change and development in modern China. Monsieur Lazhar   Narrative 94 Minutes French with English subtitles *Mild Language We are thrilled to show the work of Québécois filmmaker Philippe Falardeau for the first time at the Sundance Film Festival. Exemplifying precise filmmaking and deeply affecting storytelling, Monsieur Lazhar is Falardeau's fourth feature film and Canada's 2011 Oscar submission. During a harsh Montréal winter, an elementary-school class is left reeling after its teacher commits suicide. Bachir Lazhar, a charismatic Algerian immigrant, steps in as the substitute teacher for the classroom of traumatized children. All the while, he must keep his personal life tucked away: the fact that he is seeking political refuge in Québec-and that he, like the children, has suffered an appalling loss. Mohamed Fellag as Lazhar delivers a performance full of charm, compassion, and humanity, allowing the story of a beloved teacher to breathe with wit and originality. With Falardeau's gentle humor and elegant touch, Monsieur Lazhar tells a gorgeous story about a man who transcends his own grief and tragedy to help his young students process death and loss in their lives. Ethel   Documentary 97 minutes It would have satisfied even the most voracious history buffs if Rory Kennedy, youngest child of Robert and Ethel Kennedy, had enlisted her mother's perspective simply as a fresh angle on the Kennedy years. But ETHEL is so much more. Intimate, humorous conversations and never-before-seen images from the family troves uncover an enthralling story of a vivacious, authentic heroine whose transformation from rambunctious Republican firecracker to savvy Democratic campaigner to socially conscious single mother of 11 arcs definitively as her husband's drama unfolds. The film's power surfaces as Ethel's unique value system and the intrinsic connection between the family's private and public lives come into focus. Tales of the young brood attending Senate hearings, of heartfelt letters RFK wrote as a way of incorporating them into momentous political occasions, and of each child's assignment to a social-justice mission reveal the respect and love that fueled Ethel's household-a microcosm for what this country can be. Ethel Kennedy stands alongside her husband as a beacon of integrity and hope. Under African Skies   102 minutes English, Afrikaans, & Zulu Subtitles Paul Simon's historic Graceland album sold millions of copies and united cultures, yet divided world opinion on the boundaries of art, politics, and commerce. On the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of Graceland's release, Simon returns to South Africa for a reunion concert that unearths the turbulent birth of the album. Despite its huge success as a popular fusion of American and African musical styles, Graceland spawned intense political crossfire. Simon was accused of breaking the United Nations' cultural boycott of South Africa, which was designed to end apartheid. Renowned filmmaker Joe Berlinger brilliantly intertwines both sides of a complex story as Simon revisits old ghosts and gains insights on his own musical journey. With the compelling perceptions of antiapartheid activists and music legends such as Quincy Jones, Harry Belafonte, Paul McCartney, and David Byrne, Under African Skies is both a buoyant chronicle of unparalleled artistic achievement and a profound rumination on the role of the artist in society. Slavery by Another Name   87 minutes Sam Pollard performs a remarkable act of historical reclamation in this documentary, recounting the many ways in which American slavery persisted as a practice many decades after its supposed abolition. It is a story impressive in its sweep and alarming in the way that its larger theme-an American moral failure-has been obscured in history. Facing economic catastrophe under Reconstruction, as well as freed black citizens' political and social ascendancy, southern states found effective tactics to continue forced servitude in new modes. Techniques such as peonage (forced labor to pay off debts), leasing convicts to private business, or forcing convict labor in state-run enterprises subjected newly freed American citizens to inescapable conditions that insidiously operated under more palatable names than slavery. Pollard recounts this slowly evolving hidden history, including the activism that powerfully confronted it, with a stirring combination of photographs, reenactments, and the testimony of key historians, bringing to light many shocking details, but more importantly redefining "emancipation" in history and American political life.]]> Artist Services, Community, Artist Services, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Marketing by Megan Leiker 2011-12-29T22:15:00+00:00 Andrew Berends is a documentary filmmaker using Kickstarter to fund his project Delta Boys, a recipient of the 2008 Sundance Institute Documentary Film Grant. Click here to join the final push to complete production on this documentary. “Any time you wake up, it’s your morning. We are here waiting for our freedom. I hope that now is the bitter time, and very soon all of us will enter to the joy side.” That’s what one young militant named Chima told me when I was living in Ateke Tom’s rebel camp in the oil-rich Niger Delta region of Nigeria. But the inhabitants of the Niger Delta are still waiting. They live in poverty while precious oil is pumped from beneath their feet, and the rivers on which they subsist are polluted by over three hundred oil spills every year! My film Delta Boys explores the untold stories of the Niger Delta militancy – rebels who band together in the face of corrupt government oppression in this oil-rich region of Nigeria – following the lives of two militants: Ateke Tom, the "Godfather" of the Niger Delta Vigilante Force, and Chima, a 21-year-old who left home to join the fight. The film also documents life in a tiny fishing village caught in the crossfire of the conflict. Mama, a 22-year-old, struggles to give birth to her first child with no access to modern medical care, while raids are launched from a militant camp across the river. The militants have called for a greater distribution of wealth and jobs. When their requests have been ignored, they've sabotaged flow stations, blown up pipelines, and kidnapped foreign oil workers. But many feel that while the Niger Delta cause is legitimate, the militants' motives are not so pure. In the process of filming Delta Boys, I had to sneak past government checkpoints to reach militant camps hidden in a maze of winding tributaries at the mouth of the Niger River. Getting access to the militants wasn’t easy, but once I was allowed in camp and demonstrated my willingness to share their risks and their living conditions, they began to share their story. I stayed on as long as I could until I was captured by the Nigerian Army, detained by the government for 10 days and expelled from the country. I hope that Delta Boys will help raise awareness of the Niger Delta oil conflict. We are overly dependent on oil to produce, transport, and fuel virtually everything that we consume. The Niger Delta is just one of many regions in the world that is being pillaged in service of this addiction. Delta Boys is virtually complete. I am reaching out through Kickstarter for support to help cover finishing costs. Unless something is done to change the current course of events, one thing is certain: in 40 years, Nigeria’s oil fields will be empty and the inhabitants of the Niger Delta will have nothing to show for a century of oil exploitation other than environmental devastation.]]