Campfire: Is Crowd-Funding a Sustainable Alternative to the Hollywood Studio System?

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Permalink Reply by Tsuko on November 19, 2008 at 4:21pm

Crowd-funding offers a good deal of advantages for a rising filmmaker, a community can offer a lot more than a settled filmaking company. While the company will just as easily twist your work to fill their concept of 'wide audience', and twist your worktime to fill some schedule, a community would not do such a thing, and their opinions are far more relevant than those of a marketroid. A community can help with publicity too, and with enough people and noise, publicity from large companies can be attracted easily.
The problem with such a system is that while a studio and investors recover their expenses completely, the contributors of a community don't get such a treat, which doesn't matter too much for a single film, but for several it becomes a problem unless you treat the donors as investors, and pay them back in kind.

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Permalink Reply by PiousRenegade on November 19, 2008 at 11:05pm

"paying them could be a matter of the most elaborate microaccounting ever"

Meh. Companies perform such actions through quarterly dividends, paying x per share to each shareholder. If we take that tack, then I suppose were just turning a movie into a publicly traded equity.

I'm always happy to see new ideas challenging the establishment. If crowdsourcing can produce a profitable movie of similar quality to a massive corporate flick, but unencumbered by the established system, then all the better. Either the old school people change to reflect the new way, or natural economic selection turns Beverly Hills into Compton.

Oh, what a tragedy!

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Permalink Reply by Filipe Soares Dilly on November 21, 2008 at 6:39am

I really think it is. And I know a "kind of" crowd-funding project: http://www.bigbuckbunny.org/ and http://www.yofrankie.org/ . Its a initiative of the Blender institute (the same guys that develop Blender 3d) to develop more the 3d program, for more info visit: http://www.blender.org/ .

PS: sorry for my poor English.

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Permalink Reply by Twowan on November 21, 2008 at 10:57pm

While I see crowdsourcing as a very valid alternative to Hollywood Productions and I do invite you to check out Laboratory Films (www.laboratoryfilms.com) to see an alternative project, I, personally, do not believe in crowdfunding. Money should not flow this way. It's fundamentally wrong. Anyway, if anyone wants to invest in films, they can find hundreds of legal film investment funds all over the world. (Just ask your banker.) They usually give some kind of tax advantage. Nothing new here. Actually Hollywood is financed in great part by these film funds many of which are foreign. In the case of Artemis, you are investing a very, very small amount of money in a very, very small film. "Very, very small" is the key word. So expect very, very small returns. In my book, if you ask people to invest real money, you must give them ownership through a share system. If you don't it's just a hand out... Jessica could be holding a cup at the corner of 42nd and Lex.

In our opinion, the real solution is not to have the audience pre-pay for the film but really for filmmakers, for artists, to come together in a radically new production system. (We have had some great open-source examples but now it's time to challenge the for-profit world, the real big-time corporate world.) A system where all who contribute become true shareholders with all the rights that this brings. But beyond money, it's a way to finally participate on big films. Instead of having hundreds, thousands of artists, isolated, trying to work on something small with little chances of finding an audience, you bring this network on a strong project, a really big project that has the ambition to rival Hollywood. so how do you do that? At Laboratory Films we have one system with one method but there could be others. The important part is to achieve strength through great numbers without it being a mess of committee creating. It's a true cybernetic revolution that we hope to validate.

Check it out. Thank you.

Twowan

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Permalink Reply by Tsuko on November 21, 2008 at 11:17pm

I do think crowd-funding a large budget movies without giving back to the crowd it's just not possible. You'll get away with the first one, for novelity's sake, but it wouldn't be a sustainable business model. Yet, the legal implications of providing payback, and the likeness of scammers taking this as a new way to scam, are unsettling.

If you step down in the scale of budget, going for indie artists, not paying a professional studio to give you flashy yet obviously green-backgrounded fake effects, using actual public locations instead of sets, etc; the cost go down enough for the crowd-funding to be entirely possible (dropping the famous actors could even halve costs), even without the pay back thing.



Apart from crowd-funding, you can also have crowd-making (or both). It is unrealistic for regular acted movies (at least as in CROWD), but for CG movies it is entirely possible. Your average joe might not be able to contribute, but your fellow hacker (using the term for what it means, not what the media missuses it as) might give a lot, just like bazaar developing. I have yet to see a large scale bazaar-made CG movie, but i surely want to see it done.

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Permalink Reply by Laurence on November 23, 2008 at 11:06pm

My video response,


Find more videos like this on MIX
Scuse the background but I'm not too fussed when it comes to thai hotel room decor :P

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Permalink Reply by Oscar on November 29, 2008 at 2:13pm

I think it's a great idea. Whether or not crowd-funding could sustain a film career depends on too many factors to predict. Some people said we would never land on the moon. So, is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? I don't know. I can only speak for myself. I would never personally contribute any of my hard-earned dollars to a stranger (or friend for that matter) who was making a film. I don't throw away my money unless there's something in it for me. There's no shortage of movies out there to watch -- and I'm not so hard up for a new movie that I'd give someone 10, 20, or 50 bucks as a contribution for a movie that I might get lucky enough to see one day. If that person wanted to give me a role in the film, with a promise of future proceeds if the film makes money, then I'd contribute 50 bucks at most. It would be a gamble.

