Tag: VOD

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Truly Free Film

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 4: Story Arc for Investors or Why I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Raising Money.

By Roger Jackson

Previously: Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 3: The Producer’s Dilemma

Last Week

Before I write about seeking money and investors, here’s what’s been happening in the past week. We’ve had — as of writing — 18 films submitted for our private beta launch. Films come in every day and we will never tire of clicking on the trailer link and getting a glimpse into a new world. I mean that. We know what it takes to make a feature film or documentary, and the reason we’re building KinoNation is to serve the creators of films like these. Keep them coming, the Private Beta is still open, we’re looking for lots more great films. It’s really fun to watch a group of compelling and disparate trailers, then delve into the IMDb pages for each movie, and in some case have discussions with the filmmakers. A couple of examples this week. Greek director Stathis Athanasiou submitted his stunning fantasy-romance DOS. Our reaction was pretty much “wow!”  Then Roseanne Liang submitted her delightful 2005 documentary Banana in a Nutshell. (which spawned her theatrical release My Wedding and Other Secrets.) Films like this that performed (or are performing) well on the festival circuit, but struggling to find video-on-demand distribution, are exactly what Klaus and I had in mind when we conceived KinoNation.

 

Bootstrapping

OK, so the subject of this post is finding investors.

Continue reading “Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 4: Story Arc for Investors or Why I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Raising Money.”
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Truly Free Film

How VOD Changes The Whole Film Landscape

It a big question (how VOD is changing the film landscape), but we already see the answers starting to unfold. As the lovers of cinema recognize they can access anything anywhere anytime, and the captains of industry in the culture strands accept their business is one of infinite choice, everyone becomes more desperate for the curators and filters that help connect us with what we will enjoy most.

Continue reading “How VOD Changes The Whole Film Landscape”

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Truly Free Film

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 3: The Producer’s Dilemma

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 3: The Producer’s Dilemma
By Roger Jackson

Previously: Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 2: Birth of a (Kino)Nation
The Producer’s Dilemma
You probably know the classic movie making conundrum that indie producers struggle with: talent (or rather their agents) won’t commit to a film project until you prove you have funding, and investors won’t write a check until you prove you have talent attached. The producer’s dilemma. And, of course, all successful producers find creative solutions to that thorny issue. KinoNation has a similar challenge: It’s tough to get filmmakers fully committed without video-on-demand distribution outlets in place, and it’s hard to sign VoD outlets without a slate of films.

Continue reading “Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 3: The Producer’s Dilemma”
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Truly Free Film

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 2: Birth of a (Kino)Nation

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 2: Birth of a (Kino)Nation
By Roger Jackson
Previously: Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 1: Every Movie Ever Made…
KinoNation
We were determined the site would be a dot com domain — not dot biz or dot US or dot-whatever. But available dot coms are rare and we weren’t going to pay thousands of dollars to some shady cyber-squatter. Klaus found KinoNation.com — it was available, it makes sense, we like it and seems easy to remember. “Kino” is German for cinema. And “Nation” can be defined as a community of persons bound by a shared interest or passion. That seems to work. We’re also excited about the potential for this venture in China, making thousands of Chinese indie films available to the rest of the world. So the name had to sound OK to the Chinese ear (we’re assured it does) and it more or less translates into Mandarin as “Film Kingdom.” But. There’s always a “but.” In this case there’s a site in Russia, kinonation.ru where you can watch Hollywood movies — in Russian — for free. Hard to say whether they’re legit or pirated. Either way, we have the dot-com, they have the dot-ru — there’s no reason we can’t co-exist, right?
Continue reading “Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 2: Birth of a (Kino)Nation”
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Truly Free Film

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 1: Every movie ever made…

Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 1: Every movie ever made, in any language, anytime, day or night…
By Roger Jackson
 

I joined the short films website iFilm.com in 1999 and stayed until 2006, after we sold to MTV. By then we’d also sold out our original vision, captured perfectly in this 1999 commercial. Since iFilm I’ve produced war-zone documentaries for the Annenberg Foundation, started a production company, and for the past year run humanitarian projects in Afghanistan and West Africa. But I often thought of that iFilm vision…and now, more than a decade later, I find myself the co-founder (with film composer Klaus Badelt) of a digital film startup with a similar mission. This is the first of a series of weekly guest posts as we bootstrap this new venture — ideally with a ton of critique and input from you.

Continue reading “Diary of a Film Start-Up Part 1: Every movie ever made…”

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Truly Free Film

“Theaters should NOT be used as mere marking platforms for home release.”

So said National Assn. of Theater Owners prexy John Fithian in regards to Day & Date Theatrical VOD releases. “(It) devalues the content and tells the consumer that the involved movies will never be a big deal,” he added.

Granted Fithian is looking out for the Exhibitors, and he rarely is focused on Indie or Art film. But then again, when the trades start singing the praises of D&D VOD they are generally looking out only for top titles, and not your little heart-felt work of passion. In this Saturation Point Era when all face a super-abundance of content, how do you expect people to not develop a “want-to-see” desire for your film, but to actually prioritize it and move themselves to actually make a transaction?

I agree that you need to be available when the desire strikes. I also agree that you want to be eventually readily available everywhere. But that doesn’t mean that you want to reach that goal prior to manufacturing the desire.

We are doing the exact opposite of VOD/D&D with DARK HORSE.

See it in Theaters! Support your local arthouse!! Vote With Your Dollars For The Culture You Want!!! We can build it better together!!!!

Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/darkhorsemovie

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Truly Free Film

How Would You Use All 27 New Platforms Available For Direct (aka DIY/DIWO) Distribution?

