Investing In Film Making – 17 Necessary Points

Those of you who have worked all through your life and are now wanting to put your hard earned money in some big time venture, many a time consider films as a great option. This option might sound glamorous enough on the forefront but has many gray shades attached at the same time.

Films do not certainly guarantee to be a hit or a miss – in case your investment lands up being a hit, it’s a true jackpot, but in case it turns out to be a flop, the huge losses might create irreparable damage to your life and image.

Remember the key factor is never invest in a film making project, until and unless you are sure that you would be able to bare the loss of the amount invested and some more bucks over and above that.

Those who have come out to be great successes in the film making business, prove that now they are all completely financed and can bare the losses if any. Their experience teaches them several new ways and means to judge the viability of their investments.

It may sound easy to invest in filmmaking and make big money, but this is certainly a hard nut to crack. You must beware of those hounds, who claim to be Mr. Know-It-All and manage to drown your hard earned money with some simple yet worthless advices.

Here is the way to initialize the idea of investment in film making:

1. Equip yourself with the right knowledge required about film making and details about how the independent film makers work.

2. Get in touch with the film trends – know what’s hot and what’s not. As a film takes a long time to make survey as to what to trends would persist for the next year or so.

3. Considering some particular film maker, research about him fully – his caliber, talent and above all, his experience in the field.

4. You must have faith in the project you are investing, else the others alos would have no faith in it.

5. Try meeting the professional several times before the final decision is made so that you can check his passion of film making and his determination for the job, before spending even a dime on the project.

6. Gauge through their plans of making the film and if they would like to work with you all through the film making process.

7. If not, would they even allow you to visit the sets of film once a while to follow up the progress of your project?

8. Discuss all the issues that come to your mind and make written notes of what they assure you and the points being negotiated.

9. While no one can actually give a written guarantee regarding the success of the film, determination and your believe in the project indeed takes things ahead. Once you are convinced, this is a great avenue to mint money in this glamorus field.

Here are some quick tips that would guide you through the right negotiation in such deals:

1. Individually you would need to bear only 30-40% in the equity in order to make the film, and the rest should follow on if the rest are convinced.

2. Minimize the budget as much as possible.

3. The foreign sales must cover at least 50-70%.

4. A viable script is what decides the future of the project. We suggest you to you’re your own sweet time and look for the script that convinces not one but all and that is sure to fetch audience. Do not run up to hasty decisions and pick out just the first script that intrigues you.

5. Plan the distribution of the money quite carefully as it could fetch you a great deal of money by the end.

6. An investment above $5 million could buy you more than 1film.

7. Never invest more than 50% of the total cost of the film while the making. The Producer must manage the rest, and in case he can’t do so, withdraw now.

8. Do not compare your project with those produced by the big motion picture studios. Working with the independent film makers is all together different.