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Permalink Reply by d-dave on November 30, 2008 at 11:28pm

I think crowd funding is a great idea! Yet, I don't think it could ever maintain a career. This being said if one can not make a career out of this it wouldn't be sustainable.

For me this is like asking the question will Open Source Software, or "freeware" ever kill the industry of pay software or become a sustainable way of software production? Another issue that might be different in some ways, but essentially beg the same question. Can or will Creative Commons become a sustainable way to make a career as a photographer?

In each one of these questions we face the fact that eventually people find out that they can be making money on these projects. Although creative commons is revolutionary and open source software is huge they will remain a sub-category. Each one being as important as they are they will not die out themselves; as we all know free software, cool independent films and new flexible copyright laws have changed the way we have looked at things forever. Yet, we will still face the fact that there is large amount of people that are more interested in the money.

I think that probably for most this is a good way to be spring boarded into the market in a very independent way. As people begin to build a career in the end they will need/ or want the big money to create those higher end films that cost a lot of money. Yet, who knows if you create a very rich and die heart fan base you might continue to get the constant flow of cash to keep you a float.

It just about profits sadly, and unfortunately a movie that comes out every 2 years from fan funds cannot compete against a studio that puts out 5 or 6 movies within that same year. Unfortunately the business world isn't always about artistic nature of a film, software, painting. So it takes that constant influx of profit to keep it going where fan funds could be very insecure way of obtain funds and thus make it hard to maintain a career.

With all this said, I do think that it could very well produce much more Quality Film. With that much control and creative freedom could just open doors to so many new things look already what online videos, online "television" has done, it can do just the same for the film industry.

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Permalink Reply by tubejay on December 1, 2008 at 3:53am

"this is like asking the question will Open Source Software, or "freeware" ever kill the industry of pay software or become a sustainable way of software production?"

maybe. there are a few important differences: 1. that industry leaders like ibm and google already benefit from open source. there is no analog to that in crowdsourced filming.

2. that a team of people working for free often create software just to see it available. for them this is a hobby that has little analog in the production of professional quality movies, unless you're willing to not pay your cast members (that's why i mentioned machinima.)

3. that in other ways, open source is much more established and proven. it may not be proven in the court of public opinion yet, but it's a hobby and a business and an industry that in some ways, requires less to produce than it does to produce a good film. investing in open source takes you much farther than investing the same amount in a movie.

i would agree that any cause for optimism in open source is also cause for some in crowdsourced movies, but at least in open source you get more than the right to download and watch. crowdsourcing is always more likely to work if people have additional rights other than watching them.

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Permalink Reply by Edward on December 3, 2008 at 8:15am

I'm not sure.

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Permalink Reply by Steve Woolf on December 4, 2008 at 11:52am

Good thoughts all around, imo. I think it's pretty clear that we need new ways of getting large projects done. Crowd-funding is a really interesting and exciting first step, but probably only a first step. People do need to be compensated in some way for investing, and we need a way to rally up larger sums for bigger projects. I have a feeling some developer is working on that in his garage as I type this...

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Permalink Reply by Corey Parker on December 7, 2008 at 11:09pm

@Steve We have hit a point When All you need is a camera and a computer, I feel you could make a Lord Of The Rings Movie For a Mill Right now, cause the tech Is There now.

As For Crowd-Funding, it's in no way a new thing, hell Evil Dead Was made that way, Sam Raimi Got Money From Doctor Types to fund his movie, Now There is One problem When using Crowd-Funding sooner or later someone will ask "Wheres my Cut?"
There will always be someone who want's a cut of the profits and Really Would you rather have to pay 80 People(CF) back or a One person(Studio)?
I think what a studio is will change but There will always be need for people with deep pocket's So I don't think CF or SF will ever Win the race But I do Think The Low(10,000-300,000$) To No-budget Films Will Gain a much grander Market.
Making Film's For 250 Million Isn't Needed To Make an Epic Film anymore and I think TV is beginning To see that and it's only a matter of time before Hollywood sees it to.
Hell Look at Your Old Sister Show Indy Mogul. They do great work, and their not the only one's, There are people out their that can make a hell of a product for a few bucks now, cause Tech Has Matched our Imagination, Finally!
Is the next Two Year's Independent Films Will Look as epic as LOTR, At least I think it will.

Can using the web to involve a lot of people from around the world making small donations be a sustainable way to make studio-quality films?- I think so.
Can a filmmaker build a career that way?- Yes I think they can.

We have the ability to make our own projects now and Why Go to film/Acting Classes If You can learn first hand?
More Filmmakers and Actors will Come from The Web Then From The School's in the future.
Were at the Beginning Of a Huge Media Shift But the old trick's are the best tricks, Things Will stay But The Business models Will Change!
Movie's Will be made For under a 100 Million and Will Still Gross a lot and long as there is money Rich People Will follow.
And Actors will come from the Schools, The Net, and Nowhere.
This Concludes My Rant for Today.:D
-Wek-er1

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