Fathers are Indestructible

Fathers are indestructible, or so I think it's supposed to be.

From childhood you look up to your father with eyes of wonder, respect, and admiration. He's there to protect you. Nothing can hurt him and, therefore, nothing can hurt me.

I was one of the lucky ones. Someone with a father that was there no matter what happened. Someone that stood by you in all your troubles and didn't ask how or why you screwed up just was there to help you pick up the pieces and encourage you while you fixed it.

My father was not just my Dad, either. He was father to dozens if not hundreds of kids. When we were young we'd bring home stray dogs and cats. When we got older we'd bring home stray kids.

Kids that didn't have a great family life were drawn to our household, our stability, and my father. He was always there with a friendly smile and encouraging word, even when he was chasing off some idiot boy that was thinking with the wrong head around my sister. He'd still welcome them back into the house... with a stern glance.

And, as much as you might think otherwise, they respected him for it.

That was my Dad. He was everyone's Dad and I loved him for it and will miss him, forever.

Time stopped today

Time stopped today. That's the only way I can describe it. Today my father passed away and everything stopped. In my mind I tell myself I need to worry about work, family, money, anything and everything, but I can't. I just can't get the images out of my mind.

Just a week ago I sat with him, talked to him, laughed, read, and watched TV. Just a week ago it seemed like we had lots of time. But during the last week a lot of things changed.

My father had been living with MDS, a blood disease, for three years and had lived more than 2 and a half years past when doctors said he would. He was a stuborn cuss, but this week it all caught up with him.

I know life goes on and am doing the best to make sure it does for my wife, my familiy, and my mother, but, for me, time has stopped.

The clock will start up again, I just can't say when.

MATCH.DEAD first written review is in...

The first written review is in. It’s full of great sound bites, but this sums it all up:

"And when it comes out, in however limited or wide a release, I want to watch again."

Check out the review. If you didn’t see the last screening, don’t worry, you still have a chance. The friends and family screening is still coming and we’ll have another online screening coming soon. To get in on that you need to join our facebook group at:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10767740772

Here’s the review:

http://templestark.com/tas/2008/10/movie-r...nline-screener/

Social Marketing in Social Media

It's rough out there. We all know that. Jobs are scarce. Money is tight. And yet, we're all still making film, right? So how do you stand out when you don't have any money left in your advertising budget?

Social Media.

Over the last few years social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Flickr, YouTube... maybe you've heard of a few of these? There are dozens more out there. Each with a particular audience or delivery method. They run the gamut from discussion to sharing to microblogging to life streaming. Did I lose you?

Good. If you said yes, then you've got a lot to learn, but I've got a lot to teach. If you said no, then you're helping me make my point.

Social Media is all about, you guessed it, being social. Communicating with other people. Passing on your ideas and collecting other people's.

You've already started if you are reading this. Blogging is a great place to start. With free blog sites available, what's stopping you? Check out WordPress or Blogger right now and get started.

But you need to do more than just type content into the great beyond, you need to engage your audience. Social Media is a two way street. So if you are tempted to turn off comments: don't. Allow people to express their viewpoints. And answer their questions. If you don't communicate with your audience then you've lost before you began.

That all said, blogs are just a small part of social media.

How about YouTube? The obvious solution here is, upload your trailer. But why wait until you have a trailer? Upload footage from your auditions (get those waivers), storyboards, interviews with the writer, director, leads? Take them on a scouting trip. Remember, its about community. You're building one that's going to follow you from the beginning.

Once production begins, take your audience along for the ride. I know, its hard to do anything during production besides be on set. So use Twitter.

When we started production of MATCH.DEAD we took our audience with us to the set. Throughout the day we would send text messages from the set to Twitter, and hence our followers, to keep them apprised of what was happening. Throw additional sites like twixtr and twiddeo into the mix and you can upload photos and cell phone videos as it happens. When we added twixtr to our feed, our Twitter friends really picked up. They were now able to watch us on the set.

What if your film is in the can? You've got a long lull as you sit in the editting room. Don't forget your fans during this dead time. The biggest problem is, editting isn't exciting. There isn't anything sexy about sitting in front of an editting bay for hours on end (sorry, all you cutters out there).

So how do you keep your audience engaged? Contests, photos, etc. You held stuff back I hope. Start engaging them with production photos, stories from the set, etc. This is where your social networking sites really come into play.

And don't forget to cross post.

Put up a blog entry and advertise it with a link to your Twitter fans.

Upload a photo on your social networking groups on Facebook and MySpace, then embed it into a blog entry with a link back.

Make it easy for your fans to move back and forth between all your different areas. DO NOT make them look for you.

Now the film is done. Its out to distributors or you've already sold it (big congratulations, BTW). What now? Well, you certainly aren't done. Tell everyone. Build hype. Remember, your fans will stick with you from project to project, so don't abandon them just because you've moved on to your next project. Keep building that fan base.

We recently ran a promotion on Twitter for our completed film MATCH.DEAD (BTW, any distributors out there, we're still shopping). We promised everyone that responded to us with a public request to view our movie that we would invite them to a special, limited, online screening. The key thing to this is the way that Twitter works. They had to make the request to us like so:

@match_dot_dead I want to see the free online screening of MATCH.DEAD. Sign me up!

By doing this they advertised our film to all of their friends as well as telling us they wanted to see the film. We doubled our fan base on Twitter in just a week with this promotion. That's called viral advertising. Additionally, they responded with glowing reviews in the same public forum. You can't beat that!

Be creative. That's the key. Chris Brogan points out 50 Ways Marketers Can use Social Media to Improve Their Marketing. Take from this list, but also come up with some fresh new ones.

You know your product. You know your audience. Now figure out a way to make it win-win for everyone.

AWARD: Most Innovative Audience Building Online-Tactic

We want to thank all of our online fans. We were rewarded today with the "Most Innovative Audience Building Online Tactic" which included a free conference membership to "The Conversation: The Future of Cinema, Games, and Online Video"

Unfortunately we won't be attending due to short notice and short funds.

You can read all about the conference here:
http://www.theconversationspot.com/home.html

And the award here:
http://www.indiegogo.com/blog/2008/10/contest-winner.html

Thank you to each and everyone of you. Now let's go make MATCH.DEAD the biggest release of the year. Together we can.

The Evil Dead Breakfast Club

Yes, you read that right, two iconic movies from the 80's now are coming together in the next great web series: The Evil Dead Breakfast Club. Coming soon from Infinite Spectrum Productions. In addition to the online web series, you'll be able to purchase your own copy with lots of features and extras. If you have either of these great movies that defined a generation you'll want to get your own copy.