> Artist Services, Creative Funding, Documentary, Documentary Film Program, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Andrew Berends 2011-12-02T15:53:25+00:00 Danielle DiGiacomo is an independent film producer, consultant, and programmer based in New York City. She participated at the 2011 Sundance Institute Creative Producing Lab and is currently working on Elijah Rosenberg's Ad Inexplorata, an FFP-supported project. Click here to support her most recent project, Best Kept Secret, on Kickstarter. On November 21, five days after the Best Kept Secret Kickstarter campaign was launched, I received the following Facebook message from a Hebrew School friend I haven't seen since shortly after her Bat Mitzvah. "Danielle,  I cannot tell you how moved I was by your link to Best Kept Secret. I'm sure you're unaware but my son is autistic (very high functioning with a diagnosis of PDD-NOS) but I can remember when the therapists broke the autism word to me--it felt like my nightmare was coming true and I couldn't imagine how my son's life would turn out. Who would care for him when we no longer could, etc. We are so lucky that his progress is ridiculous and, quite frankly, he may be a quirky person who works his way out of the official diagnosis, but I know what know the fears, and the crushed dreams, and hopes of how things are supposed to turn out. I'm so glad you shed a light on the lack of public resources and good resources for special needs people who age out of school. Great Work, thank you." I was moved to tears by this message.  We--myself (Producer), Samantha Buck (Director), Scott Mosier, (Executive Producer), and Zeke Farrow (Associate Producer)--launched the campaign for $14,675 to be used toward the rough cut of the film. That number is far lower than what we actually need, but after several discussions, we decided to play it safe and lowball our goal, due to our recent experience in the marketplace and the stagnant economy.  We were awestruck when, a week after we launched, we surpassed our goal. Through all the tools of promotion we have been using--Facebook, Twitter, e-mails, subway solicitation, sandwich boards, and oh, Scott Mosier (who is Kevin Smith's longtime producer and talked about the film on their weekly podcast, SMODCAST)--people beyond our usual circle came to be aware of the film and were responding from all over the country. People we had never heard of. Our film had hit the nerve we wanted it to hit.  And messages keep pouring in:  "I am a parent of an autistic child... You have my money and thanks for putting together such a great project." "Kudos to Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier for making this project known. As a father of an autistic son, I cannot wait to shake Mosier's hand and hug all the teachers at the JFK school." "My 5-year-old son is autistic and the more information that gets out there about this condition the better." The money, obviously, is why we used Kickstarter; frankly, we still need at least $60,000 total to finish the film. But the unexpected and most rewarding effect of our Kickstarter campaign has been finding our audience--people dealing with stories like the one we are telling in the film, including parents of autistic children, special education teachers, and social workers.  My number one lesson learned from this, my 4th successful Kickstarter campaign: Crowdfunding? Yes. CrowdFINDING? Also yes. ]]> Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter, Producing, Documentary Film, Producers, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Danielle DiGiacomo 2011-12-01T02:28:20+00:00 Lemon Andersen's play "ToasT" is being presented in collaboration with Under The Radar Festival at the famed Public Theater in New York City. Elise Thoron (who helped to develop and directed County of Kings and Washi Tales) and street artists will be collaborating with set designers to help him bring it to life. "ToasT" is raising production funding on Kickstarter and was recently supported with a development grant from the Sundance Institute Theatre Lab. Receiving a Fellowship from Sundance Institute brought all the ghosts back up. Nine months before, I had given up on playwrighting - even though it's the best medium for me to stage my poetry.  Playwrighting is also the hardest hustle to master. I sent out a mass email to my close friends and artists telling them that I no longer wanted to make a living being a playwright - that I will venture into copywriting full time and write poetry and plays on the side. It was a very dark moment for me. After putting up a couple of critically acclaimed shows you would think I was a made man. But actually it was the opposite. I would show up to award ceremonies uninvited and find myself in the darkest corners of the room accompanied by a watered down drink and the hopes of someone saying hello. My work and culture are not found in the social settings of the theatre world. People in that world barely use the word "whassup." But that never meant to me that we can't meet each other half way and agree that we all share a passion for live drama. When I was given the chance to join a couple of playwrights on a writing retreat to the Sundance/Ucross Lab in Wyoming, I knew it would be a great opportunity to re-kindle my love for writing for the stage and get the other artists at the retreat to know that even though I came from a tough place, I share the same passion for theatre and cry even harder than they did at the end of King Lear. I have daughters too. After Ucross, I walked away with new friends I still stay in touch with till this day. Blast their accomplishments on my social networks. Keep them strong when they have doubt about their positions as writers in theatre and remind them that sometimes we are all we got, so let's play hard. This fall I received a Fellowship from Sundance Institute's Theatre Program to finish the play I started at Ucross, which is titled "ToasT."  