Karl151k
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Film Production Blog "flipmovie"
Advertising!
Jan 12, 2007 06:08PM
You've lost all touch with humanity due to being locked in the editing bay for 18 hours a day. You can't remember the difference between scene 2 and scene 22 anymore. This strange daylight phenomenon happening outside is confusing to you. Congratulations! You are now finished editing your short film! Sit back, relax, take a deep breath...deeper... a little more... Ok. Good. Now, let it out and GET STARTED PROMOTING YOUR MOVIE!
As many times as you may hear this, it's true. Finishing your short film is only half the work. Now comes the hard part. Convincing people to see your movie and yes, maybe even paying to do so. At last check there were about 10,000 short films made in 2006. How do I know that number? I don't. I made it up, but for the sake of this post, we will assume it's accurate. So, you have a 1/10,000th stake in the short film community . How do you let the masses know about your latest opus? Well, if you are age 27 and under like most short filmmakers seem to be, you are probably quite familiar with this inter-web-net thing. (Heck, you're already somewhat Internet savvy if you managed to find this blog.)
How can you make the Internet work for you? Easy! There's several ways of advertising on the Internet and some don't even cost you any money. We'll start off cheaply. Start a blog/myspace/chain-letter. (Maybe not the chain-letter). Blogging about your film serves many functions.
Another free method of advertising is to find an online message board (preferably one that relates to movie making, or at least the topic of your movie) and tell their users about it. Now, this can be difficult to pull off without sounding like a spam post. The best way to do it is sign up about a month or two in advance of when you'd like to announce your movie. In that time, check on the board, post as you see fit, and try to fit in. Then, after you've been accepted into their tribe, casually mention your new movie. If the board is a supportive and nurturing type, the users will inquire further and you can start a dialog. If your post is deleted as spam, accept it and move on with your life.
The next Internet marketing technique is, duh, start a website. In this modern day, a short film without a website is like a... something without a something else. You don't need anything flashy (in fact, the less Flash, the better), a simple one page site is fine. Have your movie's main image on the site, along with a synopsis, some credits, and an email to contact the director. You can get as in depth with your website as you like, but I believe that simplicity is key. This website will at least make your presence known online and give people an opportunity to contact you about it.
Moving up in price, we reach banner ads. Now, I am presently paying for several banner ads on a variety of targeted websites. Having said that, I believe that most banner ads do almost NO GOOD in terms of getting people to purchase your DVD (if you are doing a self-distribution thing). My website's server tells me where the visitors were referred from and less than .5% came to the site as a result of the banner ads. That's not to say that online banner ads don't serve a purpose. They certianly do. They help generate awareness of your movie and can make people feel more comfortable with it down the line. Imagine if you had seen this ad on several sites over the course of a few months.
Then, you happen to find yourself at a film festival and you see that lo and behold, Flip is playing. You'll put two and two together and very likely go and see that movie you'd been "hearing about" for the last few months. In that situation, the user never even clicked the ad but it still served a purpose. And this is why I still buy banner ad space. I believe it can benefit the movie in the long run by getting people to become familiar with the title.
So, where do you buy your banner ad space? Well, consider your target demographic. For my movie, I listed all the possible people who could benefit from watching Flip. I narrowed it down to the following: Filmmakers, Men ages 17-30 and Women ages 25-40. Of course, the ages are somewhat arbitrary, but just listing "Men" or "Women" as demographics is a little... broad. Finding a place to post the banner ad to attract filmmakers was easy. My favorite message board, DVXuser was my first stop. Getting a banner ad there for a month cost me about $300, which I was happy to pay because it was not only a perfect demographic, but I felt good finally giving back to a site that had provided me with so much free information in the past. Another site I have ads running on is Filmthreat. Filmthreat fits all my demographics so it was a real no brainer. Best of all, they are very supportive of independent filmmakers and they will work with you to maximize your advertising budget.
