Movies and Television do not Make Money

This is according to people in Cleveland.

So, we will focus outside of Cleveland.

As my Consiglerie says “Nuff Said!”

You Have No Audience

The great thing and worst thing about my Family is that “being from New Orleans, we tend to speak our mind.” So in talking to my Brother, he mentioned, “I have no Audience for my show so how can people make money by being connected to it.” I did offer up some proof to the fact we have an audience, but I had to be honest and admit that we lost a lot of it while I been involved in the business side of things.

Too much Business and not enough Show. It is Show Business. I been forgetting the “Show.”

So to that end, I have to scale back on the business end and rebuild the audience. There is a lot of unedited footage for “Out of Darkness.”

I have two new external Winbooks and a new HP that can edit. So there is no excuse.

The DVD will be out this coming month. There is another expense that will go on a new credit card. I’m not crazy about being in debt, but …

Anyway, with the campaign for Season Two planned, I have no doubt we will make the sells. I’m only starting with 100 DVDs. To which, my Mom, another one who speaks her mind, said, are you sure you can sell 100.

I responded, If I can’t ain’t no use in doing the show.

I also have plans to release the new footage online as web episodes of about 5 minutes each. That should build our audience back up and I’m looking into some other shows as well.

Still I do keep up with things on the business end, but I can’t focus on it like I have been doing.

VC, Money, and Angels

Been an interesting set of days. Prelude2Cinema was one of the finalist at the COSE Arts Business Innovation Awards. It was very nice to be recognized as an artist but also a business person. I took Megan Weizel, who will be playing the “Bride” in “Out of Darkness.” She was delightful company.

I had already decided that no matter if we won or not, that the TV show had to move forward this month. So afterwards, I talked to one of my partners and we went SHOPPING.

We picked up a new Canon HD Camera and two 750 GB WinBook hard drives to add to the new HP Edit Computer. So now, we are good to go. Of course, I have to start doing some writing and scheduling the actors.

I’m also going to look into producing some other web series for Prelude2CinemaTV.

Next month is the Emmy Nomination Party. Since I’m on the Board of Governors, I get to be involved in the Party. One of the Governors talked about New Media and how online producers (like us) affect TV. There is a committee about it and I’m on it.

Also I had another Business Pitch. I learned a lot about VC’s (Venture Capitalist). I think our focus should be on Angel Investors and also some people “still don’t get it.” Well one guy summed it up nicely. He said that VC’s  want companies formed around ideas so the individual can become dispensable whereas the creative industry want the individual focused on.

He called us a “Excellence Person Business.” None of it was meant as an insult. I really liked their honesty. I do know that without me, there isn’t a company so therefore I (and my team) have to focus on getting funds from people who understand that. There are people who fund creative businesses and are richly rewarded by it.

Still, the company (i.e. Me and others) have a lot of work to do. So in that sense, I have to start focusing on getting programs for Prelude2CinemaTV. So with no further ado, “On with the Show!”

Getting Political without Getting into Politics

I was talking the Editor TIm Franke about promoting the TV show “Out of Darkness.” We are almost finished with the DVD and ready to do Season Two. I came up with an ideal about creating a site for our fictional Mayor about running for re-election. Real Politics seems to get a lot of attention and be really entertaining more than substantional so it should be interesting to run a campaign as she runs for re-election in Cleveland.

I filled Tim in on yesterday and in retrospect after watching the video, it wasn’t that bad. I explained Branded Entertainment. People just didn’t listen so I had to explain it again.

And back to politics, I’m having lunch with JaNience Walter who plays Mayor Carolyn Rockwell in our TV show Monday. I think she’ll like the ideal. It gives us a chance to do some shooting for the show before the new season.

BRANDED ENTERTAINMENT TIP #1

You have to create Events around your Program to get people involved.

The run for re-election for our Mayor should get a lot of people involved in the show. We are going to do a party at one of our sponsor places next month and our Mayor won’t be asking for any donations. She’ll tell people to keep their money. I do need someone who runs against her though.

Audiences have their choice of where to go nowadays and if you don’t involve them, then they can elsewhere. And you definitely don’t want that.

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know

Did a session on Branded Entertainment at Corporate College. This is my field and this blog is to to educate people on what exactly Branded Entertainment is and to go behind the business and personal scenes at my company. So, hold on, “it’s going to be a bumpy night.”