What is film crowdfunding? What are the successful factors of film crowdfunding?

Film crowdfunding, that is, film project fundraisers launch project crowdfunding on the crowdfunding platform, and it is successful to reach or exceed the target amount within a preset time. For projects that fail to meet the standards, the support funds will be returned to all supporters in full. After the fund-raising project is completed, netizens will get the rewards promised by the sponsors in advance, which can be movie tickets or lettering.

Successful factors of film crowdfunding

Step 1: rely on IP/ star effect

Director Xiaogang Feng can say that he doesn't understand IP, but people who mix film and television investment circles can't help but understand IP. Almost all well-known crowdfunding projects in the domestic market are supported by IP. Great Sage came back to consume China Super IP "Qi Tian Sheng Da Monkey King", and 100,000 jokes consumed their own animation IP.

The greatest charm of IP lies in its connection with potential consumers. Twilight, The Hunger Games and Divergent attracted the youngest movie consumers in the United States, while Tiny Times and other youth movies attracted the post-80s, post-90s and post-00s. The crowdfunding platform measures the size of IP and can also predict the fiery degree of the project after it goes online.

The second is the star effect, which is also the change of IP. There are several famous movies in the history of Hollywood film crowdfunding: David? The animated film Desperate Mob produced by Finch, Spike? Li Zhongchou's film noir's Sweet Blood of Jesus (directed by Steven? Soderberg donated $10,000. CERF's animated short film "Dream Heroes" (SideKicks, Lala Anne? Hathaway) and Christine? Veronica Maas of Bell. Once these films stepped onto the crowdfunding platform, they were immediately publicized by major media. The crowdfunding platform hardly needs to worry, ensuring that they can overfulfil their tasks and even break the crowdfunding record.

From the perspective of investors, stars and box office are linked in a straight line, and it is not difficult to know their worth. It can be estimated by directly checking the box office of the star's previous works. Like Melissa, the popular comedy queen in Hollywood? McCarthy's box office value in North America is $80 million, even the worst quality Mommy has this income; Little Robert? Donnie's Iron Man is worth 300-400 million yuan in North America, with an average character of about 50 million yuan, and Judge Daddy's performance in North America is about 48 million yuan. In Hollywood, ordinary stars are willing to promote themselves through movies. Unless they are particularly unreliable, they only recognize money and don't recognize scripts. This is an affirmation of the project and an intangible endorsement.

Step 2: Create more names.

Investing in crowdfunding projects on Kickstarter generally doesn't get a monetary return, and most crowdfunding people are out of true love for the project. Domestic film crowdfunding is more like a new type of wealth management product, with a rate of return and additional income. Some people will buy crowdfunding simply for the rate of return, regardless of the value of the project itself. There is an essential difference between the two.

Is no monetary return not conducive to project crowdfunding? Actually, the answer may not be. Many crowdfunding projects are very careful in playing. For example, veronica mars, which broke the record of the shortest time for Kickstarter to raise millions of dollars, is divided into 26 ways to play. Among them, the first few are similar to a domestic treasure crowdfunding routine, such as:

Funding of $65,438+00: PDF version of the script can be obtained (about10,000 investors bought the project).

Grant $25: You can get a script and a commemorative T-shirt.

Grant $200: you can get an extra poster signed by the protagonist.

Tricks mainly focus on large-value gameplay, such as:

Grant $400: You can ask the stars to record a greeting video specially for you, or ask director Thomas and the stars to follow you on Twitter for a whole year.

Funding of $65,438+0,000 yuan: Fans will have the opportunity to go to the shooting scene of Veronica Mars and act as extras. They will definitely have the opportunity to appear, such as having lunch with the main actors on the roadside, but these scenes may be deleted and the participants' round-trip travel expenses must be reimbursed by themselves.

Funding of $6,500: you can get a chance to be called out by the protagonist, and the director guarantees that this scene will not be cut. You can get a character named after yourself in the movie by spending more money.

Funding of $65,438+00,000 (the highest amount, only one, will be killed if it goes online): the sponsor will play a role with lines in the film. However, this role and scene have been decided, and everyone can do it, only one line.

For domestic investors, there are both monetary returns and extra income, which is not the best of both worlds. Imagine that the movie version of "Cyclone Girl" engages in crowdfunding, so that Yang Yang, a little fresh meat, and Weibo, a fan, can be together for even one day. Does anyone want it?

Step 3: Creativity is king.

I have to admit that China has various shortcomings in creativity, from movies and TV shows to reality shows. The situation in Hollywood is much better, especially in independent films. Kickstarter has cooperated with Sundance and Tribeca, the most important independent film festivals in America. At Sundance Film Festival on 20 14, more than one third of the participating films were raised through crowdfunding. Zach. Bluffing and Kate? Hudson's "Where's the Heart" raised half the shooting cost from Kickstarter and sent it to Sundance Film Festival that year. It was bought by Focus Pictures on the first day.

Another feature is that there is no fixed standard for Kickstarter's film selection. On the film list, many avant-garde and experimental films are among them, but it has a screening mechanism. If an ordinary project wants to qualify for the competition, it must at least prove to Kickstarter that the film is "interesting and unconventional". This screening mechanism not only ensures that the film has a successful fund-raising rate of more than 40%, or that projects that meet Kickstarter's "interesting" standards can stand out.

The most successful example of screening mechanism is at 20 12. A live-action short film about an illegal immigrant girl aged 15 who believes that she can become a painter was pushed to the first place through the screening system of the website and won an Oscar, which filled a gap in the history of crowdfunding.

In addition, Bian Xiao also released the most neurotic, wonderful, dazzling and dazzling film in Swedish history. The explosive movie Anger at Work also benefited from Kickstarter. There is no fixed standard for the screening mechanism, as long as you can conquer others.

Step 4: Sincerity.

If you say that your movie can't attract big stars and has no IP background, the creativity seems to be like this, but you still want to have a movie dream. The only way is to impress investors with true feelings.

Founded five years ago, Kickstarter has successfully financed more than 3,000 short films and 5,000 films, most of which are unknown. The reason why the website can contribute to its crowdfunding success is to sell feelings. Kickstarter is fun. It tells the story of game development of independent game makers (a crowdfunding platform focusing on the field of cultural creation by searching the official account of WeChat WeChat). The shooting of the documentary "Independent Game Movie" only costs100000 US dollars, and the average amount of support from 1600 supporters is 62.5 US dollars, which is not too much burden, but it feels like supporting young people with dreams to develop games, and their sense of accomplishment is bursting.

The story of the documentary short film Mudblood is also very simple. Do you like watching Harry? The high school students in Porterie Quidditch Competition invented a land Quidditch game, which recorded the story of small friction in usual training and the process of the last two teams' competition. Almost a self-entertainment crowdfunding project was supported by 540 passers-by. It can be said that Quidditch has overcome everything.

In addition, there is another key point, that is, the sense of participation of investors. On the crowdfunding website, every project that investors participate in will be notified online as soon as there is progress. Even if the film has been released, investors should be "harassed" by making Blu-ray discs. Supported movies can also be watched through iTunes, which will definitely not give investors a feeling of sinking into the sea.

In the end, every crowdfunding person can realize his dream and every investor can get the ideal income, which is the most wonderful thing in the development of the film industry.