Besides making shorts in series for web series and possible independent TV series on small cable networks, how else can shorts be made for profit?
Brain Storming Ways To Make Shorts Profitable
- Thread starter Modern Day Myth Prod. LLC
- Start date
They email you an excel spreadsheet every month? That seems a bit archaic, and I'd be pretty hesitant to go with any service that can't provide real-time reporting on viewership and traffic. That's pretty much bog-standard analytics and it's not difficult to do.
But the issue isn't really finding a place to sell your video. There are plenty of options for VOD or disc sales that anyone can take advantage of. I've got 25 shorts on vimeo right now, and vimeo just enabled VOD delivery so that it would take nothing more than a few clicks for me to start charging for them - but that certainly won't make any of them profitable.
The problem is marketing, promotion, and convincing an audience to pay for your work, short or otherwise. None of the platforms I've seen really address that sufficiently, probably because it's the single biggest challenge in making an independent film profitable.
You're competing for attention. It's hard enough to do that when you're giving things away for free - how many people get more than a few hundred views on a short film on youtube without putting significant effort into promoting themselves? It's marketing 101 - 1-3% sales against reach is considered good. For something like shorts which people don't usually pay for it's likely to be at the low end, 1% or less.
So you do the math - how much do you need to make your short profitable? Lets say you made it fairly cheaply and only need $500 to be 'profitable'. You're going to charge $1 to view it, so you need 500 paying viewers, which means you need to reach an potential audience of at least 50,000 people. Can you do that - or more importantly, can you do that without spending even more money? Of course Vimeo takes 10% after fees, so that's really probably 13%, so you actually need to hit even more people to reach your profitability level.
So lets say you somehow made that all happen, and you made your $500 - were you really profitable? Did everyone involved get paid fairly for their time? Did you get compensated for the time you spent promoting the film to hit that goal? Did you make enough to help offset some of the cost of the equipment? Federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour - at $500 you're only covering about 70 hours of work. That barely covers a 3-person cast/crew working for two days.
Now maybe everyone volunteered, so you only had to spend the $500 out of pocket, but that doesn't mean you can discount that time when you start talking about profitability. I think profitability is the wrong thing to focus on, at least in terms of true independent filmmaking, it's too short term. We should be focusing on sustainability - the ability to keep on making films. Profitability is a key underlying component of that, but if you don't think about the long term sustainability of what you're doing it's easy to fool yourself into thinking you've made a profit when you really haven't.
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I find this distributor is not alone with being behind the times. But, They are working hard to be legit. I don't mind the Excel spread sheets. I have to use Excel for my day job and my movie production company. I use Excel to keep track of my inventory of my retail DVDs.
Obviously, small businesses like mine is working against losses with smaller revenue than operating expenses. All I can do is hope something connects with my project in development to change the direction of the tide.
Obviously, small businesses like mine is working against losses with smaller revenue than operating expenses. All I can do is hope something connects with my project in development to change the direction of the tide.
+1
Approach filmmaking as a hobby and you'll be much happier with the outcome.
Approach filmmaking as a business and you'll find it's a tough-as-h3ll sustainability model.
A barber with $300 in tools can make a better and easier living than a filmmaker with $3,000 (maybe even $30,000!) in tools.
People reading my new script may wonder how we will pull off so many locations that the script dictates. Two factors are I will not make the films without a business partner and we will combine resources. And, we will use greenscreen and a matt painter and stock footage if necessary to pull it off.
I believe Indie filmmakers can make better films, if they can agree to combine resources.
I believe Indie filmmakers can make better films, if they can agree to combine resources.
Interesting DVD packaging ideas are:
A DVD called Vamps 2, which is by an independent producer and contains two feature horror vampire films and a few shorts they list as bonus features. I can only guess the producer made both the features and shorts and Best Buy sold the DVD a few years ago for $24.95.
Richard Donnar's Superman 2, which includes Superman 2 feature movie along with the entire Max Flicher Superman cartoon collection plus BTS clips and interviews for a price of $29.95.
Again, sold at Best Buy.
It seems features packaged with extras on DVD is the best way to go.
A DVD called Vamps 2, which is by an independent producer and contains two feature horror vampire films and a few shorts they list as bonus features. I can only guess the producer made both the features and shorts and Best Buy sold the DVD a few years ago for $24.95.
Richard Donnar's Superman 2, which includes Superman 2 feature movie along with the entire Max Flicher Superman cartoon collection plus BTS clips and interviews for a price of $29.95.
Again, sold at Best Buy.
It seems features packaged with extras on DVD is the best way to go.
You really should compare apples to apples. You started a
discussion on how to make short films profitable. Your
example of Warner putting the 72 year old Superman short
films on a DVD package of “Superman 2” is unrelated in
any way to your hypothesis that packaging short films with
features is “the best way to go”. Those movies are in the
public domain. YOU can put those short cartoons on a DVD
and sell them.
Regarding Vamps 2. The “bonus feature” of “Vamps” was
added because that film got a DVD release back in 2001
and didn’t make any money. It sold less than 100 units.
The “Shocking Shorts” are three short films in the public
domain and E.I. did not pay anything to include them on
the DVD. Those same three short films were packaged with
“Suburban Nightmare” in 2004 and “Feeding the Masses”
in 2010.