Speaking of the Filmthreat ad campaign, I'd like to point out another form of advertising. Video! I know, it seems so obvious, but many filmmakers completely ignore this aspect of online advertising. If you already made a movie, you clearly posses the skills to cut a trailer for it. Go make a 30 second trailer and post a link to it anywhere you can. (Specifiably, your website/blog/myspace). This can be the most influential factor in terms of getting people interested in your movie, so take your time and make it a good trailer. And, while you're at it, go out shoot some original video content using the characters from the movie. You can use these to pique people's interest in the movie as well. For a better example of what I'm talking about, you can view a PSA (public service announcement) type clip we shot for Flip to be aired on Filmthreat in January.
Flip - Aldo's PSA (Give it a minute to load).
These ads are intended to familiarize people with the characters and hopefully get them to visit the website. As an added bonus, they were a chance to get together with the same cast and crew from the movie, which is always fun.
Well, those are just a few of the traditional ways of advertising online. If you really are a filmmaker, you should be creative enough to figure out some more original ways to get your name out there.
As many times as you may hear this, it's true. Finishing your short film is only half the work. Now comes the hard part. Convincing people to see your movie and yes, maybe even paying to do so. At last check there were about 10,000 short films made in 2006. How do I know that number? I don't. I made it up, but for the sake of this post, we will assume it's accurate. So, you have a 1/10,000th stake in the short film community . How do you let the masses know about your latest opus? Well, if you are age 27 and under like most short filmmakers seem to be, you are probably quite familiar with this inter-web-net thing. (Heck, you're already somewhat Internet savvy if you managed to find this blog.)
How can you make the Internet work for you? Easy! There's several ways of advertising on the Internet and some don't even cost you any money. We'll start off cheaply. Start a blog/myspace/chain-letter. (Maybe not the chain-letter). Blogging about your film serves many functions.
- It generates awareness of not only your movie, but it also shows everyone that real people made the movie. It's not just some faceless product out there floating around on the Internet. Adding a human element to your project can make it that much more interesting.
- You can update the blog about the film festivals your film has been accepted to. This can be useful in bringing more people to your festival screenings. (The Internet is worldwide after all.)
- On your blog, you can post helpful articles and how-to's regarding filmmaking. If you do these on a weekly-ish basis, people will keep returning to the blog (and in the process they will be more interested in the progress of your movie).
Another free method of advertising is to find an online message board (preferably one that relates to movie making, or at least the topic of your movie) and tell their users about it. Now, this can be difficult to pull off without sounding like a spam post. The best way to do it is sign up about a month or two in advance of when you'd like to announce your movie. In that time, check on the board, post as you see fit, and try to fit in. Then, after you've been accepted into their tribe, casually mention your new movie. If the board is a supportive and nurturing type, the users will inquire further and you can start a dialog. If your post is deleted as spam, accept it and move on with your life.
The next Internet marketing technique is, duh, start a website. In this modern day, a short film without a website is like a... something without a something else. You don't need anything flashy (in fact, the less Flash, the better), a simple one page site is fine. Have your movie's main image on the site, along with a synopsis, some credits, and an email to contact the director. You can get as in depth with your website as you like, but I believe that simplicity is key. This website will at least make your presence known online and give people an opportunity to contact you about it.
Moving up in price, we reach banner ads. Now, I am presently paying for several banner ads on a variety of targeted websites. Having said that, I believe that most banner ads do almost NO GOOD in terms of getting people to purchase your DVD (if you are doing a self-distribution thing). My website's server tells me where the visitors were referred from and less than .5% came to the site as a result of the banner ads. That's not to say that online banner ads don't serve a purpose. They certianly do. They help generate awareness of your movie and can make people feel more comfortable with it down the line. Imagine if you had seen this ad on several sites over the course of a few months.
Then, you happen to find yourself at a film festival and you see that lo and behold, Flip is playing. You'll put two and two together and very likely go and see that movie you'd been "hearing about" for the last few months. In that situation, the user never even clicked the ad but it still served a purpose. And this is why I still buy banner ad space. I believe it can benefit the movie in the long run by getting people to become familiar with the title.