UPDATED 8/31 730A (Now 30 Platforms & Services!)
Thanks for the recommendations in the comments and elsewhere!
UPDATED 9/1 630A (Now 31 Platforms & Services!)
UPDATED 9/1 830A, UPDATED 9/8 8A (32!), UPDATED 9/15 6A, 9/23
UPDATED 5/15/2012 (Now 33 Platforms & Services!)

We are awash in wonderful opportunities. Distribution has long been said to be one of the top concerns of Truly Free / Indie filmmakers. Ditto on the marketing side. We’ve been neglectful to address the equally important social side, but that’s changing. Financing is always a challenge, but even there we have new help and hope. The great news is that never before have we had so many opportunities in all these areas.

Now comes the time to develop some best practices. How do we use all of these wonderful opportunities? How do we prepare for them? How do we access them? Here’s a list of the 27 platforms & tools I know of; I am sure you know some more to add to the list. Let’s get this new model started!

How about everyone pick a platform (ideally one they used) and write up some recommendations on how to use it well, and we run them as posts on this blog?

So…

How do you think we should utilize all of these great tools and platforms? We are not going to figure it out one by one on our own. The truth will only be revealed through collective endeavor (and a little good fortune). I would love to hear some advice from all the budding and experienced PMDs out there… not to mention filmmakers who have utilized or plan on utilizing any of these.

I am having a bit of a hard time coming up with the proper discriptions for the tools and services. This is very much a Work In Progress. If you have a better definition, please let me know. Several services show up in different categories. There are definitely suppliers that I have forgotten or neglected to mention (my apologies, but this is a public service and not my job job).

1. Artist Direct Distribution / Platforms: FilmDIY (promo video), MubiGarage, Ooyala, Viddler,

2. Artist Direct Distribution / Platforms – non-specialized: These are places filmmakers can “sell” their work, but are not filmcentric. Craigslist, Etsy,

3. Artist Direct Distribution / TVOD Players: Distrify, Dynamo Player (Review), EggUp (review), FansOfFIlm.tv (still in Beta) , FlickLaunch, Groupee, OpenFilm,

4. Artist Direct Distribution / Service Facilitators: Sundance’s Artist Services,

5. Audience Aggregation, Analytics, & Commerce: FanBridge, TopspinMedia

6. Audience Participation: LiveFanChat, Kickstarter, IndieGoGo, Social Guide, SoKap, Watchitoo

7. CrowdFunding/Audience Participation:
     IndieGoGo • 4% fee if you make your goal, 9% otherwise, +3% credit card processing fee
     Kickstarter • 5% fee, +3-5% credit card fee (only funded if you make your goal)
     RocketHub • 4% fee if you make your goal, 8% otherwise, +3-5% credit card fee
     SoKap • 5% fee, 10% fee on product sold via their marketplace, +3% credit card fee
     United States Artists • 15% fee + 4% credit card fee
     Eppela • 5% fee + PayPal processing fee (~2-4%), (must use PayPal, only funded if you make your goal, Italian)
     Kapipal • Currently no fee + PayPal processing fee (~2-4%), (must use PayPal, Italian)
     And 10 others listed here

8. Digital Delivery Facilitators: Veedios (article)

9.Digital Distribution Access Providers: Brainstorm, Distribber (analysis), GoDigital, Gravitas, Inception Digital Services, IndieBlitz ,Might Entertainment, New Video, Premiere Digital,

10. Digital Download & Streaming Aggregators: Amazon, AsiaPacificFilms.com, CinemaNow (aka BestBuy), FilmDIY, iTunes, Vudu, XFinityTV (aka Comcast),YouTube

11. Digital Limited Run US Theatrical Exhibition: Cinedigm, FathomEvents, Screenvision

12. Digital Streaming Aggregators FREE (AVOD): Crackle, Snag (Owners of IndieWIre, host of my blog), Vimeo, YouTube

13. E-commerce: E-Junkie (shopping cart)

14. Educational Market: An Overview, Educational Market Streaming

15. Exhibition/Four Wall Services (i.e. self booking): QuadCinemaFourWall

16. Exhibition/New Model: Emerging’s Digital Repertory Program, Specticast

17. Free Peer to Peer: VoDo, BitTorrent

18. Fulfillment: Amazon Services, Amplifier, theConneXtion, CreateSpace, FilmBaby, IndieBlitz,Kufala Recordings, Paid, Transit Media, I got a lot more when I did a search but I don’t know one from the other.

19. Influencer / Social Media Analytics: Klout, PeerIndex, Topsy, Traackr, Twitalyzer,

20. Markets / Online On Demand For Territorial Licensing (B2B): Cinando, Festival Scope,

21. Mobile Phone & Tablet Film App Builders: Mopix (see demo here) Stonehenge

22. Mobile Video Sharing: Thwapr,

23. Platforms: Facebook, Playstation, Roku, RoxioNow, XBox

24. Search (for SEO): Ask, Bing, Google, Yahoo

25. Social Discovery Platforms ( Online TVOD): PreScreen

26. Social Networks: Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, Twitter, Weibo

27. Stream To View Transactional VOD (Pay): Constellation, Prescreen (review)

28. Streaming Subscription (SVOD): Amazon, AsiaPacificFilms.com, Fandor, Hulu, LoveFilm, Mubi, Netflix

29. Trailer Distribution / Online Internet Video Archive

30. Video Conferencing / Multi-party (for Fan Engagement & Remote Appearances): Watchitoo

31. VOD Aggregation: itzon.tv,

32. VOD Channels: Multichannel Video Programmers (note: not all offer VOD), FilmBuff

33. Facebook Video Players/Channels:Cinecliq, Milyoni