It's a about the harshest poetry you can ever read at a Sunday dinner. = Even Lenny Bruce would have said "Oh damn, here comes Dolomite!" (my main character). But these Toasts have the most beautiful characters who are dear to my storytelling and knock on my imagination every night waiting for me to give them a new place to signify. So I've put it out there. I will tell you now that Kickstarter is not for the weak at heart - but neither is playwrighting. So onward with the challenge of finding a way to make it happen. Onward with the lessons I will learn everyday of putting my pride to the side and even knocking on my neighbor's door asking for her support in Spanglish. Who knows? ToasT might be the first time she ever saw a play and her pledge would have gone further than she could have imagined. I'm Lemon Andersen, the playwright behind ToasT, and I'd love for you to be a part of bringing it out into the world. It's been waiting a long time to connect with you. Thank you. A Note from Sundance Institute Producing Artistic Director of Theatre, Philip Himberg: There is no such thing as a “Sundance Playwright,” since our body of work is defined by an eclectic  appreciation of theatre makers that reflect the range of art being created in America today. We are so excited that Lemon Andersen (spoken word artist, monologist, and now playwright) has joined the Sundance Family. An alum of our Sundance Playwrights Retreat at Ucross Foundation in Wyoming (2011), Mr. Andersen is launching his Kickstarter campaign to fund development, rehearsal, and eventual production of ToasT, a piece set back in the 1970s in infamous Attica Prison. What defines a Sundance Institute artist is their ability to venture into new territory, risk, leap into the unknown, into journeys that are the most challenging. With a talent like Lemon’s, this is sure to be an extraordinary project, and we are proud that he is our first official Sundance Institute Theatre Program alum on Kickstarter. Let’s get the ball rolling …]]> Creative Funding, Sundance Institute Lab, Theatre Program, Artist Alumni, Theatre, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Lemon Andersen 2011-11-22T04:44:17+00:00 Whitney Dow is an award-winning filmmaker whose directing credits include the 2002 Sundance Film Festival documentary Two Towns of Jasper and the Documentary Film Grant recipient When the Drum is Beating, among others. He is using Kickstarter to help fund global distribution of When the Drum is Beating. Click here to help the film reach its goal.  I am heading to Port au Prince tomorrow to screen When the Drum is Beating in Haiti for the first time.  A wonderful Haitian filmmaker, Rachele Magliore, has translated the film into Haitian Creole and recorded Haitian actors’ voices to replace the English speakers who appear in the film. We are going to be holding free outdoor screenings on large inflatable screens in camps for people displaced by the earthquake, and because illiteracy is a huge problem in Haiti, we felt we needed a version of the film that everyone could understand. It is ironic that Haitians who appear in the film speaking English (because the film was made originally for American public television) have now been overdubbed in Creole. Go figure. I must say that I am a bit nervous about these screenings, as I am sensitive to my position as another (white) outsider who is telling a Haitian story. Haitians, very rightly, are sensitive about how there country is portrayed in the media, and while When the Drum is Beating is celebratory, it also has some very tough content. And although I see the film as apolitical,  the reality is that everything in Haiti is political.  It should be interesting. We are about three weeks from the end of our Kickstarter campaign, and I have some thoughts on what has developed thus far. It is much harder than I thought it would be—the highs are incredibly high, and the lows are brutal. Help comes from some of the most unexpected places, as does surprising silence.  As someone who has funded my films in very traditional ways and played my cards close to the vest, it has been extremely difficult to publically request help. However, by doing so I have made connections that will live on far beyond this campaign. When you are going for a grant or a television sale, you are looking for that one great connection that will lead to the big deal that solves everything. With Kickstarter, incrementalism is the key. There is a Creole proverb that sums up the experience: "Piti piti zwazo fè nich li," which means “Little by little the bird builds its nest.”]]> Creative Funding, Culture, Documentary, Documentary Film Program, Partners, Kickstarter, Artist Alumni, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Whitney Dow 2011-11-17T21:13:37+00:00 Cheryl Dunn is a New York-based filmmaker and photographer whose films have screemed at numerous festivals including Tribeca, Edinburgh, Rotterdam, Los Angeles, and on PBS. She is collaborating with producer and Sundance alum Lucy Cooper (Hesher) on the feature documentary Everybody Street. Click here to visit their Kickstarter page and help fund the final stages of production.   Everybody Street is a feature documentary about NYC street photographers who have taken some of the most iconic images of the last century. Whether you take pictures with your phone or a Leica, or are just a fan of photography and film, you will relish the opportunity to hear the real stories of the men and women who are the very foundation of the street photography movement and of the medium itself. Some of these photographers include: Bruce Davidson, Joel Meyerowitz, Mary Ellen Mark, Max Kozloff, Ricky Powell, Martha Cooper, Jamal Shabazz, Bruce Gilden, Clayton Patterson, Jeff Mermelstein, Rebecca Lepkoff, Boogie, Luc Sante, Jill Freedman, and Josh Wildman. The film, shot in16mm and in HD and featuring a score by New York-based band Endless Boogie, takes you into the studios and out onto the streets where you will see firsthand the working techniques of these incredible artists as they unfold in the theater of New York City. Many of my subjects have never been documented before, remaining, until now, hidden behind their cameras. After being invited to show the short at the Tate Modern Museum in London, I spent the summer shooting more incredible photographers and street scenes, delving further into this elusive world. With the attention this garnered, we now have the amazing opportunity to record some additional, pivotal scenes with unprecedented access, not only in New York but abroad as well. In addition, I have been lucky enough to hire the talented editor David Zeiff  (The Cove, Some Kind of Monster, Crazy Love) to bring it on home. I have also teamed up with independent film producer and Sundance alum Lucy Cooper (Hesher, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints) to expand the 36 minute short into a feature-length documentary. Lucy’s films have played not only at the Sundance Film Festival, but also at Cannes, Edinburgh, Tribeca, and Berlin film festivals, among many others. They’ve received Oscar nominations and won a Golden Globe. Everybody Street is an invaluable treasure-chest of knowledge and insight into the art of photography and the City of New York. You can see exclusive stills and clips and follow our progress (and even participate!) by checking our Kickstarter page here. I know you will enjoy seeing it as much as I am loving making it.  My thanks, Cheryl Dunn  ]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Partners, Kickstarter, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Cheryl Dunn 2011-11-15T21:10:56+00:00 Richard Ray Perez is a documentary filmmaker and director of Cesar's Last Fast, a Sundance Institute Documentary Film Grant recipient. Perez and his team are using Kickstarter to fund the final stages of production on their project. Click here to contribute. Yesterday I bought some pears, brought them home, and set them out to ripen on the kitchen table. This morning, just before I started today’s work on our film, I looked at one of the pears. I realized that it’s more than just a fruit. That pear is a story. The story starts with a seed that a farm worker planted. With water and proper attention, that seed turned into a sapling that another farm worker planted into a field. That field that grew into an orchard, a fertile forest nurtured by the hands of farm workers who care for each tree: feed it, water it, and prune the branches so it could blossom and bear beautiful fruit. At just the right time, another farm worker then picked it, careful not to bruise or damage it and along with other pears, carried it several hundred feet to a bin. That bin was transported to a packing house where another farm worker packed it. Then it was transported to the supermarket where I chose it and some other pears and brought them home to ripen on my table.   