For indie filmmakers, every year brings on new challenges and new opportunities. Here are 10 goals to consider in the New Year:
1. Do consider a theatrical run before jumping to the digital platforms. A theatrical run will generate reviews and give your film credibility.
2. Start preparing for the digital platforms by making sure you can submit all the necessary deliverables.
3. The social networks and search engines are your most efficient and economical ways to market your film.
4. Please, please, please address the 50/50 rule. Allocate 50% of your budget to making the film and 50% to marketing the film.
5. Don't edit your own film. It's impossible to be objective. Many good films are ruined by bad editing.
6. Don't overspend on equipment. Your vision and talent are what's going to make your film noteworthy.
7. Don't waste your money on national or worldwide distribution. iTunes now reaches over 190 countries.
8. Make sure your film is feature length, which is a minimum of 70 minutes.
9. Make still photographs during production, not afterward.
10. Stay away from consultants and companies that promise you the moon. Anyone who can guarantee success would be richer than Bill Gates and Warren Buffet combined.
NEWS BRIEF:
As the Chinese box office sagged alarmingly this past year, filmmakers and studios in the Middle Kingdom began desperately searching for answers. Many concluded that bigger Chinese properties were the solution and banked on new, higher-quality franchises coming on stream in 2018.---Patrick Frater. Variety.com.
MY FAVORITE NEW YEAR QUOTES:
The object of a New Year is not that we should have a 'New Year.' It is that we should have a new soul.---
G.K. Chesterton.
Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each New Year find you a better person.---
Benjamin Franklin.
Cheers to a New Year and another chance for us to get it right.---
Oprah Winfrey.
May all your troubles last as long as your New Year's resolutions.---
Joey Adams
.
An optimist stays up until midnight to see the New Year. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves.---
Bill Vaughn.
Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past. Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God it can go.---
Brooks Atkinson.
Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.---
Hal Borland.
To all our readers: Have a happy, healthy, and fulfilling New Year.
