Category Archives: Funding

The best summary of the mediascape to date

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The excellent CMF Trends has released another excellent white paper: Content Everywhere 2: Securing Canada’s Place in the Digital Future by the Canadian Media Production Association.

The 33-page report focusses on developments in the ‘linear, original digital content space’ in Canada, the US and the UK.

With facts and figures, it outlines the ‘videofication’ of the Internet:

“CISCO predicts that video traffic will be 79% of all consumer Internet traffic in 2018, up from 66% in 2013. Internet video is growing at a rapid pace, increasing fourfold by 2018 and consumer VOD traffic will double by 2018. For example, the amount of VOD traffic by 2018 will be equivalent to six billion DVDs per month.”

The report next analyzes the SVOD trend, OTT original content, nimble Internet successes and old media forays.

Case studies from all three countries follow.

One conclusion:

“The biggest obstacle is discoverability in a crowded marketplace –- and the only way to address this challenge is to produce a show that you know has an audience.”

The report closes with this summary of common characteristics of digital-first content across all markets:

  • Global, universal stories
  • Pre-existing and demonstrable digital audience
  • Underserved audiences (in traditional media)
  • Unique creative, perhaps unsuited to traditional media
  • Creative appealing to younger digital audiences
  • Premium talent or ‘event’ programming
  • ‘Digital native’ skills (social media, community building experience)
  • Transmedia competency to market and support content

My take: worth the time to read! Excellent insights and case studies. The takeaway is that you no longer make something for a comissioner/distributor, you make it for your audience. BONUS: email addresses of Digital-First Buyers in Canada, the UK and the US!

Writersandfilmmakers.com uses the crowd to produce films

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Toronto-based Writersandfilmmakers.com has a different approach to short and feature film funding.

I call it a mashup of merit and crowd sourcing.

They’re running two competitions, one for shorts and one for features. Up to 1,000 writers or filmmakers sign up to judge each other’s work. The top filmmaker then gets to select one of the ten top scripts, pays the writer and makes her film.

I asked Jonathan Krimer, via email, why he started this venture:

“As a writer, I recognized that the number one barrier to making a film was funding. Sitting down and writing isn’t too expensive. But making a film is. No matter how much gear you or your friends have, you still need funding. I thought if people could come together and assess each other’s work we would be able to decide which projects to move forward on as a community. Let’s create a community where the participants want the best of the other group. Its a Win-Win-WIN. The last win is the funding.”

The funding comes from the entry fees. When each competition reaches 900-1,000 entrants, fees of $50 for the short film competition and $100 for the feature film competition become payable. The winning short film-maker gets $10,000 to pay the writer of the script they select, $15,000 for principal photography and $10,000 for completion. The winning feature film-maker gets $20,000 to pay the writer of the script they select, $30,000 for principal photography and $20,000 for completion. Writersandfilmmakers.com keeps the remaining fees to cover their overhead.

When each competition begins, each entrant must complete assignments. Filmmakers read and judge scripts. Writers watch and rate films. Writersandfilmmakers.com crunches the numbers to determine the winning filmmaker and the top ten scrips.

Which competition will happen first, short or feature? Any idea when?

“I am predicting the short film competition will occur first because the funding is absolutely insane! 10K for a short script and 25K for a short film?! THAT’S AMAZING! In addition, we have a two to one ratio of short film entries versus feature film entries. As for when, that’s a difficult one to predict. Our current rate of entries is seeing incredible spikes here and there. One day we have 20 entries, the next day we have one. What’s interesting about this competition is the more the word spreads, and the more the community helps spread the word, the faster we can start assessing each others work and funding a film.”

My take: I applaud this venture because it relies purely on writers and filmmakers, and not on funding bodies. Using the crowd to create a meritocracy is laudable. I like that it totally sidesteps issues of commercialization and focusses wholly on scripts and indie filmmaking. The writer prizes are very rich! Given the low entry fees (which are not payable until the competitions reach critical mass) I say go ahead and enter! I only wish there was a way to create communities of writers and directors through this who could collaborate on future projects, perhaps by location, as this is garnering entrants from cities around the world.