When I think of our film, Cesar’s Last Fast, of course I think of Cesar Chavez. But I also think of the hands that nurtured and delivered this pear to my table. I think of the probability that the farmworker who picked this pear lives in poverty, may face the threat of deportation, and ironically, can’t afford to eat the very fruit they pick. But the story doesn’t have to end like this. The most exciting part of our project is that when we’re done, we are going to screen Cesar’s Last Fast for farmworkers across the nation. Since Cesar Chavez’s passing, an entire generation of farmworkers have immigrated to the U.S. Interestingly, they know little about Cesar Chavez and the historic movement he led, a movement of their predecessors. The goal of our film is to introduce Cesar Chavez’s story and his organizing model to today’s farmworkers. This project is not just a film. It’s a powerful tool to empower today’s farmworkers and workers in other low-wage industries by presenting a concrete example of how they can organize and challenge the industries that routinely exploit them. Cesar’s story is a concrete example that it can be done. “Si Se Puede” is not a trendy slogan. It’s a reality rooted in history.  You can help us bring this reality to today’s farmworkers. There are 16 days left for you to pledge. You can pledge as little as $1. So I encourage you to contribute what you can to empower the people who work hard to bring food to you and your family. Thank you.]]> Creative Funding, Culture, Documentary, Partners, Kickstarter, Artist Services, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Richard Ray Perez 2011-11-07T21:25:48+00:00 Marco Williams has directed four Sundance Film Festival selections including In Search of Our Fathers (1992), Two Towns of Jasper (2002), Without a Pass (2002), and Banished (2007). He is using Kickstarter to fund the final stages of his most recent project, The Undocumented, which exposes the annual recovery of dead bodies and skeletal remains of those who attempt to cross into the United States through the Sonora desert. Click here to help fund the completion of this film. When I started filming The Undocumented, I decided to keep a production diary.  I made this decision for two reasons: 1) For this film, I was going to do the camera and the sound, and I was alone on location for most of the shooting. The production diary was a way for me to have conversations and to reflect on the ups and downs of the production, and  2) I anticipated that the diary would be like a documentary proposal—it would become a kind of script.  Filming Marco Williams' The Undocumented. (The critical consideration if you decide to maintain a diary is: you have to read it. It is more important to re-read what you have written than it is to write in it everyday.) I wish to share an entry from my first trip to Mexico. For these shoots, I hired a cameraman and a field producer, both of whom were fluent in Spanish. I am not fluent. I filmed five different families and also worked as the soundman, which allowed me to ‘direct’ and to be in the heart of the filming. For the Mexico shoots I sought to apply a hybrid aesthetic. I wanted to film family life and the arrival of the coffin in cinema verite and compliment this with interviews.  Why this approach? Unlike in Arizona where I spent more than 75 days shooting over a four month period (a density which allowed me to shoot verite and to develop relationships through a longitudinal time frame), with the Mexican families I knew I would ‘parachute’ in, spending three days at most with a given family. Interviewing was my only hope of gathering information.  Hualtuco/Capolita, MexicoAugust 17, 2009 The family of Joaquin Silva Martinez took us in as though we were members of their family. They included us in meals and allowed us to film all facets of daily life. We filmed the women milling corn and making tortillas, the preparation for the wake, the arrival of the coffin, the rosary, two different masses, and the burial. Most of the footage captured was of the family in a public arena. We never were invited into their private space—their bedrooms, for example. I share this because we were around them a lot.  The most intriguing moment occurred when the casket arrived. Until its arrival there had been a general carefree attitude. There was playfulness. There was joy. There was lightness. When the casket arrived, the mood shift was palpable. It was as though a switch was turned to an off position. From lively to somber in a matter of minutes. My worry about this experience is how much is “within the frame” (captured in the film), or how much is stuff that we observed and experienced firsthand. After all, we didn’t film every interaction, every act of generosity. Below, I share two scenes. One is of the family prior to the arrival of the casket, and the other is after the casket arrives. I invite you to evaluate whether my impressions were in the frame or outside of the frame.  Preparation from Marco Williams on Vimeo. The Arrival from Marco Williams on Vimeo.]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Partners, Kickstarter, Documentary Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Marco Williams 2011-10-18T18:27:04+00:00 Mike Plante started Cinemad as a film zine in 1998, which continues as a blog and podcast at iblamesociety. He has worked at Sundance Institute since 2001 in a variety of roles and had some strange times working at CineVegas. He also helps run Cinemad Presents, a distributor bringing unusual films to unusual venues. Going into distribution, even micro-distribution like we are doing at Cinemad, is going to have some challenges. You just hope that 50% of what you think will happen, will happen.New lesson: A poster is a game of inches. We value the art of the poster, but had to make an adjustment. The traditional poster size, in the US since the 1980s anyway, is 27” by 41”. Every studio makes that, so every theater has poster cases that size. In order to make one or a few, you can go to most local printers with a big, awesome inkjet printer. But it gets pricey per poster, $20 is a deal. A more professional printer will want to do 1000 that size, to make it worth the time and materials. Great, as the price each gets down to a buck or so, but then you need more than a grand and you’ll probably have 750 posters left over. If you wanna go nuts plastering a town with them – that’s the way to go. But we really only needed 100-150 per project. That took us to a great place that would do 100 for a little over $6 each, but with a smaller printing press, as most of the big presses are being scrapped for metal in this day and age. Smaller run for a smaller press meant the biggest we could go was 26” by 39”. All in all, not a huge deal, but lesson learned. A quick trip to a theater showed the poster should be fine in theater cases. You just try not to have the budget affect the art.]]> Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Mike Plante 2011-10-15T00:09:19+00:00 Digital distribution has to be done in a certain order if Cable VOD is part of your plan. If Cable VOD is not an option, your digital release pattern can be more flexible, allowing for experimentation with the different platform options and timing. But for now, for films with Cable VOD potential, holding off on digital plays until Cable VOD has run its course is certainly worth it, given that it still accounts for 70-odd percent of your digital distribution revenues (it used to be approximately 80%). Very often, if a title has gone through digital distribution before Cable VOD, it will eliminate or at least dramatically hinder the possibility that Cable MSOs (Multi System Operators) or even an intermediate aggregator will take the film. Companies such as Gravitas are also programmers for some of the MSOs, so they have more flexibility, but they too discourage putting your film on YouTube rental channels before Cable VOD. After Cable VOD, Gravitas and other aggregators will usually follow with platforms such as Netflix SVOD (Subscription Video on Demand), which is the Watch Instantly service, and Amazon Prime (Amazon’s subscription service), to name two. There is more flexibility with transactional EST (electronic sell through)/DTO (download to own)/DTR (download to rent) services, such as iTunes, but much less flexibility with YouTube (even a rental channel) or subscription- or ad-supported services such as Netflix (subscription) or Hulu (which is both). Films that have been available on Netflix usually can’t go to Cable VOD after. Of course there are exceptions to every rule, perhaps because of relationships or a film proving itself in the marketplace — but it’s always better to plan ahead. In general, on the digital plays, people often go to transactional platforms first and ad-supported last, with Netflix being in the middle unless it has to be delayed because of a TV deal, for example. It’s not a hard and fast rule, though. Some distributors have experienced that one platform can drive another, but in my opinion it depends on the film and the habits of its audience. You should know that companies such as Showtime will pay more if you wait to do your Netflix SVOD after their window. Best way to go is to assess the value of each option and find out how changing the release pattern could affect revenues for your film.]]> Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Columns, Tip of the Week, Distribution Orly Ravid, Founder, The Film Collaborative 2011-09-13T03:37:16+00:00 Ramona Emerson is a Navajo filmmaker from Tohatchi, New Mexico. She participated in the 2010 Sundance Institute Native Filmmakers Lab with her project Opal, and is now using Kickstarter to fund the final stages of the film’s production. Click here to help support the completion of Opal. Opal has been a journey. Not only from my brain to paper, but from the humble and shaky 40-pager to the 10-page opus. From the Native Lab in Mescalero, New Mexico, to Park City, Utah. From envisioning the film through storyboards to watching my two actresses through our production monitor. I’m so glad I am able to share all of it with the world as we work our way through our Kickstarter campaign and try to finish our film. I knew at a very young age that I wanted to make films and somehow I have managed to keep at it for many years. But the ability to transfer those early memories on the reservation of going to the movies with my grandmother, to the actual reality of making films, has been a dream come true. From memories of my dangling tennis shoes above the soda-covered theater floors to the flickering lights of the movies dancing on my grandmother’s face: films have been a very personal and present part of my life. Opal is a reflection of that and of the personal stories I love to tell. My hope is to create a story that reflects a very true representation of what it’s like to grow up on the Navajo reservation, but more importantly questions the roles of women and girls both on and off the reservation. On the set of Ramona Emerson's Opal. Opal is, on the surface, a tale about a young Navajo girl who takes on the town bully. But she is so much more than that. She is the symbol of the movement of young girls who refuse to take no for an answer and refuse to conform to the restraints of modern society. This story is as important as it is personal – and if you know me, you know it will get done somehow. At this point we have done a lot to make this film happen: we’ve scouted locations, gathered a talented cast, managed to shoot some of our interiors and key “cruising” scenes, and got a trailer made. Another two days and we will complete all the scenes needed to finish the film. Wow! You should see what I see on my monitors. These actors light up the screen, the landscape is beautiful – our New Mexico light is not letting us down. I cannot wait to begin shooting again and sharing everything in my head with all of you. It is happening! As of today, we are halfway through our Kickstarter campaign and we still have not reached our goal. But we steadily push through each day with support from not only friends and family, but from people whom we have never met. For this, we are truly amazed and humbled by their belief in the story that we are trying to tell. Thank you a million times over to each and every supporter we have. And this includes all of our friends in the local film industry who have worked for free and donated their time and creative energy to help get this story told. Thanks to our fellow filmmakers who helped us and suffered in the heat and believed in us. Thank you also goes out to our friends and supporters online who have helped spread the word. I am proud to be part of such a supportive community of artists. But we still need your help. We have about 12 days left on the campaign. Please help spread the word and get Opal on the big screen. She’s tough, she’s awesome, and she needs to be heard. So please check out the trailer and become part of this adventure we are on. Go Opal!]]