Crowdsunite, a website that specializes in crowdfunding reviews like only a millennial startup could, recently compiled a list of the industry’s top 10 platforms based on user reviews. Weighing the funding success rate, customer support and user friendliness, Crowdsunite concluded that the niche hybrid Seed&Spark ranked higher than Kickstarter, while the likes of IndieGogo and GoFundMe didn’t even make the cut. A plausible reason for this is that the survey considered platforms that cater across several industries (publishing, medical), but the reasons behind their viability are nonetheless worth considering for your next campaign. While users have frequently taken issue with Kickstarter’s “all […]
“Red Letter Media is Creating Weird Internet Videos and Films” is the tagline for the Milwaukee-based collective’s page on online fundraising platform Patreon. It’s an appeal that has impressively generated the group almost $100,000 a year in fan donations. Red Letter Media is the home of various creators, including Mike Stoklasa, whose critical vivisections of George Lucas’s Star Wars prequels landed him on Filmmaker‘s 25 New Faces list in 2010. Offering reviews of films and video games alongside other content (like a comedic instructional feature film, How Not to Make a Movie), Red Letter monetizes itself through YouTube advertising, DVD […]
The following is a guest post from director, writer and actress Bethany Orr, whose untitled Iceland-set, psychosexual drama is currently raising funds on Indiegogo in a campaign titled “Iceland or Bust.” Click here at the link to learn more and to support the project. Okay, so you’re not Zach Braff. The market is saturated with projects competing for attention and the hard-earned dollars of YOUR potential supporters. So why crowdfund in 2014? Hasn’t that train left the station? I mean, it’s a huge risk, what if you embarrass yourself? Crowdfunding is, after all, the quickest new way to get unfollowed […]
Last year, I did a lengthly profile on Dogfish Pictures’ inaugural Accelerator program, which adapts a start up financing model to the independent film landscape. Dogfish equips each of its selected participants with seed financing and an office space where they’ll develop their product(s) over the course of nine-weeks, with added input from mentors. The program is capped off by a demo day, in which a member from each team pitches to a room full of investors, industry personnel and lowly journalists like myself. Applications are now open for the second edition of Accelerator through August 8, but this year, James Belfer and Co. are widening the field. “Content […]
Kickstarter announced today major changes to its process for accepting applications, simplifying its guidelines for creators and allowing campaigns to “launch instantly” by bypassing the human approval process. Kickstarter’s new rules boil down, writes founder Yancey Strickler, to three points: Projects must create something to share with others. Projects must be honest and clearly presented. Projects cannot fundraise for charity, offer financial incentives, or involve prohibited items. (The rules in full can be read here.) In his post, Strickler emphasizes that “Launch Now” is just an option; creators will still be able to propose projects to Kickstarter’s Community Managers, who […]
Thunder Funder is the recently announced film production arm of Thunder Studios, a Long Beach, California soundstage and production house, and it’s making a bold play for independent projects. Rodric David, founder and CEO of both Thunder Funder and Thunder Studios, has announced $12 million in annual investment and partnerships with several other companies — post-production services vendor Pace Pictures, Red Digital Cinema and, to handle distribution, indie vet Cassian Elwes of Elevated Film Sales — to bring to independents “all the tools required to present audiences with a film that is truly the best it can be.” A dive […]
Crowdfunding your film can be fraught with many potential dangers, but one of the most common issues overlooked by first-time crowdfunders is the cost of running a crowdfunding campaign. These costs are varied but can include: the production of promotional assets like campaign videos; the cost of your time for marketing the campaign and supporting your backers; the cost of fulfilling your campaign rewards; and finally the costs of using your crowdfunding platform of choice, Kickstarter, IndieGogo etc. The price of using crowdfunding platforms can be broken down into two key costs: credit card processing fees (normally something between 2-4% of […]
Scrolling through Twitter yesterday, I came across an interesting bit of data from the programmer-critic Miriam Bale that extended beyond the usual 140 characters. Linking to an external app, Bale drew up a breakdown of what she calls “the cost to have an indie film career.” Stipulating that most independent filmmakers finance at least a portion of their work, in addition to their basic living expenses, it would take about $119,112 to sustain four years of a “career.” Bale also postulates that working a full time gig at $12/hour, you could save around $3,072 a year, for the next 39 years, before […]
This guest post by Alexandre Rockwell is published as his Kickstarter campaign to support finishing costs of his latest feature, Little Feet, launches. You can learn more and donate here at the link. “An old dog learning new tricks.” That’s what a pal of mine said to me the other day, and I could not disagree more. I never have seen myself as an old dog and “new tricks” are what I have had to constantly seek out to keep making handmade films over the years. Continuously reinventing oneself and jumping into the fire over and over is either insanity […]
A film I’ve been looking forward to for some time is Leah Meyerhoff’s I Believe in Unicorns, which I saw in rough cut at the IFP Narrative Lab. I was tremendously impressed with what I saw then, particularly the emotional sensitivity of its direction and central performances. The film is now finished, and premiering at SXSW. And there’s a Kickstarter campaign. Check out the new teaser above, read information from the filmmakers about the film below, and consider donating: I Believe in Unicorns is Leah Meyerhoff’s debut feature film which tells the story of a teenage girl who gets in […]