Crowdfunding With A Movie Star

Crowdfunding With A Movie Star

 Crowd funding is one of the ways that many film makers find the money to complete a project and or to fully fund a project. To go into it as an unknown film maker of a first film and a cast of beginners in a mountain most of us will have to climb. Today I would like to begin with a film maker who I was say has a big leg up on most of us. I would look at it as hitting the lottery. The lead actress in his film is Keisha Castle Hughes. Academy award nominated (she should have won) for her first film Whale Rider. Location plays a part in getting talent for your project. In the case of her career so far I would argue that location has been the only thing that has held Keisha Castle Hughes from being top of the A list actresses. Okay let me get back to the campaign we are going to look at. The title of the film is Find Your Voice and there is about a week left in this campaign. I suggest you check it out.



 Next up is a sci-fi feature film. I am one of those people who believe that sci-fi should be more about characters and situation rather than special effects. This campaign looks interesting and is near both is funding goal and its end date. I hope that you will check it out. The title of the film is The Toll.



 

 I have been told by readers of this blog that I avoid animation like most guys avoid Twilight films and that is not true. Yes, I hate Twilight, but no I do not dislike animated films. It is just hard to find animators to interview. I may try to get an interview with the film maker behind the next project we are going to look at. The title of the film is Yellow Brick Road and it is about what you think that it is.

  
 Next up is the campaign for Deadly Waters.

  

 

 Thank you for visiting today. Good luck with your film making projects. Please take a moment to like this post on Stumbleupon and to share it on your facebook page. Also you could add me to your google plus.

Gotham City Sirens, Update

The campaign has reaches it goal of 900 dollars, but you can still donate..

Keep in mind that crowd funding campaigns are tricky. You should always aim for more than your goal. Even if you reach it with a day or two left you want to continue to push through to the end. There have been campaigns at kickstarter that hit their goal and then ended up falling short because someone backed out after the fact.

Visit kickstarter and indiegogo. Check out campaigns and if you see one that you really like then get involved.






That will be it for today. Good luck and have a nice day.

Check Out These Crowdfunding Campaigns

 There are a few crowdfunding campaigns that I would like to share with you guys today. I usually learn about campaigns from someone sending me a email or on google plus. I do not think that this campaign is more important than that campaign or this subject material is more worthy than that one. It usually comes down to the film maker, their passion for the project and the past work that they have done.

If any of you have a campaign starting up and want to talk about it please drop me a note by leaving a comment or visiting me on google plus and I will get back to you. Digital feature film making does not have to be a lonely business. It is okay to make connections along the way.

Okay first up is an international production. There is a few days left in this campaign so if you wish to get involved you will have to move quickly. I understand that this film maker shot her last film using a T2i, I would like to do an interview about that soon.


www.igg.me/at/nonghak - ນ້ອງຮັກ (Nong Hak / Dearest Sister) - A Lao Horror from Mattie Do on Vimeo.


  The next project that I want to look at is something that could be something very special. I like new twist on the horror film model. The film Mermaid Down could be that and more.

 

Mermaid Down - A Film In Pre-Production from Mermaid Down on Vimeo.

  Next up is a horror comedy titled Back from the Grave.

  
 
Anyone who knows me personally would tell you that I love Shakespeare. I cannot get enough of Shakespeare and someday I am going to shoot a twist on Hamlet. Okay that takes me to this kickstarter project, Thane of East County.



Next is the campaign for a horror film titled Headless.

 

  The last film is a Fan film. I think some of the best low budget film making is being done in the area of fan films. This one is from the Dark Knight universe, Gotham City Sirens.









That will be it for today. On a personal note I would like to add that my screen writing book is now available again at Amazon. You can check it out by clicking the image on the right side of this page.

 Please take a moment to share this post and to like the post of stumbleupon.

From Trailer to Feature, Me + You, Interview Part 1

From Trailer to Feature, Me + You, Interview Part 1



There are a lot of ways to approach raising money for your first feature film.
Crowd funding has become one of the most popular ways. Most of the films that I have spotlighted here and film makers that I have interviewed have gone through the crowd funding process during at least one level of production.

One of the more popular ways for digital film makers to begin the crowd funding process has been to shoot a quick trailer to show what they have in mind and to show off their qualifications to get the movie made. The campaign for the movie “Me + You” for me at least stood out amongst many others that had chosen this path. The actress/film maker, Iyin Landre, dropped everything and headed off to the country where her film is set, Brazil, to shoot the trailer. The idea of traveling to a location where we do not speech the language to pull together a crew and to work with people that we have never met before would be more steps than most of us would be willing to take when working on our first feature.

If you want to know more about what was involved and to get involved in her Kickstarter campaign you can do so by clicking here.  This year I have highlighted about half a dozen crowd funding campaigns and the cool part was that each of them had different financial goals and for different aspects of the film making process. Some were for post, some for general production and some for the entire production. The ones that have reached their goals did not do it all from first hand involvement. The person who visits and reads about the campaign is not usually the one who donates. The money usually comes from shares. Your involvement does not have to be cash. Post a campaign on your facebook. Share it on twitter and Google Plus. However many people that you are directly connected to you can times that by ten through the reach of your social media. If you like a campaign then take a moment to hit that share button.

Okay let's look at part one of my interview with Iyin Landre.

First I would like to thank Iyin Landre for agreeing to do this interview about her film Me + You, and the Kickstarter campaign for it.

Thanks for reaching out Rodney, great to have people like you blogging about independent film.

Q1: The first question has to be what is “Me + You” about?

