Distribution for a short

C

CootDog

Hello there! I gotta tell you about my project I've signed on to do.
It's a 3D animation short, approx 30 min. We'll probably make it 27 min for TV viewing. ANYWAY, if this was to be rated it would end up being PG, PG13 at the highest.
What we are doing is half of the full length movie. It's an epic with battlescenes entering into over 50,000 characters rendered! This takes place in space. There will be over 50,000 ships in a couple of scenes. :yes:

So why am I telling you all this?

Because I have some questions for you all. Here it goes:

We want to enter this into festivals and contests. I think the script is great, but I wrote it and am not sure. I haven't had it critiqued by filmmakers. SO we expect this to bring some money. How much, we don't know. All the ships (over 300 different kinds) have been custom made. So Finally to the first questions:

1. Do you think this could get distribution? Like on DVD?

2. Is there any money in entering it into festivals?

3. Is it feasible that a company would want to buy the movie from us, all the 3D objects and the rest of the script? How would we approact that?

OK, that's all for now... :weird:

I'm sure I'll think of more later. :rolleyes:

Thanks for your input!
 
lol i dont think this is gonna be much help

but im in school and just started animation this term learning lightwave

all those battles and ships has to be a ton of work! 3d modeling is so intense.
 
1. Do you think this could get distribution? Like on DVD?

1. Maybe, but not one that pays or pays well to be sure. Even Vin Diesel's short film "Multi-facial" only sold for a couple grand. I have many many short represented by BIG FILM SHORS for all distribution worldwide. THe $$ ain't exaclty rushign in & that's for 20+ short films.

2. Is there any money in entering it into festivals?

2. Only if you win & at festivals with a cash prize have the fiercest competition. Plus it's like gambling at a casino... you have to pay $25-50 a pop to find out if you got IN and THEN the competition begins... PLAN - have at least $500-1,000 set aside in your budget for film festival ENTRY FEE's. Do the math... at $25 each, $500 is only 20 film festivals, and you are NOT going to get into all of them.

3. Is it feasible that a company would want to buy the movie from us, all the 3D objects and the rest of the script? How would we approact that?

3. It's feasible, but unless you have a LOT of buzz around your short, it's not as likely to happen. The Movie Business is not unlike any other business. Until you have a track record of making people money, and a substantial profit no less, on the movies & ideas you have, it will be very hard to prove to someone that it's worth a decent amount of money.

The risk on investment is high until you have proven that you are a good investment. There are a lot of ways to make your product more valueable since we're all mostly beginners here & not "inside" ourselves.

a. FILM FESTIVALSyour own mentin of Film Festivals, and WINS do lend credibility. Having "official selection" laurel leaves on your site or press kit never hurt either.

b. PRESS - getting your short or project, or even yourself mentioned in the press is a good way to get exposure, and always impressive in a press kit. Web site mentions are good, printed press better, and TV the best. ((see http://www.sonnyboo.com/press.htm as an example))

c. WEB TRAFFIC - having a lot of verifiable (not exaggerated) downloads & viewers for your movie demonstrate that people are interested.

a b & c are all about viewing your finished movie no longer as a piece of art, but as a commodity. How do you make your product stand out? How do you make it worth more $$$ to a buyer? Again, since we are not making the big studio's a lot of money with our latest box office numbers, we have to demonstrate that we can make them money because people, aside from our own self confidence and the adulation of our friends & family, LIKE the movies we make. Press, Film Festivals, and Web Traffic all show that unbiased 3rd parties liked your movie enough to screen it, mention it, or download it.

Even then, we havent proven that people would be willing to shell out $10 each to see something we made at the multiplex versus the latest CHucky sequel. Investing in us is still riskier than making a sequel to Witchboard 11, or Aliens Vs. Predator, or any Nicholas Cage action movie. It's because they can analyze box office numbers & calculate that if they spend $45 million and get domestic, worldwide, plus home video, airline, and cable TV deals, they will still make an extra $10 million in profit if the movie SUCKS and no one sees it.... THAT is a safer bet than risking $1 million on an untested, untried unknown like you or me.