> Creative Funding, Native American and Indigenous Film Program, Partners, Kickstarter, Native Film, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Ramona Emerson 2011-09-09T22:17:50+00:00 David Becker participated in the Sundance Institute Independent Producers Conference (now the Creative Producing Summit) for his film Small Steps: Creating the High School for Contemporary Arts, which went on to air nationally on PBS. He also coordinated the restoration and re-release of Barbara Kopple’s landmark documentary Harlan County, USA, which screened at the 2005 Festival. To see a trailer and become a backer of his latest documentary, visit the film’s Kickstarter page. I’m writing from upstate New York, where the devastating effects of Hurricane Irene can still be seen all around: uprooted trees, downed power lines, the mud and mess left behind by flooded rivers. Many people are still without electricity. But slowly the stores on Main Streets are opening up again, power is being restored, and life in the Catskills moves on. This was an historic weather event, but the power of nature – both good and bad – is nothing new to the people of this region. For the past two years, I’ve been exploring the relationship between the people of the Catskill Mountains and the nature that surrounds them. Last summer, a crew of filmmakers, musicians, and artists traveled to the Catskills and moved into a little red cabin, once used by the writer Jack London. We were there to make a film, To Be Forever Wild. Over the course of the past two summers, we’ve filmed people interacting with nature throughout the Catskills. This is the landscape that inspired the first homegrown American artistic tradition, the Hudson River School of painting. For generations the Catskills have captured people’s imagination, provided relief from daily life, and inspired a love of wilderness.  In To Be Forever Wild we meet hikers, artists, cliff-jumpers, farmers, naturalists, philosophers, and dreamers. We find in the people that we meet – and in our own experience as a crew, which is also documented in the film – that reconnecting with nature is not only life changing and enriching, but also a strong foundation for personal development, artistic inspiration, and environmental protection. We were something of an unconventional crew. Many of us are professional filmmakers, but for some this was their first shoot. Others aren’t filmmakers at all – several musicians, a still photographer, a painter from Siberia. During the day we filmed with people throughout the Catskills; at night we had bonfires and played (and recorded) music. Often the people we met that day would join in. This film has been a community effort from day one. We opened up a production office in the small Catskills town of Saugerties. The crew volunteered their time and equipment,  local farmers donated boxes of vegetables, and a local bakery donated bagels and eggs for breakfast every morning. Area students have been interning with us and are helping to organize all the footage. Crew for To Be Forever Wild in the Catskill Mountains. Kickstarter was the logical extension of the community effort that surrounds this film. We are reaching out to the independent film community, the Catskills community, and those concerned with the environment – as well as the ever-growing world of Kickstarter – to help us complete the film. Reaching our goal on Kickstarter will allow us to edit the film, start our outreach campaign, and submit to film festivals around the country. At the heart of To Be Forever Wild are the people we meet. They range in age from 8 to 80, but they all share a passion for the natural world. Their stories are surprising, inspiring, and unforgettable. More often than not, their passion for the nature around them has become their life and defines them as people. As we have seen so clearly in recent days, nature also has a powerful dark side. Some of the people we meet in the film have come face to face with that side of the story – people like Stephen Tuomey of the Haines Falls Rescue Squad. In ordinary times, Stephen and his volunteer squad rescue people who fall or are injured in the mountains. The past few days, they’ve helped to rescue people from their own homes as floodwaters overtook them.  As the Catskills region and others along the East Coast clean up in the wake of Hurricane Irene, we are reaching the final two weeks of our Kickstarter campaign. In some ways it’s an awkward time to be raising money for a film. But overall this past week has strengthened our resolve to share the stories of the Catskill Mountains and the people who live here.  We hope you’ll join our film adventure and help us complete the film by supporting our Kickstarter campaign. We can’t wait to share their inspiring stories with you and audiences in the Catskills and far beyond. You can read more, see the trailer, and back the project here: http://bit.ly/fwdrive. Thanks for you support.]]> Creative Funding, Documentary, Partners, Kickstarter, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter David Becker 2011-08-31T19:20:08+00:00 Nekisa Cooper is an independent producer who most recently worked on Dee Rees' 2011 Festival selection, Pariah. She is currently producing Maris Curran's debut feature Five Nights in Maine along with a team of Sundance Film Festival alumni. Visit their Kickstarter page today to help fund this project. In 2008, I participated in the inaugural Sundance Institute Creative Producing Lab and it was an experience that truly changed my life. To be instructed and nurtured by such incredible producing superstars as Mary Jane Skalski, Ted Hope, Paul Mezey, and Meg LaFauve was beyond a blessing. They reinforced my chosen path to support independent artists in pursuit of their dreams. My job as a creative producer sits at the intersection of art and commerce – supporting a writer and/or director in realizing their creative vision from concept to screen and beyond in a world of limited resources. This journey led me to producing Dee Rees’ first narrative feature Pariah, also supported by the Sundance Institute Screenwriting and Directors Labs, to be released by Focus Features this winter.   Currently, I am producing writer/director Maris Curran’s first feature, Five Nights in Maine.  I read the script and fell in love with her writing. The storytelling is layered and beautifully poetic with characters that engaged my senses and my heart.   In Maris’ own words:  “The film is about the complicated relationships we all have with the people we love – about the process of leaving home and returning – about negotiating and learning from the process of coming home… And it is a film about race. It is a film about subtlety, about tension, and what is left unspoken. Ultimately, Sherwin [the protagonist] makes the personal political and elevates the film to be about much more than one person’s loss. It is a film about compassion.” I’m proud to be part of a team of amazing artists who all recently had films screening in the 2011 Sundance Film Festival including cinematographer Brad Young (Pariah, Restless City), Composer Gingger Shankar (Circumstance), and Production Designer Chad Keith (Martha Mary May Marlene, Take Shelter, On The Ice, Restless City). The project was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship and was selected as one of 10 international projects to develop at the Cine Qua Non Writers Lab in Mexico. It will also participate in IFP's No Borders International Co-production Market in September. It truly takes a village to make an independent film. We have only a few days left in our Kickstarter campaign and could really use your help. In less than five minutes, there are four things you can do to join us in bringing Five Nights In Maine to life:  1) Visit this link to pledge support through Kickstarter: http://kck.st/nzSGZR2) Like our facebook page: facebook.com/FiveNightsInMaine3) Follow us on twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/FiveNightsMovie4) Forward the link to this article to friends and/or family Thanks so much for your time and support!]]> Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Nekisa Cooper 2011-08-29T22:53:26+00:00 Do you really know what "VOD" means? There is no universal standard yet for definitions of digital rights. While IFTA (the organization that runs the American Film Market) has rights definitions for its signatories, it doesn’t cover all contracts out there. Many distributors and digital platforms use their own contracts with a range of definitions that don’t match up with those of others. So, let's take a look at the term "VOD." If a contract notes "VOD Rights" but does not define them or defines them broadly, it opens up a world of interpretations and questions. Recently, I even dealt with a contract that had one definition for "VOD" and another for "Video-on-Demand." Go figure. The term "Video-on-Demand" sometimes is used only to refer to "Cable Video on Demand," but other times its used much more generally. IFTA categorizes "VOD" as a "PayPerView Right (Demand View Right)," defined as "transmission by means of encoded signal for television reception in homes and similar living spaces where a charge is made to the viewer for the rights to use a decoding device to view the Motion Picture at a time selected by the viewer for each viewing." In other contracts, "VOD" could include things like "SVOD" (Subscription Video on Demand), which refers to subscription services such as Netflix and Hulu Plus. And the fees to the distributor and/or you could differ vastly. In a TV Everywhere (and hence Film Everywhere) multi-platform, all-device playable universe, you need to know exactly what you’re licensing to whom. Why? For starters, you do not want to inadvertently be in breach of contract. But also, you don’t want to lose opportunities for the best distribution — you should not give rights away for disadvantageous terms, especially if there are different fees for the myriad categories of rights and types of distribution. One can split rights based on mode of delivery: Download-to-own (e.g. iTunes) versus ad-supported streaming (e.g. SnagFilms). Or based on payment method, like Subscription Video on Demand vs. Free Video-on-Demand, which can refer to ad-supported content that generates some revenue or be just plain old free. A Netflix SVOD license, for example, has a fee that can vary over time. The fee is determined by the demand in the system. Whereas Cable VOD is a rev share based on transactions. Cable VOD also involves numerous operators, with just a couple of middle companies servicing the primaries. And some of those aggregators and distributors charge different fees for different classes of digital distribution and that can be for very good reason. The work is different, and so is the revenue. So, how does one classify an iPhone app that offers in-app purchase downloads? Are they mobile rights? Digital-download-to-own rights? Does the term "VOD Rights" encompass them? Ask three people and you might get three different answers. So the devil is in the definition. Read definitions carefully before you sign on the dotted line. And don’t rely on a distributor/aggregator/platform's pre-set definitions, but know what you want and what is possible for your film. Then carve it up and spell it out. For example, you may be doing a broadcast deal that prohibits “mobile wireless” distribution (perhaps for a set amount a time) but you want to make sure you’ll be allowed to do a Netflix SVOD deal that will entail making the film available on mobile devices. The broadcaster may allow this, if you argue for it (as long as the film is not streaming for free to non-subscribers). And perhaps your film has an iPhone app and is available for in-app purchase. That too should be allowed and not be prohibited by a holdback against "mobile wireless" because this form of distribution is no different than DVD or digital-download-to-own in terms of the revenue model. But remember, not all films have the same revenue potentials or work the same way on all platforms. Know your film, know its audience and their film-consumption habits. And, above all, be sure to know how any and all rights are defined, classified and accounted for and analyze that in relation to the realistic potential for your film. Not all films perform well on Comcast, for example. These days Netflix revenue is bigger for many films than various other platforms, and yet that may change. Since the launch of the iPad, download-to-rent (DTR) is growing and is anticipated to grow further. This is the kind of stuff we’ll explore in this ongoing Tip of the Week blog.]]> Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Columns, Tip of the Week, Distribution Orly Ravid, Founder, The Film Collaborative 2011-08-25T22:22:50+00:00 This is part of a series by Red Flag Releasing that documents their ongoing efforts to position We Were Here (release date September 9) in the marketplace. You can read the first part here. Last week, it was about 110 degrees and Paul were I were in line at the post office, with about 20 poster tubes and boxes each in our arms. We were laughing as we waited, though the people in line behind us were visibly frustrated, their glares piercing our backs. It was nearly 7pm (tip: the Hollywood Post Office stays open late!), our intern had disappeared and had not shown up for the past 2 weeks. The attendant weighed and stickered each package as we debated — regular mail or parcel post, Priority or Express… We always ask ourselves on occasions like this: Is it worth the time and effort? How much is it saving us? With the margins in our business, this is the central debate to almost everything we do: real savings vs. the opportunity costs. It helps us remember who we are, what we are doing, in service of what purpose. It reminds us that the risks are too high and if we want to be doing this next year at this time, we have to do everything we can to spend money where it matters (and not on freight). Seriously. Is it worth it? FedEx and messengers come to you! My use-everything-three-times before you throw it away traditional upbringing would tell you, “Yes.” My obsessive-compulsive, anti-hoarding, pay-the-bills-as-soon-as-they-come mid-Western self would say, “Yes.” Philosophically, the answer is always “yes” to me – I can’t help it. Keep things simple, plan ahead, be resourceful and frugal even when you have plenty. My mother (who would wash and re-use paper towels and sandwich bags) would be proud. Certainly there are some cases where we simply do not have the know-how, or the time, so we grit our teeth and pay others to help us. In this case, though, the answer is an easy “YES.” It was the end of the day, and the post office is air-conditioned. End of story. Each trip like this saves us about $1,600 (everything went parcel post, though we did overnight to the Angelika, our first playdate, Paul dropped off posters and trailers at the Arclight on the way home and I took postcards and posters to Pasadena). It’s not a mint, but nothing to sneeze at. We’re back to basics here, in service of films that we love, that people should see, but that are going to be a challenge, any way you slice it. The point is: Everything adds up. By planning ahead and mailing our posters and trailers, our savings will pay for advertising in a couple markets! Red Flag Releasing is an independent distribution company owned by Paul Federbush and Laura Kim. The former Warner Independent Pictures executives shepherded films such as March of the Penguins; Good Night, and Good Luck; and Paradise Now. Federbush also worked as a production executive on Slumdog Millionaire. As a marketing consultant, Kim has handled films including Restrepo and Winter’s Bone.]]