HD digital download.

Limitedoffer

Limitedoffer

Well-known member
I just have a question regarding my movie that i'll be releasing in late 2010.
I want to distribute it on DVD of course.
But like i've heard alot digital download is really picking up.

What would you need so people can go to your site and download a digital copy?
I'm guessing it would take a long time?
What about posting it in Itunes?

Really dont know how you would share such a massive size file.
Especially in 720p.
 
A 45min HD tv show in 720p at a decent bitrate is 1.09GB, so a 90min feature would be double that. Not sure if we're quite there as far as technology goes. Maybe 10 more years?
 
Agreed. It really is going to be more like 10 years, and that's why this issue makes me so angry. Everyone makes it out to be that oh forget Blu-ray, that's not going to last, it's all about downloading stuff online! Umm, hey, I love my season pass for House and all, and I have the HD season pass, but it doesn't look like true HD at all, frankly. It looks pretty bad compared to even a DVD let alone Blu-ray, not sure what they are doing wrong, way too compressed I'm guessing.

All I can say is that the master QT file for a 3 minute music video is more than 1 gig uncompressed, and that's in 720p shot with the HVX200. So there's no way that a 1.3 gig file of a 42 minute show is going to look any good at all. And, true to that, it really doesn't! It's acceptable, but it's not very good. Frankly standard definition DVD looks better on my 42" screen.

Before they can put truly uncompressed, great looking HD footage over the Internet and we can have large enough hard drives to store this all securely, it's going to be a LONG, LONG time. At least 10 years if not 20 years. Because we need hard drives that are about 100 times as big as they are currently. A standard relatively inexpensive external is 500 gigs or 1 TB and that'll run you maybe $100 for the 1 TB, I guess. That would hold about 20 Blu-ray discs, that's it. Well that's not good enough.
 
Limitedoffer said:
I just have a question regarding my movie that i'll be releasing in late 2010.
I want to distribute it on DVD of course.
But like i've heard alot digital download is really picking up.

What would you need so people can go to your site and download a digital copy?
I'm guessing it would take a long time?
What about posting it in Itunes?

Really dont know how you would share such a massive size file.
Especially in 720p.
Click to expand...

Best I can tell you is the F4V flash video format in a 1280x720 rez. It stiils looks crisp as HD and file size is GREATLY reduced.
 
I don't think the standard should necessarily be an uncompressed master file though, Jonathan. We should instead look at distribution codecs (h.264, XviD, etc).

Look at music: (mp3, aac, flac). Nobody listens to it uncompressed. Even redbook audio from a compact disc isn't bit for bit the same as the master file from the studio.

That being said, I've seen some great quality 1080p 2hr films with video compressed at about 10mbits with the x264 codec. They're about 10gigs.

Once transferring 10 gigs across the internet becomes as easy as transferring 10 megs (Ok. I'm not being fair. Let's say 100 megs), we'll be ready to give up our shiny discs. I just hope bonus features such as commentaries and bts don't go away as a result.
 
JonathanLB said:
Agreed. It really is going to be more like 10 years, and that's why this issue makes me so angry. Everyone makes it out to be that oh forget Blu-ray, that's not going to last, it's all about downloading stuff online! Umm, hey, I love my season pass for House and all, and I have the HD season pass, but it doesn't look like true HD at all, frankly. It looks pretty bad compared to even a DVD let alone Blu-ray, not sure what they are doing wrong, way too compressed I'm guessing.
Click to expand...
As long as it looks good enough and it's convenient the masses will most likely adopt it. Quality isn't high on the list for widespread consumer success. I don't think physical media will get replaced, but just like w/music, video downloads will carve out a chunk of the distribution market.


-A
 
I've been researching the hell out of this. What I've learned is that ad supported outlets suck because advertisers aren't pumping much money into it. I've got a film on Hulu that pays 2.5¢ per view. It's been there a year and I've not even made $1,000 off it yet. [see here]

Going to subscription download services blows – Netflix streaming for example does not pay you for how many times your film is streamed, only a one time payout to offer it in their library (same as their DVD rentals). The best in terms of revenue is Internet VOD (Video on Demand). a pay per download model (itunes and direct sales) rivals that of direct DVD sales* from a web site.

