This is my first time posting in the distribution lounge. I've just finished my third film. With my first two short films, I always intended to put them on YouTube. However, with my third film, it's bigger, bolder and (hopefully) better. I spent a lot of time, effort and money on this one, so I'd like to attempt to go another route rather than YouTube. No disrespect to YouTube. I'm just hoping for this film to reach a different, (hopefully) wider audience.
I've done a little research and found out about Film Hub. To my understanding, you upload your film, and then depending on what I assume they deem the quality is, they push it out to distributors like Amazon Prime, Tubi, Apple, etc. I also believe there's a profit split. Do I have that right?
Right now, I'm entering the film into festivals to see if we can make a run and gain some traction that way. Since this is my first time looking at distribution other than YouTube, I wanted to see what people had to say on here. Am I going about this the right way? Is there anything else I need to do? Thanks in advance!
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Trey Alessio, I'm commenting so that this post can reach my network here on Stage 32 and hopefully some of my great connections can provide you with some advice and insights from their experiences. Thank you for putting yourself out there and posting for help!
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Thank you so much, Ashley Renee Smith!
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Festivals is a good place to start but you can also start looking for domestic distributors and sales agents that take on similar titles. A good place to do this is by going onto IMDb, looking at titles like your (genre, budget etc.) and lick on the company credits section. Here there will be a list headed "distributors". In this list there will be the international distributors, domestic distributors and the sales agent (their territory is usually labelled "worldwide").
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Hi Trey , in the "aggregator" category which is what Filmhub is, I like Indie Rights the best.
https://www.indierights.com/
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Trey Alessio, FilmHub is in my humble opinion not what they started out to be. They are now charging monthly fees to have better customer support or to have your film pulled from a platform (previously no fee). I'm w/David on Indie Rights being a great alternative. Regarding sales agents, most will not garner any international sales nowadays, but it's worth a shot. And they end up putting you on many of the same platforms you can get on via FilmHub or Indie Rights, which makes one wonder if it's worth it.
If you do go the route of a traditional Sales Agent / Distribution company, I would not sign an agreement that has a term longer than 2 years. Make sure ALL expenses are PRE-APPROVED in advance. And never agree to marketing fees or any sort. It's all a gimmick to take what little bit of money you would / could make. Years ago, I had a film that made back 6x the budget and didn't see a penny! This is how corrupt companies are! Best wishes to you!
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I will do a little research on IMDB. Thanks, Ewan Dunbar!
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I'll look into Indie Rights. Thanks, David Santo!
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Thanks for all the advice, Stephen Folker! Much appreciated
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Trey, aggregators are usually a last resort rather than a first. They deal in volume and simply put their films up on platforms. If you believe that your film doesn't have potential to, say, get picked up by Starz or Showtime domestically, or garner an MG in any international territory, then perhaps that's your best route, although it's safe to assume you won't recoup your budget. However, if you realistically think there's some potential upside, it's definitely worth submitting to and chatting with other distribution & sales entities. You can expect there to be some expenses and market fees - as long as they are transparent with these and they are reasonably capped, that is actually standard industry procedure. You also want to ensure that there's no cross-collateralization. I think a 2-year term may be challenging; however, you can ask for performance minimums with the right to take your film back if they don't meet these in the first two years, for example. There are plenty of shady operations out there, but there are plenty of reputable ones as well. If you ask around, you can usually get the low-down. :)
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Thank you everyone for jumping in with great insights!
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Robert Deege Thank you so much for this! Very insightful and helpful
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Trey Alessio Keep us posted as to what direction you go! And if you go the route of a traditional distributor, reach out to other filmmakers who have had their works distributed by said company and ask if they've made money (or their budget back). And there are a couple of groups on Facebook where you'll find all the info you need about predatory companies. Best wishes to you!!