Telefilm Micro-Budget Partners

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Telefilm will accept one letter of recommendation from each of its 29 partners for the Micro-Budget Production Program.

If you are an emerging filmmaker in Canada, I believe this is your best shot at fully funding your first feature.

Check out the media co-ops in these cities:

My take: worth exploring!

Funding for female filmmakers

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As reported at On Screen Manitoba, BravoFACT and BravoFACTUAL will now ensure that 50% of their awards will go to female filmmakers:

“The change is meant to help foster up-and-coming female filmmakers in Canada. In order to qualify as female-lead, a submission must have a director or producer attached who is a woman. In addition, every BravoFACT and BravoFACTUAL jury in 2015 will include a female filmmaker as a guest juror.”

The next deadlines are April 1, 2015 for BravoFACTUAL and June 12, 2015 for BravoFACT.

My take: this is long overdue. Go grab a piece of the pie, sisters! We need to hear your stories more than ever.

7 Steps to financing your first feature for free in Canada

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Telefilm recently announced the third version of its excellent two-stage micro-budget feature production contest. I applaud Telefilm for financing 22 features this way and sticking with this program.

Having watched the development of the program over the last three years, here’s my take on how to finance your first feature for free in Canada:

  1. Become a Canadian citizen or landed immigrant.
  2. Join one of the film co-operatives on the Designated Partners list. Consider moving to a cheaper city with less competition.
  3. At the co-op meet a writer member with a feature script you really, really like and want to direct. Convince a producer member to join you two. (By the way, if you can organize a great party AND you can balance your cheque book, consider becoming a Producer — they are in short supply.)
  4. As a trio, make a short film (5-10 minutes) of excerpt scenes from the feature script.
  5. Read this year’s guidelines and get your submission together: second-draft script, budget, marketing plans, pitch video, etc. Telefilm usually announces the Micro-Budget program in October but delayed it until January this year (perhaps due to system changes.)
  6. Submit to your co-op and cross your fingers.
  7. When you’re successful, add the Recommender Letter to your package and submit to Telefilm.

If you’re successful, congratulations! You’ll have $100,000 to $120,000 to make your movie in 12 months and a further three to distribute it digitally.

If you’re not successful, develop a new project and start over. Telefilm will not consider the same project again.

Plus, if you’re not successful at the co-op or Telefilm stages, MAKE THE FILM ANYWAY.

You’re probably asking at least two questions right now:

  1. How can I make the movie when I don’t have the $100K?
  2. How can I ever reapply to the Telefilm Micro-Budget program once I make my first feature?

The answers, as I see it?

  1. The truth is, once you start paying your cast and crew and spending money on renting cameras and equipment, $100K is not enough anyway. If you can entice your co-op buddies and local, non-union actors to collaborate with you on your venture and you use your own or the co-op’s equipment, you’ll actually need much less cash. Maybe $10,000 to $25,000. Find investors or crowd-fund this. You have all the materials you need already!
  2. Telefilm (and CAVCO) calls anything over 74 minutes a feature. If your film looks like a winner, commit to it as your first feature and make it the best possible. If it’s not as great as you wished for your first feature, cut it down to something between 61 and 74 minutes, including credits. That way it will still qualify as a feature at those festivals that use 60 minutes or greater to define features, but it will not be regarded as a feature at Telefilm. This is a case of having your cake and eating it too. You will learn so much by making the film that your next feature pitch will be immeasurably better.

My take: another strategy is to stop waiting to be ‘picked’ and just get on with doing it. As Seth Godin says, the only thing holding you back is your lizard brain.

CineCoup offers $1M plus theatrical release

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CineCoup is back!