So, where do you buy your banner ad space? Well, consider your target demographic. For my movie, I listed all the possible people who could benefit from watching Flip. I narrowed it down to the following: Filmmakers, Men ages 17-30 and Women ages 25-40. Of course, the ages are somewhat arbitrary, but just listing "Men" or "Women" as demographics is a little... broad. Finding a place to post the banner ad to attract filmmakers was easy. My favorite message board, DVXuser was my first stop. Getting a banner ad there for a month cost me about $300, which I was happy to pay because it was not only a perfect demographic, but I felt good finally giving back to a site that had provided me with so much free information in the past. Another site I have ads running on is Filmthreat. Filmthreat fits all my demographics so it was a real no brainer. Best of all, they are very supportive of independent filmmakers and they will work with you to maximize your advertising budget.
Speaking of the Filmthreat ad campaign, I'd like to point out another form of advertising. Video! I know, it seems so obvious, but many filmmakers completely ignore this aspect of online advertising. If you already made a movie, you clearly posses the skills to cut a trailer for it. Go make a 30 second trailer and post a link to it anywhere you can. (Specifiably, your website/blog/myspace). This can be the most influential factor in terms of getting people interested in your movie, so take your time and make it a good trailer. And, while you're at it, go out shoot some original video content using the characters from the movie. You can use these to pique people's interest in the movie as well. For a better example of what I'm talking about, you can view a PSA (public service announcement) type clip we shot for Flip to be aired on Filmthreat in January.
Flip - Aldo's PSA (Give it a minute to load).
These ads are intended to familiarize people with the characters and hopefully get them to visit the website. As an added bonus, they were a chance to get together with the same cast and crew from the movie, which is always fun.
Well, those are just a few of the traditional ways of advertising online. If you really are a filmmaker, you should be creative enough to figure out some more original ways to get your name out there.
DIY Production Design
Dec 11, 2006 06:36PM
Since we don't have a colossal budget or any corporate sponsors for this film, I have taken it upon myself to do the production design for some key props. Since Flip is being distributed both on DVD and in film festivals, I need to be sure I don't have any unauthorized copyrights or trademarks in my movie. That means that any prop I had written into the story needs to have an Alter-Ego version (or Bizarro version, as I call them). With each of the following props, I have taken their existing logo/design and tweaked it to the point where it is no longer infringing on the existing look. Case in point: a bottle of Jack Daniel's Whiskey.
As you can see, the bottle no-longer says "Jack Daniels". It is now, Jeff Daniels. A few other key differences are: Old Number 7 is now Number 8, Tennessee Sourmash is now Mississippi Sourmash and the general decoration around the label is different.
It was relatively easy to do this all in Photoshop. All I did was measure the existing bottle's label, create a new project in Photoshop with those dimensions, and add the text accordingly. The shapes are all variations of the pre-existing shapes that can be created with the "Shapes Tool" in Photoshop. When I was done, I saved it as JPEG and had it printed at a local photo lab. Altogether, it cost me about $3 plus the cost of the alcohol.
The next product is a box of cigarettes. I don't really want to promote smoking, but I felt it was necessary for the story to have the main character smoke. This prop was a little harder to make than the Jeff Daniels label. I had to first measure the width of the box of cigarettes, then I had to measure the length of the entire box. My end result was a Photoshop project about 9 inches long by 2 inches wide. (Image on right, feel free to use in your own production)
The font I used was actually a font I downloaded for free from Typenow.net called Marlboro font. Unfortunately the lowercase "b" in that font wasn't long enough to match the long "l" in my logo. So the "b" on my package is actually an "l" with an "o" stuck on it. Once again, I made a look-alike logo with the shape tool and added some warnings about smoking to the bottom. I copied and pasted 3 of these onto an 8" by 10" size project and printed it out as an 8x10 at the photolab. This way I had 3 for the price of one. (In case I need to make back-ups).
