Today’s guest post is from Yancey Strickler, one of the founders of Kickstarter, the crowd funding site. Kickstarter, along with other crowdfunding sites, has brought some real change to the indie film landscape, bringing more power to the creator class to fund their work. But getting your work made, is just part of what it means to be an artist these days; you need to get your work seen (and that’s not all). Luckily for us, Kickstarter is just getting started.
This Friday night on a Brooklyn rooftop, Kickstarter will host the first-ever Kickstarter Film Festival in conjunction with Rooftop Films. The night will feature 90-plus minutes of footage from a dozen filmmakers who successfully raised money on Kickstarter, among them documentaries, features, and shorts, as well as dance and experimental film. There will be music, plus delicious treats provided by Kickstarter food projects. If you’d like to join us, tickets are just $10.
Since Kickstarter launched 14 months ago, filmmakers have used the site to raise funds for post-production, shoots, crews, equipment, music licensing, locations, film festival prep, DVD production, color correction, and just about every other cost associated with making and distributing a film. They’ve found success: almost half of the film projects meet their funding goal. Overall $10 million has been pledged on the site — $2 million of it to film projects. [...]
Today’s guest post is by director Allison Anders (Mi Vida Loca, Grace Of My Heart), co-founder of the “Don’t Knock The Rock” Film Festival”
Seven years ago I was given one of the greatest opportunities of my opportunity-rich life — a tenured post at UCSB as a distinguished professor in the Film And Media Department at UC Santa Barbara, where I remain on faculty, teaching one quarter each year. My first quarter I created a class on rock ‘n’ roll films since this had long been my private passion, and called the course “Don’t Knock The Rock”, named for the 1956 Alan Freed, Sam Arkoff, Columbia film of the same name. I loved the experience of sharing these music rich movies so much I didn’t want it to end.
With the help of producer Elizabeth Stanley who was at that time at the DGA, and who connected me to festival producer Gianna Chacere (now with The Hamptons Film Festival) , I began to lay out plans for a festival in Los Angeles showcasing rock ‘n’ roll movies. My musician daughter Tiffany Anders was returning to Los Angeles, after living in Brooklyn for a good chunk of her 20s, so I immediately welcomed her home and enlisted her to curate live music for my hair-brained idea. The first year she delivered Sonic Youth, J Mascis, The Tyde, Dead Meadow, Wayne Kramer, and Ariel Pink before I even knew he had been born!
We are now launching our 6th annual (we took one year off) DKTR Fest July 8th and will run every Thursday of July and August at The Silent Movie Theater, Los Angeles. From our first Don’t Knock The Rock Film And Music Festival, our agenda was, and remains, the same: to showcase music films and live music performances for die-hard fans and music nerds and to get the word out to them. We are dedicated to that agenda, even though the struggles of the niche film festival like ours are many, well actually, money; the struggle is always money.
[...]
Today’s guest post is from filmmaker Amos Poe.
“If you’re an American filmmaker, you’re a Hollywood filmmaker.” – Martin Scorsese
There’s been much talk lately about the current state of “independent” filmmaking which includes all aspects of fundraising, production, post-production and distribution. This is my perspective based on 40 years of experience and a modicum of hope.
In 1969 when I got my first Super 8 camera and started making films – needless to say, I had no idea there was such a thing as a “film school” - I picked up a book called “The Moguls”. As I recall (I’ve long since misplaced the book) it had a number of chapters, each dealing with a different man responsible for inventing and building Hollywood. All were immigrants – Louis B. Mayer, Harry Cohn, Adolph Zukor, Schenck etc. One chapter, I think it was Adolph Zukor, a German immigrant, went something like this.
Zukor was in the haberdashery business on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn. He sold shirts, ties, suits… to men. One day a guy walks in and looks around, sees that there’s empty space in the entryway. Zukor walks up to him, “Good morgen. Can I help you?” The guy says, “I wanna help you. Since this space is empty, how would you like to make some money from it?” “What do you have in mind?”, Zukor asks. “How would you like to put a few Nickelodeon machines here?’ “Vat’s that?” Zukor had no idea what these machines were, he’d never seen a nickelodeon machine, or a film for that matter. [...]
Check out Amos “the avatar of no-wave cinema” Poe’s KickStarter page’s pledge incentives for his new translation of Dante’s “La Commedia” for an example of well thought out rewards. There are low ones that most will skip over so that they don’t think themselves cheap. There are high ones that feel out of reach but encourage you to also reach higher. They give a DVD (which frankly could have been a digital download) at the the second lowest level. Even if I didn’t know, like, and respect Amos and his work, I might be inspired to give (I did).
Update 6/9: It has been pointed out that offering profits via KickStarter may not be legal, so get your lawyer to weigh in on that before trying it at home. When Amos & Co. they took the share of profits off the “offering” (ain’t it great how easy it is to change things in this digital age?).
And check back here tomorrow for some thoughts from Amos on the current creative environment.
I forget again who sent me this link, but I found CoffeeAndCelluloid’s post on their KickStarter experience illuminating.
Although I have yet to engage in a crowdfunding attempt yet, I have been contemplating. And I have been providing some advice, thoughts, and general consulting to those that have. I think the points Joey Daoud raises about needing to raise a fan base first, having some investment pre-committed, and needing to have supporters, promoters, and blogs lined up in advance are all right on. He’s helping all of us learn how to make this better together.
Joey also posted many good links to bring more perspective on the whole crowdfunding experience:
- Kickstarter and Flattr
- How to Figure the True Cost of a Kickstarter Project
- Behavior Patterns of Kickstarter Funders
- Feature Film Editing and Kickstarter [Podcast]
Today’s guest post is from Stephen Holmgren, Putty Hill’s producer.
Last winter, Putty Hill director Matt Porterfield and I met with a small group of friends at Matt’s house for a home-cooked Baltimore dinner. We were there to discuss fundraising ideas for Matt’s pending feature, Metal Gods, which we were determined to shoot over the summer. Matt had been polishing the script for years, and we were having success meeting great teen actors from local auditions. All we needed was some money to shoot and edit the movie.
We were open to working with production companies and investors on a variety of levels– wanting more than anything just to have something completed by our self-imposed September deadline. We had various budget levels, including a best case, worst case, and disaster scenario. We knew that, despite positive industry responses, the reality was that if this movie was going to happen it would most likely have to come from local financial support. We brainstormed a long list of ideas, knowing we needed to reach outside of friends and family, to people who supported the arts. At this point, Kickstarter was in its infancy and
not on our radar.
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We have a guest post today from Miao Wang, director of Beijing Taxi, set to premiere shortly in SXSW.
A number of people have asked me for my secrets in regards to Beijing Taxi’s successful recent Kickstarter campaign. Frankly, the campaign’s success far exceeded my expectations. As is often the case, I simply had no alternative. I had gotten the last of my rejection letters from the post production grants I applied for. I had just received my invitation to have BEIJING TAXI’s world premiere at SXSW. It gave me a much-needed boost of energy and a deadline to push for! I knew having SXSW’s world premiere would be a crucial element in the fundraising effort, yet it was a couple of weeks before I could publicly announce it. The pressure is on! It was either get into mounting debt for the post production expenses, or do my best to raise as much as I can! It seemed like a win-win situation. I had heard about Kickstarter a few month ago, but didn’t manage to find an invitation to post a project until the last minute. Luckily my friends at Argot Pictures came to the rescue and helped me secured an invitation. I was due to start color correction and sound mix in two weeks! [...]
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