So I completed my film whats next?

You could post on a site like short-filz.com. From what I hear
it’s a website to support all indie filmmakers.

nynamyna said:

1. Does these paid online distribution sites really work? Did any one of the filmmaker here really made money out of it? Are people really paying money to watch independent films?

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Which sites are you referring to? Do YOU pay to watch movie
on any of them?

nynamyna said:

2. What about screening movies in different cities and collecting money? Has anyone tried that and made money?

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This is called “four walling”. You rent the theater, pay for all
advertising and then collect 100% of the ticket sales. I doubt
you could get too many people to show up to watch a short
film - maybe a block of short films? Would YOU pay to watch
short films in a theater near you? Perhaps you should try this
in a local theater and if it makes money you could expand to
different cities.

nynamyna said:

3. What about film festivals? How much money should we spend in order to get our film selected in atleast one of them? Does this method really work?

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Festival entry fees range from $20/$30 to upward of $80. Shorts
are placed in blocks that add up to 60 to 80 minutes. It can be
really nice to get accepted into a film festival. the method of entering
many festivals and getting into at least one has worked for many
filmmakers. Are there any film festivals in your area? You should
go to one once.

Thanks for your tips. I am referring to the website like indieflix.com. They say that they will pay us 70% of the profit. Does these kind of wesites really work? As you said, I might bundle one or two movies to screen together in my local theatres. Is anyone interested in screening their movie in Chicago?

by the way Short-filmz.com is my website

nynamyna said:

Thanks for your tips. I am referring to the website like indieflix.com. They say that they will pay us 70% of the profit. Does these kind of wesites really work?

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They do what they say; they pay 70% of the profit. Do you pay to
watch movies there? Does anyone you know pay to watch short
films there? If you put your movie there would people you know
pay to watch it?

nynamyna said:

by the way Short-filmz.com is my website

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And you have said it's there to support all indie filmmakers so I'm
suggesting it's a great website to build an audience for you film and
you future ventures. Am I wrong?

In general: People don't pay to watch shorts. Its a sad situation. There are a few things in the pipework (and some already here) to counter that situation but I personally don't see them really making much for the creators.

One thing a successful producer told me that I thought was interesting, is it to focus not on getting distribution, but getting buzz. Buzz will attract distributors or make it easier for you when you approach them for distribution.

Getting buzz is getting people to talk about your film, share your film through social sites, get professionals to review it, get accolades from film festivals, and get interest from the media.

Hey, there are other ways to make money from your film. I'm guessing the film is finished so sponsoring within the film itself (product placement etc) is out of the question, but maybe you could take a page out of Youtube's book and put adverts before the film and put it online. Possibly put it on Youtube too if it gets enough buzz. 1k views translates to roughly $2 if you're not partnered with a network (like "MakerStudios").
It may not be a lot of money but it will definitely get you exposure.

Now I'm going to go shoot myself for suggesting exposure is enough because I hate it when people "offer" me exposure for my music. It doesn't pay the bills, as they say.

nynamyna said:

Thanks for your tips. I am referring to the website like indieflix.com. They say that they will pay us 70% of the profit. Does these kind of wesites really work? As you said, I might bundle one or two movies to screen together in my local theatres.

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Here's a little tip, to gauge which digital platform sites like IndieFlix and so many others can do for you...

Go to one of the traffic stat websites (like Compete.com or Alexa.com), and look up the URL's of these film sites. Do they get a lot of regular traffic, or very little? Some digital platforms get very respectable or great traffic, others do not. If you're on a site that doesn't get a lot of traffic, it's a waste of time.

Why?

2 reasons:
1) Any film site needs a LOT of traffic to result in buys of your short or feature film. As with a brick & mortar store where the greater the foot traffic, the higher their sales are -- the same with online film platforms. That's why the 'big boys' sites like iTunes, Hulu, Google Play, etc. do better for many filmmakers.
2) It takes a lot of time to get your film up (and correctly, with the necessary metadata, etc.) on many sites. If one wants to do this, cool, do it. But to get yourself up on, say, 50 sites, versus being on the top 10 sites... I'd rather take the time to be on the top 10 sites.

So, if you want to try the smaller sites, you could certainly try one or two and see if that gets you any results. But those sites need foot traffic -- eyeball traffic -- or your film will just sit there, lucky to get one buy a week or month.