I know what you're thinking. "Is this movie just about characters getting loaded and smoking?", well, not really. But they do drink and smoke, as people in Vegas are apt to do. These are the little alcohol bottles typically found in mini-bars in hotel rooms. I had to make a few different kinds for the movie. The first 2 are just Smirnoff rip-offs. I followed roughly the same procedure of measuring and printing as before, but this time, I had to make 2 different kinds of labels. I made the blue one first, then I just did a color switch for the red one. (I also changed a number on it). The Maui Rum bottle was pretty easy as well. The trees are standard shapes in Photoshop and I just created an orange half-circle behind them. To that circle I added an "Outer Glow" effect and it looked just great. When I was done with all 3 of the labels, I put as many as possible onto an 8x10 sheet and printed them at the photolab. So, for the cost of 3 8x10 pictures at a photo lab, I got plenty of props that need absolutely no legal clearances! What a deal!
Since we don't have a colossal budget or any corporate sponsors for this film, I have taken it upon myself to do the production design for some key props. Since Flip is being distributed both on DVD and in film festivals, I need to be sure I don't have any unauthorized copyrights or trademarks in my movie. That means that any prop I had written into the story needs to have an Alter-Ego version (or Bizarro version, as I call them). With each of the following props, I have taken their existing logo/design and tweaked it to the point where it is no longer infringing on the existing look. Case in point: a bottle of Jack Daniel's Whiskey.
As you can see, the bottle no-longer says "Jack Daniels". It is now, Jeff Daniels. A few other key differences are: Old Number 7 is now Number 8, Tennessee Sourmash is now Mississippi Sourmash and the general decoration around the label is different.
It was relatively easy to do this all in Photoshop. All I did was measure the existing bottle's label, create a new project in Photoshop with those dimensions, and add the text accordingly. The shapes are all variations of the pre-existing shapes that can be created with the "Shapes Tool" in Photoshop. When I was done, I saved it as JPEG and had it printed at a local photo lab. Altogether, it cost me about $3 plus the cost of the alcohol.
The next product is a box of cigarettes. I don't really want to promote smoking, but I felt it was necessary for the story to have the main character smoke. This prop was a little harder to make than the Jeff Daniels label. I had to first measure the width of the box of cigarettes, then I had to measure the length of the entire box. My end result was a Photoshop project about 9 inches long by 2 inches wide. (Image on right, feel free to use in your own production)
The font I used was actually a font I downloaded for free from Typenow.net called Marlboro font. Unfortunately the lowercase "b" in that font wasn't long enough to match the long "l" in my logo. So the "b" on my package is actually an "l" with an "o" stuck on it. Once again, I made a look-alike logo with the shape tool and added some warnings about smoking to the bottom. I copied and pasted 3 of these onto an 8" by 10" size project and printed it out as an 8x10 at the photolab. This way I had 3 for the price of one. (In case I need to make back-ups).
I know what you're thinking. "Is this movie just about characters getting loaded and smoking?", well, not really. But they do drink and smoke, as people in Vegas are apt to do. These are the little alcohol bottles typically found in mini-bars in hotel rooms. I had to make a few different kinds for the movie. The first 2 are just Smirnoff rip-offs. I followed roughly the same procedure of measuring and printing as before, but this time, I had to make 2 different kinds of labels. I made the blue one first, then I just did a color switch for the red one. (I also changed a number on it). The Maui Rum bottle was pretty easy as well. The trees are standard shapes in Photoshop and I just created an orange half-circle behind them. To that circle I added an "Outer Glow" effect and it looked just great. When I was done with all 3 of the labels, I put as many as possible onto an 8x10 sheet and printed them at the photolab. So, for the cost of 3 8x10 pictures at a photo lab, I got plenty of props that need absolutely no legal clearances! What a deal!
Suggested Reading from the Director of Flip
Dec 11, 2006 06:30PM
Well, the Flip DVD is out and selling quite well. Thanks to everybody who has picked up a copy! Now begins a weekly(ish) segment on the Flip Blog: Articles and Such. In every Article (and Such) we'll discuss the various aspects of filmmaking. This weeks Article is Suggested Reading. This is a list of great books that any filmmaker should own, or at least have read. Starting in no particular order with...
