I'm an indie filmmaker and I'm preparing to shoot an independent documentary. This will be a low budget film, but I want it to be really well made (good camera work, decent editing and some nice 3D/compositing effects). The reference for me is movie "Collapse", I really like the way it was shot and edited.
Now for the questions (again, let's take the movie Collapse as a reference).
Supposing I've finished my film. Let's pretend, that it is realy good and touches some vital matters concerning US today. Now:
a) I can sell it via my website. What amount of copies could be typically sold that way in US?
b) I can try to look for a distributing company to attend my movie. Providing that my film is well made (but anyway the topic is not any Paris Hilton romance but "underground", like the "Collapse"), what are the chances of finding any company willing to deal with it? What amount of copies could be sold via such "official" distribution on DVD or whatever medium?
c) Are there any television channels in US broadcasting docs? What could be the income from such a source?
d) Is there ANY chance of distribution in cimemas?
f) What could be the total income that such a film can generate from various sources?
My questions come from visiting Pierre Rehov's site (http://www.pierrerehov.com/). It says, that the cost of his typical doc to make is from 150.000 to 250.000 USD. Do you think that his films, which are not "mainstream" in any way (are distributed on DVDs and I guess sometimes showed on various TV stations), earn that amount of money? So is the level of 200.000-400.000 dollars of revenue possible for a doc?
Now for the questions (again, let's take the movie Collapse as a reference).
Supposing I've finished my film. Let's pretend, that it is realy good and touches some vital matters concerning US today. Now:
a) I can sell it via my website. What amount of copies could be typically sold that way in US?
b) I can try to look for a distributing company to attend my movie. Providing that my film is well made (but anyway the topic is not any Paris Hilton romance but "underground", like the "Collapse"), what are the chances of finding any company willing to deal with it? What amount of copies could be sold via such "official" distribution on DVD or whatever medium?
c) Are there any television channels in US broadcasting docs? What could be the income from such a source?
d) Is there ANY chance of distribution in cimemas?
f) What could be the total income that such a film can generate from various sources?
My questions come from visiting Pierre Rehov's site (http://www.pierrerehov.com/). It says, that the cost of his typical doc to make is from 150.000 to 250.000 USD. Do you think that his films, which are not "mainstream" in any way (are distributed on DVDs and I guess sometimes showed on various TV stations), earn that amount of money? So is the level of 200.000-400.000 dollars of revenue possible for a doc?