As discussions go on the original intent often changes. So
are you no longer talking about brain storming ways to make
short films profitable?
discussion on how to make short films profitable. Your
example of Warner putting the 72 year old Superman short
films on a DVD package of “Superman 2” is unrelated in
any way to your hypothesis that packaging short films with
features is “the best way to go”. Those movies are in the
public domain. YOU can put those short cartoons on a DVD
and sell them.
Regarding Vamps 2. The “bonus feature” of “Vamps” was
added because that film got a DVD release back in 2001
and didn’t make any money. It sold less than 100 units.
The “Shocking Shorts” are three short films in the public
domain and E.I. did not pay anything to include them on
the DVD. Those same three short films were packaged with
“Suburban Nightmare” in 2004 and “Feeding the Masses”
in 2010.
As discussions go on the original intent often changes. So
are you no longer talking about brain storming ways to make
short films profitable?
You are right about getting off-topic. My bad.
I used Vamps 2 because it is an Indie quality DVD set. The Superman 2 was just to illustrate how studios come up with similar ways to market films.
I guess I am one of those few who bought the Vamps 2 DVD package.
I was advised by a producer on LinkedIn to work on recruiting actors from Chiller and comic book conventions and giving them parts in future shorts. They are yesterday's stars. But, they still have enough star power to boost sales. Also making fund raising shorts with yesterday's stars will bring in more investors.
I used Vamps 2 because it is an Indie quality DVD set. The Superman 2 was just to illustrate how studios come up with similar ways to market films.
I guess I am one of those few who bought the Vamps 2 DVD package.
I was advised by a producer on LinkedIn to work on recruiting actors from Chiller and comic book conventions and giving them parts in future shorts. They are yesterday's stars. But, they still have enough star power to boost sales. Also making fund raising shorts with yesterday's stars will bring in more investors.
But that's the problem - it's not an example of how studios make shorts profitable, it's how they use shorts to (possibly) increase the sales of a feature film. If they tried to sell a disc of the shorts alone it probably wouldn't make any money - otherwise they'd do just that. If anything as an example it just drives home the point that the audience isn't really interested in paying for shorts.
A great suggestion from a writer is to write a short story version of the screenplay and look for a magazine with large distribution channels to sell First North American Serial Rights to print the story in their magazine.
A published short story in a related genre magazine will absolutely help build a fan base.
A published short story in a related genre magazine will absolutely help build a fan base.
Getting a short story published in a magazine with international channels will get science fiction fans familiar with the story, the writer's name, and series name. If they like the story, they will seek it out in other media, such as the short film and a novel.
I have not seen one good idea posted yet about this question. The only short film that I can think of that was a popular seller on DVD was AFTERMATH.....and the reason WHY it was successful was that it is a graphically gory short of a coroner who, receiving the body of a murdered hooker, becomes sexually excited and mutilates the corpse before having necrophilic sex with it.
So it had marketable value as a horror film, and also as a "sick" film that a certain demographic (mostly young males) will be interested in solely because of its extreme content. They arent going to care about the quality (tho it us beautifully made) as long as they get a gross-out. Also, it had the cachet of showing something---a man having sex with a womans corpse---that had never been shown in a film before.
Other than that kind of bally-hoo, I do not see any other way shorts can be sold. People simply dont want to pay forthem, and as far as attaching them to DVD packages, the only real interest is in shorts made by the director of tge feature film, like Criterion Collection does often, to give some insight into the directors style or themes.
So it had marketable value as a horror film, and also as a "sick" film that a certain demographic (mostly young males) will be interested in solely because of its extreme content. They arent going to care about the quality (tho it us beautifully made) as long as they get a gross-out. Also, it had the cachet of showing something---a man having sex with a womans corpse---that had never been shown in a film before.
Other than that kind of bally-hoo, I do not see any other way shorts can be sold. People simply dont want to pay forthem, and as far as attaching them to DVD packages, the only real interest is in shorts made by the director of tge feature film, like Criterion Collection does often, to give some insight into the directors style or themes.
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But will they pay for it? Not likely with the short, so again this really has nothing to do with making shorts profitable.
There are plenty of profitable shorts. The formula is pretty simple. Get millions of people to watch your short, and sell advertising against it. It's hard to do with a single short, and in reality it's most profitable for the short aggregators (i.e. YouTube).
An interesting method: A previously unpublished writer published a
short story in a magazine with international challenes that gets
science fictions fans fimiliar with the story, a short film is made from
that story and makes money.
Can you think of one example of this being a way to make a short
film profitable?
The chances of an unknown science fiction writer getting a story published through "international channels" is next to impossible. Fiction readers are just like film watchers---they want to read known writers, so any platform for short fiction will stick with that. New unknown writers only get published in much smaller venues. And even if it did work, would they want to pay to see the short film? No.
This is the recommended method for new writers to get established suggested at ASJA Conventions for writers to establish themselves before they can market their first novel to a publisher. Magazines are always looking for new content.
I know publishers and heads of the ad departments of some of the magazines from when I use to advertise my vampire books in such magazines. The same people are still with those magazines. They are the first magazines I will try.
VODs can make money from Itunes, CreateSpace, and BigStar even for shorts.
Your logic only applies to novels. Big publishers of novels won't give an unknown writer the right time of day, unless the writer has a short published in a magazine that becomes popular.
Sure, and there are plenty of other options - but these are ways to charge money for a short, not ways to make shorts profitable. That's a significant difference.