1) Rebel Without A Crew:
Robert Rodriguez' personal diary during the production of his first feature, El Mariachi. This book is, without a doubt, the best "on set diary" I have ever read. It covers not only how he financed, shot, edited, and distributed the movie, but also how he did it for under $7,000. It's full of great tid-bits and helpful information for filmmakers, and is an entertaining read even if you don't care about filmmaking. I always tend to read this book before I start a new project. It gets me enthused about the project. (Once you have read Rebel, check out David Carradine's similar, but much less technical, Kill Bill Diary)
2) The ScreenWriter's Problem Solver:
This book, by master-of-screenwriting
-books Syd Field, is a catalogued reference book for screenwriters. If you are in the middle of a script and come to a roadblock, simply flip to your specific problem in the index and follow the directions prescribed. Examples of the types of problems (and solutions) offered: "Talking Heads", "Something's Missing", "Enter Late, Get Out Early", etc. This is a wonderful reference and it doesn't get too philosophical. It treats screenwriting almost like an alchemy, which is essentially what it is (no matter what anyone says).
3) Extreme DV :
Rick Schmidt has created a wonderful "How-To" book with Extreme DV. The "How-To" in question is how-to write, direct, shoot, edit and produce a DV feature for under $3,000. Over the course of some 300 or so pages, Rick diagrams how exactly this is all possible. Of course, in the interests of making his book cover seem as attractive as possible, the aforementioned $3,000 assumes you already posses a nice video camera or are willing to buy a $400 1 chip camera. The rest of the information is very solid, and he backs it all up with his own feature experiences. This book may not portray the most realistic way to spend $3,000 but it certainly gives the reader a lot of good "cost-cutting" ideas.
4) Directing Actors :
Author/ Director Judith Weston has given her readers the ultimate resource with her book Directing Actors. It should really be called "Understanding Actors" because it goes in-depth as to what the actors are really thinking when you are directing them. The book gives many good examples of counter productive techniques, such as "I need you to be angrier" and then gives ways to correct that kind of direction. She also offers examples of notable actors and goes in-depth into their processes. This book can save you a year of directing classes at film school.
1) Rebel Without A Crew:
Robert Rodriguez' personal diary during the production of his first feature, El Mariachi. This book is, without a doubt, the best "on set diary" I have ever read. It covers not only how he financed, shot, edited, and distributed the movie, but also how he did it for under $7,000. It's full of great tid-bits and helpful information for filmmakers, and is an entertaining read even if you don't care about filmmaking. I always tend to read this book before I start a new project. It gets me enthused about the project. (Once you have read Rebel, check out David Carradine's similar, but much less technical, Kill Bill Diary)
2) The ScreenWriter's Problem Solver:
This book, by master-of-screenwriting
-books Syd Field, is a catalogued reference book for screenwriters. If you are in the middle of a script and come to a roadblock, simply flip to your specific problem in the index and follow the directions prescribed. Examples of the types of problems (and solutions) offered: "Talking Heads", "Something's Missing", "Enter Late, Get Out Early", etc. This is a wonderful reference and it doesn't get too philosophical. It treats screenwriting almost like an alchemy, which is essentially what it is (no matter what anyone says).
3) Extreme DV :
Rick Schmidt has created a wonderful "How-To" book with Extreme DV. The "How-To" in question is how-to write, direct, shoot, edit and produce a DV feature for under $3,000. Over the course of some 300 or so pages, Rick diagrams how exactly this is all possible. Of course, in the interests of making his book cover seem as attractive as possible, the aforementioned $3,000 assumes you already posses a nice video camera or are willing to buy a $400 1 chip camera. The rest of the information is very solid, and he backs it all up with his own feature experiences. This book may not portray the most realistic way to spend $3,000 but it certainly gives the reader a lot of good "cost-cutting" ideas.
4) Directing Actors :
Author/ Director Judith Weston has given her readers the ultimate resource with her book Directing Actors. It should really be called "Understanding Actors" because it goes in-depth as to what the actors are really thinking when you are directing them. The book gives many good examples of counter productive techniques, such as "I need you to be angrier" and then gives ways to correct that kind of direction. She also offers examples of notable actors and goes in-depth into their processes. This book can save you a year of directing classes at film school.
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1 Comments about Karl151k
Dec 13, 2006 01:39PM
i'm still navigating my way through the site...well hope all's well and wish you'll the best and stay in touch
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