Finding Film Funding and Other Extreme Sports
A behind-the-scenes look at film funding, passive income, and pitching.
It’s been a strange week, and I’m pooped.
Personal stuff slightly got the better of us, and work has been a full-blown, adrenaline-fuelled rollercoaster.
Bringing a project over the line is exhilarating, and exhausting. Months of back-and-forth. Nearly there, sudden about-turns, balancing requests, storyboarding, pitching, rejections, rethinks. Then finally, someone bites. And that tiny sparkle in your brain lights up again.
Now we just need to turn the bite into a full-on chomp, and a signed contract.
We had that nibble of interest a couple of weeks ago. Since then, we’ve been focused on turning it into a full-on chomp and a signed contract.
Anyone who’s pitched a creative project knows the feeling. You throw your everything at it: hair-pulling, spreadsheet-making (the thing i’m most awful at in the entire world), relentless emailing, second-guessing, third-guessing, silence, Zooms…all the Zooms. Anything to push it into that elusive "sealed and dealed" category.
And then, finally, late on Friday night… we got the sign-off. And i crumbled into a tired and wired mess on the sofa with a throat infection, more grey hair and PMT.
Rejection
Someone recently asked us how many projects we have on the go over the course of a year. I reckon it's about 50. Not all of these get over the line. Some are written off. Some are just scribbles. Others are half-formed storyboards.
There’s one in particular that’s been under our hats for five years. The story is so good it terrifies me that someone else will snap it up. We nearly got it signed off earlier this year. It felt like we were there. But just before we started to celebrate.. it fell through.
Did we price too high? Too low? Go too big? Too safe? Despite my general state of overhtinking, I’m a positive thinker, and I always believe if someone’s genuinely interested, and the value to them is clear and fair there must be a way to make it work. So why didn’t it? I shall continue to ponder and tweak at it, whilst summoning up the energy for another pitch attempt.
So how do we fund these project?
Often, when you’re thinking of ideas for films, there are so many jostling for space. That’s one of the parts I really love, snuffling out characters, the locations, the details that make a story pop. So you’re all excited and raring to go and then comes the trickier part: funding. You’ve worked out your value and what you need to bring this film to life - what next?
Here’s how we tend to approach it:
Grants: In the UK, there are lots available, both nationally and locally. Weirdly, many local ones go unclaimed because people simply don’t know they exist. So check your council’s website, you might be surprised. We certainly were, there are grants that cover equipment, websites, to cultural grants for creative projects. Just a few to take a look at (feel free to msg me for a full list!) BFI, DocFest, RTS, Arts Council.
Crowdfunding: Just writing this word makes me feel tired. We’ve done it once successfully and once unsuccessfully. So, looking back, the difference was obvious. The successful one we really put a huge amount of time, energy, strategy, at it and it had a clear sense of community. The other one we didn’t quite so much - why? The first time we were just starting out, our overheads were lower and we didn’t have a lot of work commitments to consider so we could throw our all at it, but the second time around we were stretched, we had a few big projects on, and we overstretched ourselves thinking we could take it on.
If you’re stretched on resources (especially time), it’s a tough ask, but when it works, it’s really powerful, not only do you have the funding but you have an active community of interested people..
Pre-selling : This works really well if you have a rock-solid story, an already engaged audience who are eager for content around your protagonist, and you build a tight strategy to get that buzz going. If you don’t, it can be an uphill climb, similar to that of crowdfunding. Vimeo is where we normally pre-sell, but they normally only allow this for a period of 30 days, so bear this in mind when planning your timeline. You have to release your film 30 days after you start pre-selling.
Brand partnerships: In the adventure/outdoors world especially, there are brands who might come on board to help bring something to life. This route takes a lot of relationship-building, but it’s a good fit for the right kind of story, especially if it is one that compliments the brand values and fits into the brand story.
Passive Income:
Stock footage: This one’s a slow burn. We’ve been uploading consistently to Blackbox (there’s an application process but don’t let this put you off), which allows you to sell footage across platforms like Shutterstock and Pond5. It’s extremely time-consuming, and you need a decent bank of content but it’s a good way to build passive income in the background. If anyone has a magical shortcut for Blackbox workflows, please let me know immediately. (We only contribute landscapes).
Distribution via Filmhub: If you’ve self-funded a film and want to start generating revenue, Filmhub is a great option. It acts as an aggregator, submitting your film to platforms like Amazon, Apple TV and a whole bunch of weird niche streamers you’ve never heard of. It’s been one of the best things keeping income ticking over during slower months.
(here’s a link if you want to start your journey on filmhub - this is a referral link so pls be aware we might make money if you access via us! But we’d use the service regardless and would highly recommend it)
So, slowly-slowly-catchy-wormy, all these different income strands start to form a patchwork of sustainability. It’s not fast or particularly super glamorous and flashy, but worth the time invested.
Anyway…
That was my roller coaster week.
Adrenaline in my ears on Thursday, total euphoric crash by Friday night.
Perfectly timed with my luteal phase.
Think coffee, adrenaline, PMT and lack of sleep = makes me an angel to be around.