But, these other things will help make you stand out against the countless other DV camcorder jockey's and home PC animators that all think that once they make a movie... the limo will come pick them up & take them away to Hollywood.... because Hollywood has a history of being able to psychically know when a movie from an unknown finishes and were they live.
 
RE: Distribution for a short...

CootDog said:
Hello there! I gotta tell you about my project I've signed on to do.
It's a 3D animation short, approx 30 min. We'll probably make it 27 min for TV viewing. ANYWAY, if this was to be rated it would end up being PG, PG13 at the highest.
What we are doing is half of the full length movie. It's an epic with battlescenes entering into over 50,000 characters rendered! This takes place in space. There will be over 50,000 ships in a couple of scenes. :yes:

So why am I telling you all this?

Because I have some questions for you all. Here it goes:

We want to enter this into festivals and contests. I think the script is great, but I wrote it and am not sure. I haven't had it critiqued by filmmakers. SO we expect this to bring some money. How much, we don't know. All the ships (over 300 different kinds) have been custom made. So Finally to the first questions:

1. Do you think this could get distribution? Like on DVD?

2. Is there any money in entering it into festivals?

3. Is it feasible that a company would want to buy the movie from us, all the 3D objects and the rest of the script? How would we approact that?

OK, that's all for now... :weird:

I'm sure I'll think of more later. :rolleyes:

Thanks for your input!
Click to expand...

1) I doubt a 30 minute film could get distribution on a DVD even if it's really good UNLESS (like SonnyBoo says) you can generate some kind of BUZZ for the project... If however, the short is of really high quality, maybe you could get it on iFilm or AtomFilms and get the kind of BUZZ that "405" got. Unfortunately, I don't think they actually made much (if any) money on the actual short though they did get representation and work out of it. Additionally, it's really difficult to speculate based on what you've told us. Right now all I can picture in my mind's eye is something similar to a Star Wars scene where there's a bunch of spacecraft fighting each other... Hard for me to visualize it as an epic when it's only going to be 30 minutes. The work may be epic in its preportions, but will the short really be epic?

2) Again, as SonnyBoo points out, festivals could pay off a bit if you win some of the better ones. Having said that, if you could garner acceptance at some of the larger fests, you might be able to land some kind of representation and work if your stuff is really good. I would say that the latter would be more feasible.

3) If your short ends up being truly outstanding, it could be used as part of a pitch. I was at the Screenwriting Expo in Los Angles in the beginning of the month and there was a filmmaker who made a short film in MiniDV. He brought in his laptop and played a 3 minute trailer as he pitched the idea to executives. Of course he didn't sell anything (nobody usually sells at a pitchfest) but his pitch was good enough to not only get him a meeting with other execs, but they want to see the actual short as well as the script. So, your short could work out in a similar fashion if you took it down this path... But to sell it outright is unlikely... Mainly because you have to get it in front of the right people for that to happen. If you can manage that, it could happen if the work is good enough.

Good luck with it...

filmy
 
What do you think?

I know this may sound weird, but have you ever heard of the producer directing, animating, doing sound, visual FX, editing, and that? :lol:

Well it's looking that it will be that way for me... I've been thinking of maybe cutting it down into 10 to 15 min shorts and make it a series. :hmm:

What do you think? :huh:
 
It's got potential, Coot.

If you made it episodic, you could have them available online for viewing with the option of ordering a DVD with the whole collection. It's not exactly widescale distribution, but could be a great starting point.
 
I my opinion the shorter the short the better. Especially if you want to go the festival route. Programmers can get more shorts in a slot if they are all say under 10 minutes. Say they only have an hour slot that would be like 5 films as opposed the shorts both being 30 minutes then they would only have 2.

Making shorts seems to be the best way to get your foot in the door. I try to think of them as really expensive business cards.
 
I talked to the group and it has been decided that we'll do it in 10 min segements. Simular to "Aeon Flux" where it was a long story, but broken into many shorts, or at least shown that way. I think that will add time to generate a BUZZ about it and therefore, get more and more interest as time rolls on. Then we'd be able to sell DVD's on the entire series. :yes:

And Yes, I was just named director... Man, all these hats are getting heavy... But that's what it's all about right.. Promote one's self and sharpen your skills, that's what Indie Filmmaking is all about, right?

:D
 
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