How do indies get +$200K funding?

F

FatBird19

Well-known member
I'm suffering from complete ignorance here and could really use some help...

For small indie features--say $200k - $2million, where do they get that kind of money from? How do you get to the point where you can raise that kind of a budget? What kind of people/entities funds that usually?

Because as far as I understand, that's still far too low of a budget for big studios to dabble or take interest in, yet every year film festivals are full of these indies that have $100K - $4mil budgets. How are these funded?

I'm wondering because I have a full length movie script that a lot of people who've read it really like and we're thinking about jumping on board with a production company who's gained some modest interest from studios with their past projects.
But how would one go about getting just $200K for an independent film? What to people do to make that happen?

Any help appreciated. There's some things that film school really should have prepared me for, but I guess that's where the real world has to take over.

cheers,
-J
 
For the money you need, do what Lance Priebe, a business acquaintence of mine did.

1. Learn Flash
2. Build a kids website called clubpenguin.com (call yours clubglopney or something)
3. Sell it to Disney for 700+ million. (I believe the final figure turned out to be 762 million)
 
craigbowman said:
For the money you need, do what Lance Priebe, a business acquaintence of mine did.

1. Learn Flash
2. Build a kids website called clubpenguin.com (call yours clubglopney or something)
3. Sell it to Disney for 700+ million. (I believe the final figure turned out to be 762 million)
Click to expand...


Funny you mentioned that, my 7 year old neice was on that site tonight.

I had no idea about all this kids stuff until I spent $400 loading her ipod with zack & cody shows, bolt, bedtime stories etc. I cant even remember all these kids shows names. Big business, didn't Disney pay some stupid money for the Enstein series?
 
The marketing concept for that site is ingenious. Lance figured out exactly how to make an internet subscription model actually work.

1. Provide the basic kids site for free.
2. Have teams of moderators that work in shifts to patrol the chat and keep it kid safe.
3. Provide a small monthly subscription fee to allow kids to customize the characters. There's always one kid in a group who's parents will buck out the 5.95 a month so that little "eggbert" can lord it over the other kids because he has a custom character. That triggers the other kids to bug the crap out of their parents so they can be a "subscribed" kid too. Its the online version of designer clothing.
4. Once the subscription fee is on the parents' credit card getting billed monthly it tends to sit there even long after the kid is not bothering to visit the site anymore, which of course the kids never mention.

At the time Disney bought the company, club penguin's monthly NET earnings were like 7 million. Yes, that's per month.
 
... but if you're like me and don't know flash LOL, why not make a low low budget feature, say for $25,000 and then parlay your potential profits into a $200,000 movie...
... ok, maybe it will take you two or three movies, but get started :-)

and if you don't have $25,000, do a one-man-band movie with a borrowed digital camera and a few really talented actors, then sell that and with the potential profits ... well, you get the drift.
 
filmman said:
... but if you're like me and don't know flash LOL, why not make a low low budget feature, say for $25,000 and then parlay your potential profits into a $200,000 movie...
... ok, maybe it will take you two or three movies, but get started :-)

and if you don't have $25,000, do a one-man-band movie with a borrowed digital camera and a few really talented actors, then sell that and with the potential profits ... well, you get the drift.
Click to expand...

Or you go the next level up like http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1152850/ the director has made her last two movies for $200 - $300k and got the money for her recent one from Field Guide Films, Film Science and Glass Eye Pix. Casting Michelle Williams would have helped get the budget too.
 
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filmman said:
... but if you're like me and don't know flash LOL, why not make a low low budget feature, say for $25,000 and then parlay your potential profits into a $200,000 movie...
... ok, maybe it will take you two or three movies, but get started :-)

and if you don't have $25,000, do a one-man-band movie with a borrowed digital camera and a few really talented actors, then sell that and with the potential profits ... well, you get the drift.
Click to expand...

Whatever works for ya!
 
craigbowman said:
For the money you need, do what Lance Priebe, a business acquaintence of mine did.

1. Learn Flash
2. Build a kids website called clubpenguin.com (call yours clubglopney or something)
3. Sell it to Disney for 700+ million. (I believe the final figure turned out to be 762 million)
Click to expand...