> Artist Services, Artist Services Indexes, Artist Services Home Page, Distribution Laura Kim, Partner, Red Flag Releasing 2011-08-25T16:08:47+00:00 Andrew Okpeaha MacLean is an Iñupiaq filmmaker born and raised in Alaska. His short film Sikumi premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival and his debut feature On the Ice screened at the 2011 Festival. Visit the On the Ice Kickstarter page to help fund a theatrical run for the film. Making a movie 320 miles north of the Arctic Circle is hard. Making any movie is hard, but not many film sets have to deal with things like the threat of polar bears, traveling to set via sled and snowmobile, or the possibility that an entire location, given the right wind conditions, might decide to drift off towards Russia. Not that I’m complaining. It was hard, but fun. One of the biggest challenges in making On the Ice took place long before we started filming. That was the process of casting. Several things about casting were vitally important to me from the start. First of all, the entire cast had to be Iñuit. I’ve seen way too many films, TV shows, and commercials with Asians, American Indians, or Hispanics cast as Eskimos. I wanted a cast that deeply understood the world the characters came from. The film is about two Iñupiat teenage boys who have grown up together in a small, isolated village in Arctic Alaska. Life in places like that is fundamentally different from most of the rest of the country. In order to faithfully portray that world I needed actors who knew every facet of their character’s day-to-day experience.  Director Andrew Okpeaha MacLean on the set of On the Ice. Photo by Sebastian Mlynarski. Basically, I was looking for teenage Iñuit actors who grew up in small Arctic villages. A quick consultation with a casting agent confirmed my suspicion that the available talent pool which met those requirements was pretty much zero. If I was going to find a cast for this film, we were going to have to get creative.  So, seven months before we started filming, before we had financing for the film, before we had any idea that we would ever be filming, my producer Cara Marcous and I set out on a casting trip. We had received a sizable grant from the Princess Grace Foundation and used the money to fly to small communities in Arctic Canada and Alaska. For more than two months we flew to places like Kuujjuaq, Iqaluit, Shishmaref, Pt. Hope, Nome, and Kotzebue. One of the places we visited was Igloolik, where I got to hang out with one of my filmmaking heroes, Zach Kunuk, who made Atanarjuat (The Fast Runner). Everywhere we went we put up flyers, did interviews on local radio, made announcements on CB networks, bought ad space on community scanners, spoke at schools, met people at grocery stores, and generally did everything we could think of to try to persuade people who had never thought about being in a movie to come try out for our film. It wasn’t easy. We Iñuit are not the most naturally outgoing people in the world. We tend to be introverted and reserved by nature. And people living hundreds, if not thousands of miles away from the nearest movie theater are not easily seduced by the celebrity and glamour of film. Of those we could persuade to audition, we never knew just what we would get. Some were so shy they could barely say their names on camera. Others would tell us their entire life story, the unabridged version. Many times the stories they told us from their lives had an almost eerie synchronicity with the story of the film. Often I would ask them if they knew any good jokes, to loosen them up. The best joke we heard came from a 10-year-old... too dirty to repeat here. One guy I’ll always remember was at an audition in Fairbanks. He was homeless, sleeping outside under a tarp in temperatures that routinely hit negative 40 degrees. Talk about tough. He was a sweet, intelligent guy who suffered from such extreme anxiety and panic attacks that he couldn’t hold a job. He wasn’t right for any of the parts, but he almost deserves a movie of his own. The best part about the trip was meeting so many great people, inside and outside the casting room. One of our most memorable evenings was spent in an old, broken down trailer in Shishmaref that had no running water, so we had to improvise the best we could to make a tasty dinner. As luck would have it, we were hanging out with our friend Dennis Davis, who is one of the only foodies I know in rural Alaska. That night he invented a new recipe and a novel technique for making ‘Reindeer Tartare,’ which we documented on video: While we were in the village of Point Hope, a blizzard blew into town and shut down the airport. We were stuck there for almost a week, waiting for the weather to clear enough for a plane to come in. The weather didn’t clear, but eventually a pilot crazy enough to land in a blizzard flew in. He wasn’t going where we were trying to get to, but we couldn’t pass up what might be the only flight out of town for days if not weeks. So we hitched a ride. Click here for some footage of the storm. Good thing neither of us are afraid of flying. It was an amazing trip. We met so many cool people, some of whom we still keep in touch with. The whole grassroots, DIY approach to casting is something that transferred through to the entire process of making On the Ice. Every step of the way we engaged the community and in turn relied on them for so much—housing for the crew; donated parkas, snowpants, and warm clothing; sleds and snowmobiles to haul equipment; the actual locations in the film; helicopters; and the extras for the crowd scenes. It just wouldn’t have been possible without a deep level of involvement from the whole town. We’re trying to keep that spirit of engagement and grassroots outreach alive in the distribution phase as well. Traditional distributors have not been willing to commit to our film, despite the awards we’ve won. But we know there is an audience out there, and we know how to reach that audience. So instead of following the traditional distribution pattern, we’re planning our own release under the Sundance trademark. We’re hoping to bring the film to theaters all over the country, but particularly in communities where the film will have special resonance. That’s why we’re on Kickstarter. We’re raising money for that release. We’re hoping to take the film on the road again, to bring it back to some of those communities that were there for the first step, where the film became something more than just a script. Please watch our Kickstarter video here. Pre-purchase the DVD or pledge at whatever level you can, and please help us spread the word.  Quyanaqpak,Andrew Okpeaha MacLean]]> Creative Funding, Dramatic, Feature Film Program, Partners, Kickstarter, Feature Film, Film Festival, Institute Site, Institute Indexes, Institute Home Page, Festival, Festival Indexes, Festival Home Page, Creative Funding, Partners, Kickstarter Andrew Okpeaha MacLean 2011-08-22T18:30:13+00:00