*having your DVD in a brick and mortar retail setting (like walmart) beats the pants off both, but I'm comparing to DVD in terms of internet sales.

Better than anything right now for the indie producer is Cable VOD. Typically the deals are for a three month period and a 50/50 split of the $5 purchase price. You have to go thru an aggregator like New Video. Time Warner owns most of the VOD channels and are looking for genre titles (horror, action, etc) but IFC also has a few and they are actively seeking films based on quality, rather than genre.

But back to internet sales. To really cash in on your film, you need to do a marketing campaign pushing traffic to sites where its hosted. Create an event out of your "digital premiere", hire PR, start online advertising weeks before. Would also be good to time any regional theatrical premiere(s) you may have planned with online digital premiere for everyone who is not close to the theaters you've booked. That's called collapsing release windows and is growing in popularity for the indie producer.
 
And in terms of the image quality debate. For most people we have reached a state of "good enough". Blu-ray is sinking because DVD is "good enough". People watch TV online because the quality is "good enough". For short form content and entertainment, even YouTube is "good enough". You're not going to win over more than a small niche audience with the promise of super high quality HD. I would focus on leveraging the outlets that pay the best (largest audience) and supplement the niches that have a direct connection with your film (horror fans, political documentaries, educational markets, etc).
 
Zak Forsman said:
I've been researching the hell out of this. What I've learned is that ad supported outlets suck because advertisers aren't pumping much money into it. I've got a film on Hulu that pays 2.5¢ per view. It's been there a year and I've not even made $1,000 off it yet. [see here]

Going to subscription download services blows – Netflix streaming for example does not pay you for how many times your film is streamed, only a one time payout to offer it in their library (same as their DVD rentals). The best in terms of revenue is Internet VOD (Video on Demand). a pay per download model (itunes and direct sales) rivals that of direct DVD sales* from a web site.

*having your DVD in a brick and mortar retail setting (like walmart) beats the pants off both, but I'm comparing to DVD in terms of internet sales.

Better than anything right now for the indie producer is Cable VOD. Typically the deals are for a three month period and a 50/50 split of the $5 purchase price. You have to go thru an aggregator like New Video. Time Warner owns most of the VOD channels and are looking for genre titles (horror, action, etc) but IFC also has a few and they are actively seeking films based on quality, rather than genre.

But back to internet sales. To really cash in on your film, you need to do a marketing campaign pushing traffic to sites where its hosted. Create an event out of your "digital premiere", hire PR, start online advertising weeks before. Would also be good to time any regional theatrical premiere(s) you may have planned with online digital premiere for everyone who is not close to the theaters you've booked. That's called collapsing release windows and is growing in popularity for the indie producer.
Click to expand...

Nice post and definitely the kind of things I've been researching as well which keeps my head spinning.

The Event Aspect of a Digital Premiere makes so much sense but I really caught on to it after my last movie had already gotten "released" to many VOD outlets before I could even attempt to create a buzz.

I want to find a good PR/Marketing firm to help with my next release but trying to do a lot of the homework ahead of time.

-M
 
if anyone doesn't understand what I meant by "collapsing release windows", here is an explanation. Typically a film is available by one platform at a time. That time period (anywhere from 3 months to a year) is the "window of release" for that platform.

CONVENTIONAL WINDOWS OF RELEASE
- festival
- theatrical
- dvd/blu-ray
- cable/satellite vod
- premium cable
- basic cable
- network tv

more and more, indies are maximizing sales by combining these windows.

COLLAPSED WINDOWS OF RELEASE
- festival / dvd / blu-ray
- theatrical event tour / itunes / cable vod
- sponsored streaming online for free / hulu
 
Wow this is all great info.
I'm going to be taking all of this under consideration.
Thanks alot for the info.

Has anyone had any success with VOD?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top