Which leads me to another facet to this. There are ways to monetize short films beyond just uploading and praying for sales. One thing you could do is utilize one of the sites where you can have your own player that you can embed anywhere you want online. Including Facebook. You can also set your own price. So for a short, you could make it $.99 per viewing, or $.49 per viewing. You choose. Then, you could engage in social media work and drive traffic to wherever you want people to see your film at. For shorts, I feel the price point is very, very important. Charging $1.99 or $2.99 is a harder sell. (Some of the sites to create your own mobile embed -- and this is not an endorsement -- are DynamoPlayer.com, FlickLaunch.com, Distrify.com)

Hope that helps and gives you some food for thought.
Jerome Courshon
---------------------
THE SECRETS TO DISTRIBUTION: Get Your Movie Distributed Now!
http://www.Distribution.LA

I am the writer and producer of the short film

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There's no money in shorts. I know someone who was "lucky" enough to get his short distributed on a compilation with other shorts. The distributor never recouped their costs and so he hasn't made a dime. Distributors love indie films because it helps pay the rent, pay for the secretary, phone and electric bills, and they make a little money. Better just to sign up with Amazon Advantage and maybe Tunecore.com if you want to pay to get the short on iTunes and other sites, although it's doubtful that consumers pay to view short films.

1. Does these paid online distribution sites really work? Did any one of the filmmaker here really made money out of it? Are people really paying money to watch independent films?

Click to expand...

Of course they work, just about as good as if you did it yourself. They're charging you so they do some of the work for you and take their cut/up front fees. If you're expecting them to spend their money distributing your film, that'll depend on the quality of your film. Just remember, everyone thinks their movie is the best thing since sliced bread.

2. What about screening movies in different cities and collecting money? Has anyone tried that and made money?

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You can make money this way. If you're going down this route, make sure you learn everything you can about marketing and getting bums in seats before you consider this as an option. It can lead to other things, and sometimes it's needed to get started, just don't go in without having a plan in place.

3. What about film festivals? How much money should we spend in order to get our film selected in atleast one of them? Does this method really work?

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Hmm.. It can. You heard of "Pulp Fiction", "Fahrenheit 9/11" or ? Thay were all Cannes festival film winners. I heard they took a couple bucks (Pulp Fiction 213mil, Fahrenheit 222mil). What about "Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives" It was also a Cannes winner and did 1.1mil in the box office. Will it work? Who knows? There's like a 1 in a bazillion chance that you'll be chosen to show, and then you still have to win it.

One thing a successful producer told me that I thought was interesting, is it to focus not on getting distribution, but getting buzz. Buzz will attract distributors or make it easier for you when you approach them for distribution.

Getting buzz is getting people to talk about your film, share your film through social sites, get professionals to review it, get accolades from film festivals, and get interest from the media.

Click to expand...

Bellabelle's a smart girl. She's spot on. In case you don't know what buzz is: It's getting people to talk about/share/learn and get your film (and even yourself) to become famous. This does two things. A). It increases the chances that the film studios will come to you to pick up and distribute your film and B). Lets you negotiate from a position of power. While it won't necessarily mean you'll get a wide release... hell it might not be enough to get you an advance, let alone a decent sized advance, it may get you noticed, get your work out there and put you, your cast and your crew on the map.

Think about it like this: What do you think the difference between getting 100 hits for your Trailer on youtube vs getting 10 million hits would mean to you? The amount of work to get 10 million hits is either expensive or a boat load of work (or both). If you can do it, hell, you might be able to write your own ticket. Is this making market sound important to you yet?

Thank you all for all your support, comments, and ideas. These are the things that I have done for my movie right now. I hope it helps all people in this forum

1. I joined with two other filmmakers and screened my movie in Chicago. One of the filmmaker created a brand called 'SHOrT in Chicago Film Fiesta' and we screened our movies under that. We split the cost for theater rent, promotion, poster, banner etc. We promoted the hell out of it through Facebook. A lot of Chicago based filmmakers turned out to support us, they were amazing. Lot of people came through the filmmaking groups of Meetup.com. We recovered all our expenses through ticket sales and even made a miniscule of profit . Here is the link for that event

http://www.hollywoodchicago.com/news/21194/slideshow-highlights-of-short-in-chicago-film-fiesta
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2607106/news#ni45601678

2. I have already submitted to 5 festivals and got rejection from one of them already. I know that this is a gamble but I cannot really afford submission to many film festivals. So I started a fundraising campaign for festival. Lets see how this goes. You can also help us by visiting the link below (Sorry for promoting it here. As a indie filmmaker I am doing my best to insert it anywhere i can

http://is.gd/deardad

3. Screening in more cities. I am trying to find more people to do a joint screening in other cities. I am using Meetup.com as my source. I will keep you guys posted about this too. If anyone interested in doing a joint screening in Philadelphia, please message me.

Suggest me if you have any more ideas. The profit I made in that event is only considered to be a profit for that specific event. It is nothing when I include all my production expenses. So my goal is to recover at least some money which will help me make more movies. Otherwise I am going to be exhausted and stop after spending money form my pocket for few more movies.

Thanks,
VJ

Just a thought to add, I'm distributing my film through this new site called www.selfpubli.sh - I believe the concept is that any type of digital work can be sold with the aim for fans and friends to support your work and help you make new work - I've found it really helpful for my feature film I made, but would be interesting to see how shorts are received.

Hope people do want to support film makers and pay for shorts in the future? Would be lovely to see that happening one day.