A1: It’s a thriller about an American girl who travels to Brazil and falls in love with a drug dealer from the favelas.

Q2: Many low budget film makers have gone the route of shooting a great trailer for their project in hopes of raising money for the production itself. You went a step further by going on location to Brazil to shoot the footage for your trailer. Where did the inspiration for that come from?

A2: Honestly, a few friends of mine suggested that I just shoot it in LA, but I knew in my heart there was no way I could “fake” Brazil. I had been saving some airline miles for years, and after I finished writing the first draft, I realized that the only way I was going to get funding was if people saw what the movie looked like, felt like. So I decided to cash in my miles and fly down there for a month.

Q3: Did you have your shoot mapped out before you left or did you figure it all out after you arrived in Brazil?

A3: I had written a 5 page script for the trailer itself, but I really didn’t map anything out. A friend of mine passed on two email contacts, and with that I decided to just take a leap of faith and fly down there, hoping that cast, crew, everything would sort itself out. However, I remember arriving at 4:30AM in Rio and looking out the taxi window, thinking to myself -- what the hell was I doing in Brazil by myself? But every time that
anxiety swelled, I just focused on the end result—an amazing trailer that will raise funding for the feature.



Q4: I understand that you have shot a few short films, do you believe that is good prep for a feature or do you find feature film making to be a completely different universe?

A4: I think that it was decent prep. I believe with each short, I became a better storyteller, whether through the writing process, or the directing process or the editing process. At the same time, I realize I have never been to film school, but I don’t believe that everyone has to. Everyone’s path is different, and the only thing I can do is go with my gut. And right now, it’s telling me to shoot this feature.

Q5: I am going to ask you a few hat questions now. You are going to be wearing multiple hats on this production; producer, director, writer and actress. As the producer are you prepared for the times when you may have to tell the director that cuts and compromises will have to be made during the production? Every low to micro budget film producer will answer every single question the same way. “There is no money for that. Find a work around.” After about ten days of production most producers are asking is there any way that coffee grounds can be recycled. As you prep to go into full production mode do you find yourself going over ever possible way to squeeze more production value out of each and every dollar?

A5: Good thing Brazil has amazing coffee! Yes, the producer in me is already squeezing every dollar from production. And to my surprise, because of the Kickstarter campaign, we’ve already had a number of Brazilians reach out to me saying that they’d love to be a part of the film in some way, offering their services for free because they love the project.

Q6: This question goes to the young lady wearing the director’s hat. When you put on the directors hat for the first time did it feel like it was something that you should have been doing all along or was it like putting on the sorting hat from Harry Potter?

Did it take a while to get use to it?

A6: Well, the first time I directed was a short film I made in 2009, called “Homo.” With all the Prop 8 protests against gay marriage in California at the time, I wondered what if the tables were turned – what if two heterosexual lovers fall in love in a homosexual world, only to be torn apart by society? With that film, I would say I didn’t know the first thing about directing, about composition, angles, how to direct actors, anything really. But after that I took a directing class at UCLA Extension, and though still limited, it gave me a skill set, streamlined my ideas and helped me to find my directing style. And since then, I’ve directed more short films, music videos, etc. But I have to mention that I will not be directing “Me + You.” As much as I’d love to, I think it would be too overwhelming for my first feature, to both star and direct.

Q7: Who are your favorite directors?

A7: Darren Aronofsky for sure. I would say that he was my film school. I’ve been tweeting him, so if you read this Darren, call me! Also Danny Boyle with “Trainspotting,” Guillermo del Toro with “Pan’s Labyrinth,” and Asghar Farhadi who also wore many hats in “A Separation.”

The second half of this interview will be publish tomorrow. If you would like to visit the film’s website you can do so by clicking here.

Public Domain films

Public Domain Films

I am about to post an interview that I had done with a filmmaker who has decided to make a sequel to a public domain film.

To fill you in on what public domain means, these are films that are no longer under copyright protection. The most famous of these films is Night Of The Living Dead. Many of us know that Romero made the mistake of not filing for a copyright on his little masterpiece thus opening the flood gates for anyone and everyone since then to make what are known as walking dead films and even tv shows. No one had to pay for the right to do this because of the lack of copyright protection.
    
 Note, please guys take the time to protect your intellectual property. Register your scripts and copyright your finished films.

There are hundreds of films, many famous and known to you that are free and clear to be remade or sequeled thanks to the fact that they have fallen into public domain. The movie that I am doing my next series of interviews about is sequel to a 1943 Bela Lugosi film titled The Devil Bat. When I first heard about the sequel to that film I thought really, seriously. Then I watched the movie again, haven’t seen it since I was like ten, and I discovered that it was a pretty sound piece of film making. Bela was great as the lead actor. It had a basic plot that it never looked away from. At about seventy minutes in length it held interest from beginning to end.

  

 This showed me that the public domain can be a gold mine for material. After researching just some of the films that are free to remake or do a sequel to I have a list of four or five movies that I am going to talk over with my production partners. That said I have not begun to look at the foreign films that are public domain yet. I understand that there is a lot of Italian horror and thrillers that are public domain in this country. I know that we did not talk much about actual digital film making today, but this is a cool subject to look into. I have always hated the idea of remaking great films, but the idea of remaking or doing sequels to lost films or forgotten films is something that excites the film maker in me.

That will be it for today. The next post will be an interview with the film maker behind the making of The Revenge Of The Devil Bat and its crowdfunding campaign.

Thank you for visiting and please take a moment to add us to your google plus or to stumble us on stumpleupon.