archived-videos Insectula!

F

fleshoff

Almost complete with my rough cut of Insectula!, my first movie. It is a ode to creature features and I have been working on it for three years. We have signed a deal with Arsenal Pictures for completion funds and post work. We have had a decent amount of publicity from a funding trailer I put up early in the production (about 800K youtube and several write-ups) which has a lot of test footage and mockups, but these have since been replaced by much better effects and footage. Funding came from a loan against my IRA and a Jerome Grant. The plan is to finish my rough cut (coming in at about 2 hours) and hand it off to an editor to trim it to about 90 mins, finish other post work and bring it to AFM.

It is basically a comedy at its core but presented with a straight face. I'm kind of going for an Asylum productions level film but give it a bit more self aware and quirkier attitude. It was shot with a Canon 60D. So far things have worked out better than expected but I'm learning as much as I can while trying avoid others mistakes. I have done all the CGI and most of the practical effects (which are numerous) and it has become a much bigger project than I initially anticipated. Of course it has the expected beautiful girls to garner that audience :) I wish I had found this forum much earlier as I'm sure it could have helped with my negotiations with companies that have contacted me. I was able to get Anne Marie Gillen (Fried Green Tomatoes, Variety's Producers Handbook author) and Ron Gell as EP's which have helped me through the waters.

Here is a link that sums things up pretty well:
http://www.yellmagazine.com/insectula-hits-hard-classic-poster/61280/

Any comments or advice are very welcome! Starting to work my way through the wealth of info on this forum. Thanks!

webPOSTER.jpg


The link to our site is http://insectula.com/
 
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Looks like a ton of work.

SUPER congrats on distribution! Whew!
Can you tell us how you went about securing that?
What was the process?


Also, if you don't mind, what's the ballpark production budget for 'Insectula'?
(Include/exclude deferred compensation and/or "donated values".)
 
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The total was about 35G plus a 16G grant with no deferred compensation. Donated values would be locations and actors working for very little or no money. I don't know what the post funds will come to, but we are well within the microbudget territory. Our basic costs were set building, production equipment, practical effects materials and small payments to actors. One of the objectives was to achieve a low budget look instead of a micro. We received a lot of communications from sales agents from the trailer and didn't do much shopping ourselves. I can guarantee though that the funding trailer is very early test material and the final product is far more professional (yet equally cheesy). The funding trailer really wasn't intended to represent the final product or for public consumption, but to give an indication on the feel and what I was trying to do to in order to generate funds (which didn't really happen so I went ahead on my own). I had just started learning 3D rendering when we began and after the three years have gotten much better at it (as well as with practical effects). A new trailer should be forthcoming and will show those results.


Some of the screenshots can be had here:
http://insectula.com/slideshow/phpslideshow.php

As well as the blog:
http://insectula.blogspot.com

and FaceBook:
https://www.facebook.com/insectulamovie

and Twitter:
https://twitter.com/Insectula
 
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