Phresh Filmmakers Series #4 - Get Online - Page 8 - Helpful tips for filmmakers who want to create a web presence without spending a lot of money. Extra information on how this can help you when submitting your film to a film festival! need films to screen, festival organizers are usually people who are truly dedicated to the mission of the festival and don’t have a staff helping them. In my case, the International Black Women’s Film Festival is definitely a labor of love. I’ve spent my own hard-earned cash to front the festival and the festival’s operating expenses. Through a dedicated and committed core of friends, I was able to present the festival without losing my entire mind. Why do I do it? I love film, and I see the need for a forum that combats stereotypes of Black women in film, television and media. Festival organizing is not a money-making venture, though some festivals are flush with cash; the I.B.W.F.F. is not. As a filmmaker, please keep that in mind. If you’re going directly for the cash cow festivals, then good luck. I hate to break this to you, but you may have better luck with a smaller festival. Smaller festivals generate a buzz about your film, and smart filmmakers build on that buzz to then go after the larger festivals. If you’re absolutely confident that your film is the film of the year, then by all means, submit it to a larger festival! Just be prepared to shell out some bucks and some promotional gear to drown out the hundreds of other films that are also submitting. If you’d like to scout out your film to a smaller festival before going commando to a larger one, then this guide is for you! Even if you don’t get into your festival of choice, with this guide you’ll at least be able to narrow down your prospects and find your audience, whereby saving yourself tons of shipping fees and DVD/VHS reproductions! THE PHRESH FILMMAKER SERIES #4 GET ONLINE! You'd be surprised how many festival organizers will hear about your film and immediately search for it online. If they don't have a way to contact you, it may be more trouble than it's worth to look you up offline. As a filmmaker, you have to think realistically when setting up your online presence. You've spent weeks scripting, filming and editing your film, so why throw away one of the most effective means of promoting it? Most folks think that they'll be able to push out a dynamic web-site with all the bells and whistles within a week. That's just not true. Unless you're adept at web-site building, including a familiarity with such programs and codes as Flash and javascript, a web presence doesn't happen over night. So what do you do when you need to create a presence for your film online? Remarkably, the web has come a long way from free web services like Angel Fire and Homestead. Now, even the most novice of users can navigate user-friendly sites, and create an effective web presence on a budget! Where do I start? First, figure out if you just want a place for people to contact you and find out more about your film, or if you want a sexy web-site with multimedia that will draw in your audience. Either way, it will take some thought and time. Here's a quick worksheet to help you figure out exactly what you want from your web presence. WEB-SITE WORKSHEET Your web site address will be named after your film, or your name ___ My film __________________________ ___ My name __________________________ Possible URLs (web site address) based on the above selection Example: The URL for the International Black Women's Film Festival is www.ibwff.com 1. 2. 3. Your web-site must have the following pages, if you want to keep visitors and festival organizers engaged __ About (gives an overview of your film, or you) __ Contact (must include a way to contact you, but avoid using your personal address or home telephone number) __ Photos (give your fans a glimpse of your film by including stills) __ A list of festivals where you film has been shown Happy web-sites make happy visitors! Think of adding the following information to your web-site to keep visitors engaged __ Film clips – download-able or embedded __ A“backstage” glimpse into creating your film __ Frequent updates (either weekly, or bi-weekly) __ Include biographies __ Include nice things critics, reviewers and fans have said about you __ Setup “fan gear” that visitors can purchase, like t-shirts, mousepads, etc. I am __________ user when it comes to web-sites: __ A novice (I don't have a clue) __ A beginner (I've been online, but I've never created a web-site) __ An intermediate (I know some basic HTML, and can edit pages) __ An Advanced (I know HTML, how to embed code, and upload/download web pages to a server) The following resources will help you to setup your web presence based on the user-level you picked above. NOVICE & BEGINNER These sites are user-friendly and will guide you through the setup process. INDIEGOGO.COM What in the heck was the film community doing before this site? Post your independent film project online, and grow your audience. You can also fundraise through your IndieGoGo page and connect with other filmmakers… it’s free. www.indiegogo.com SHOOTS.COM Get a free film project listing, and post information about your film and crew. Resources on film commissions and other film management resources. www.shoots.com/htmauler/ GO HOSTER.COM New online web-site builder that's user-friendly, and easy to navigate. Big letters, and clean design make it the “go to” site for new filmmakers. www.gohoster.com VIVITI.COM Another simple, clean design site that easily guides you through the web-site building process. www.viviti.com BLOGGER.COM Purchased by Google, you now have the resources of the Google “widget” catalog, and better integration with Google features, like AdSense, to help you make money for your film! It's customizable, but you should be more familiar with HTML and CSS (cascading stylesheets) before you go messing around in the Blogger.com templates. Otherwise, it's pretty straight forward and there are a number of templates to automatically customize your page. www.blogger.com/ INTERMEDIATE & ADVANCED These sites are for the more advanced user. MOONFRUIT.COM If you want a sexy-cool site with all of the bells and whistles, and multimedia features, then Moonfruit.com is the place. Moonfruit is Flashbased, but offers an easy user-interface where the most inexperienced web-designer can create a basic web-site! Upload your trailers, photos, and more. It’s inexpensive (less than $5/mo), or keep it free with advertising banners from the company. You can choose to purchase a domain name, otherwise, your site will be yourname.moonfruit.com. www.moonfruit.com?cc=202799 WORDPRESS.COM Oh, sweet Wordpress has launched many-a-project for me… Wordpress is a free blog with a huge user-community that interacts regularly. You can create a free site to keep your fans and festival organizers up to date with your film projects, or keep everyone connected through announcements, event calendars, and other useful “widgets” that are freely added to your Wordpress blog. A blog can be used as a web-site, but it’s really setup for information that’s frequently updated. Your blog will not be www.yourname.com, but it will be yourname.wordpress.com. www.wordpress.com FACEBOOK.COM Facebook has come a long way. One of the first successful “socialnetworking” sites, it now has a sexier, cleaner interface. What makes it even better is the ease of creating a “page” devoted to something you like, that is, your film. Big ups is that you can now promote that site with an easily accessible “smart ad.” www.facebook.com GOOGLE SITES This is an example of what the original online web-site creators did, that is, create an easily customizable web-site, with “drag and drop” widgets to give your site a little life. Google Sites (the URL is too cumbersome, but the link is dynamic if you're still connected to the web!) Some other resources you'll be able to use! FOR IMAGES • • • • Improve Your Images - http://www.improveyourimages.com/ Fix Picture - http://www.fixpicture.org/ Web Photo Resizer - http://www.webresizer.com/ EasyCropper - http://www.easycropper.com/ FOR VIDEO OR DIGITALLY COMPRESSED VIDEO • YouTube (YouTube will make your videos available to anyone, so don't use it if you want your film to be “private”) http://www.youtube.com/ OTHER TUTORIALS & FILMMAKER RESOURCES • • Filmmaker Tools - http://www.dependentfilms.net/files.html Make Internet TV - http://makeinternettv.org/ COLLABORATION • Yuuguu - http://www.yuuguu.com/ OFFICE TOOLS & PRODUCTIVITY • • • • • • Peepel (Online office applications) - http://peepel.com/ 280 Slides - http://280slides.com/ Slides.com – http://www.slides.com TextFlow - http://www.textflow.com/ Open Office – http://www.openoffice.org HyperOffice - http://www.hyperoffice.com/
Phresh Filmmakers Series #4 - Get Online - Page 8
Phresh Filmmakers Series #4 - Get Online - Page 9
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