...wow. That's amazing...
 
craigbowman said:
3. Provide a small monthly subscription fee to allow kids to customize the characters. There's always one kid in a group who's parents will buck out the 5.95 a month so that little "eggbert" can lord it over the other kids because he has a custom character. That triggers the other kids to bug the crap out of their parents so they can be a "subscribed" kid too. Its the online version of designer clothing.
4. Once the subscription fee is on the parents' credit card getting billed monthly it tends to sit there even long after the kid is not bothering to visit the site anymore, which of course the kids never mention.
Click to expand...

It's interesting to see these hidden markets that most of us don't think about where people will actually still pay money for media.
Children's entertainment is a big one.


And for some reason, a lot of people will still see value in paying for media from their cell phones (videos, songs, ringtones, applications).
I just wish people felt the same when they were on their computers.
 
craigbowman said:
2. Have teams of moderators that work in shifts to patrol the chat and keep it kid safe.
Click to expand...

Odd how some parents react... back in the ancient days, when I realized how 'censorious' Prodigy was, I set The Daughter up with a dialup to an Internet Provider and go direct to The Evil Empire. The Father Daughter lecture consisted of 'if you wouldn't give a complete stranger on the street certain information... why do it on the Internet'... as it was she learned to deal with individuals to asked untoward questions... ignore them... and odd sort of behavior these days...
 
j1clark@ucsd.edu said:
Odd how some parents react... back in the ancient days, when I realized how 'censorious' Prodigy was, I set The Daughter up with a dialup to an Internet Provider and go direct to The Evil Empire. The Father Daughter lecture consisted of 'if you wouldn't give a complete stranger on the street certain information... why do it on the Internet'... as it was she learned to deal with individuals to asked untoward questions... ignore them... and odd sort of behavior these days...
Click to expand...

I'd be less concerned about that, more concerned about the kind of contents and thoughts that some will post online. Some people just think it's funny to destroy a kid's innocence.
 
Well the short answer is: have a good enough script, director, and actors to convince people that the film is a worthy investment.
 
Get a GREAT script, send it to local 'name' actors and successful producers, get someone with a real track record involved - and then draw in investors from projections based on similar projects with similar talent and the fact that you've got a great script.

Investing in films isn't all that different from investing in anything else, it's about making a sound business case for the investment.
 
Grug said:
Get a GREAT script, send it to local 'name' actors and successful producers, get someone with a real track record involved - and then draw in investors from projections based on similar projects with similar talent and the fact that you've got a great script. ...
Click to expand...

Do you have links to, or can you post examples of where you personally did this and how that actually worked for you?
 
Where does that $200K number come from?

I basically did what the one person said above. Spent my $25,000 salary over a years time (07-08) while living with my parents on equipment, shot my first script ever in homes of friends/family (June 08 to Nov 09), used friends/family as actors except for one guy from about 2 hrs away. Took a year and a half to shoot whenever people were available. Eventually got it completed for about $50k (included first 13,000 copies made and $10k deferral to composer who did about an hour of music for the film). Made a finished goods deal with a distribution company in the Christian market, which made it mostly my responsibility to market and move the copies. Made a profit with the initial order of DVDs before it hit a shelf on Aug 24, 2010. Sold out those initial copies by the end of 2010. Started using some of the funds for Facebook advertising around that time, built my page up to about 290,000 by now and kept the sales going, along with other press I dug up by cold calls/emails, etc. Got onto national Cable/VOD in Dec-Jan 2012, iTunes, etc. Hit Redbox April, 2012 which was a success and the film is still available almost 6 months later (to my surprise).

It was my own little Brothers McMullen...built from the ground up with a lot of stupidity and faith, very little money, a lot of late nights crying over my FCP keyboard, and the support of folks around me.

If you want to get started, I wouldn't go for the $200K...why not try to write a smaller story you can do well but for cheap and try to break through that way? Prove you can make a profit with something small, then go after more investment after that.

With movie #2 I'm splitting the budget into $5000 units and shopping them around to contacts I've made with this first film including a few I used on the last for some finishing funds. I've proven I can take something that's OK and make a significant profit, market my own product well, etc. Nowadays nobody wants to take a huge risk. I would try to prove yourself a little first. Don't blow $200K on a first film...that's my advice.

There's no formula for this mind you, all I can give you is my advice based on what I've learned and experienced.
 
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