The film accelerator that brought us Wolf Cop last year has another ‘$1 Million Dollars’ in production funds and a Cineplex Odeon theatrical release up for grabs. Get ready to pitch and work your butts off:

“This time we’re challenging filmmakers to go high concept and create projects that can connect with larger audiences. We’re looking for genre films with franchise potential like action, horror, thriller, sci-fi, and comedy (or documentaries that deal with pop culture tropes such as King of Kong, Indie Game: The Movie, Trekkies, etc.) and we know Canada’s got the good stuff so bring it on!”

Launch your three-person team on Monday, February 9, 2015. After 12 weeks of team challenges beginning in mid-March, at least one project will be greenlit at the Banff World Media Festival in June.

My take: if you have a franchise-ready action, horror, thriller, sci-fi or comedy feature ready to roll AND you have three months free to complete weekly challenges AND you have a large online following AND you like working in public AND you truly believe your concept is the best in the country, then go for it! What do you have to lose?

BravoFACT gets into pitch contests

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BravoFACT will be sponsoring two pitch contests at upcoming film events at opposite ends of the country, with two prizes of up to $35,000.

First up is the Victoria Film Festival with a deadline for applications of Friday, January 16 at 5 ET (that’s 2 p.m. in Victoria.) Five finalists will be contacted on Friday, January 30, so they can prepare to give a 10-minute pitch on Friday, February 6.

Next is the WITF-Atlantic’s Women Making Waves Conference with a deadline of Friday, February 5 at 5 ET. Five finalists will be contacted on Friday, February 20, so they can prepare to give a pitch on Saturday, February 28. Note: female applicants only, please.

Send your applications for both Narrative shorts and Documentary shorts to Rachel.feldbloomwood@bellmedia.ca Note: demo reels are not required for these applications.

My take: if you have a script for a narrative film less than 7.5 minutes long or a treatment for a documentary shorter than 15 minutes ready to go and you live anywhere near Victoria or Halifax, you MUST apply. BravoFACT is one of the few sources in Canada for truly independent film production funds. Disclosue: I’ve received two BravoFACT awards; one for my short i luv spam and another for Scott Amos’s Scratch.

Victoria represents at Storyhive!

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Following up on my recent post about Storyhive, here’s a list of all the projects from Victoria, B.C.:

Best of luck, everyone!

My take: If you think of projects as stores, these would be funky shops in a fashion-forward mall. Indy films would be independent retailers. TV offerings would be chain stores. Hollywood fare would be big box stores. Ask yourself, where do you like to shop for your entertainment?

$60K up for a web series in BC or Alberta

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Storyhive is changing things up and looking for web series for its next round.

Season two is open to creators in Victoria, Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton. Fifteen teams in each province will receive $10,000 to produce the pilot episode of their web series. One winner will be chosen and receive $50,000 funding for the remaining episodes. Everything gets streamed on TELUS Optik TV On Demand.

The deadline to submit is November 3, 2014. See the FAQ.

My take: this is a derivative of CineCoup, without the on-going missions. I think one of the most interesting aspects of Storyhive is the Creator Directory. This has a great potential to build collaborations between artists.

New International Digital Media Co-Production Guide

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‘International Digital Media Co-Production, A Guide for Canadian Companies’ commissioned by Interactive Ontario, is now available on the CMF Trends web site.

The guide is a survey of current best practices with a focus on Australia, France, Germany, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the European Union. It provides a detailed overview of the mediascape in each country and lists various funding sources.

The guide also suggests and discusses ten steps to finding an international partner for digital projects:

  1. Travel to Markets, Festivals and Conferences
  2. Develop Existing Relationships
  3. Look to potential U.S. partners
  4. Pursue distribution contacts
  5. Get help from the Embassies
  6. Don’t rush the relationship
  7. Research stakeholders
  8. Find the money first
  9. Meet producers when they come to Canada
  10. Think about more than money

My take: Thinking globally, acting locally makes sense in the digital realm. This guide illustrates some of the nitty gritty involved in making that a reality.