This is a transcript of SYS 495 – Shooting The Astrid Experience On An iPhone With Cal Barnes .
Welcome to Episode 495 of the Selling Your Screenplay Podcast. I’m Ashley Scott Meyers, screenwriter and blogger with sellingyourscreenplay.com. Today I am interviewing Cal Barnes who was on episode 290 of the SYS Podcast. So, check that out if you haven’t already listened to it. In that episode, he talked about his background making his move from down to Los Angeles from Portland and getting his first feature film off the ground. This week, he returns to give us an update on his first feature film, which is now finished. And he has a lot of insight into making a really low budget film. One of the most interesting things about this talk that I had with him was that he shot this film on an iPhone, the phones now are getting such high quality, it’s becoming easier and easier, and actually can produce a pretty high-quality image. So, it’s actually something I’m considering doing for my next feature, too. So, I was very interested to hear how he did this, but lots of great very practical information about getting your low budget feature into production. So, stay tuned for that interview. If you find this episode valuable, please help me out by giving me a review in iTunes or leave me a comment on YouTube or retweeting the podcast on Twitter or liking or sharing it on Facebook. These social media shares really do help spread word about the podcast, so they’re very much appreciated. Any websites or links that I mentioned in the podcast can be found on my blog in the show notes. I also publish a transcript with every episode in case you’d rather read the show or look at something later on. You can find all the podcast show notes at www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/podcasts and then just look for episode number 495. If you want my free guide How to Sell a Screenplay in five weeks, you can pick that up by going to www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/guide. It’s completely free, you just put in your email address and I’ll send you a new lesson once per week for five weeks along with a bunch of bonus lessons. I teach the whole process of how to sell your screenplay in that guide. I’ll teach you how to write a professional logline and query letter, and how to find agents, managers and producers who are looking for material. Really is everything you need to know to sell your screenplay. Just go to sellingyourscreenplay.com/guide. So, just a couple quick words about what I’ve been working on. This episode is going to publish on July 31st, which is actually the final day we’re taking submissions for our screenplay contest and Film Festival. So, if you’ve been procrastinating on making a submission, this is definitely your last opportunity for this year. But we will be back next year as well. So, if you’ve missed it this year, for sure. Check us out next year. But that’s been my main focus for now just trying to get the festival and the contest organized keeping them on track. I’m slowly making some headway on my indie rom com doing a rewrite on that, but that’s slow going. And just a lot of other things right now have sort of priority. I’ve just got a lot of things on my plate. Also, I entered into a non-exclusive option agreement with a producer this week for one of my crime thriller screenplays. It was actually through one of the leads that go through the SYS select service. It’s a British producer who’s got a few scripts together and he’s putting a package together have three or four scripts to take to a production company and pitch. He’s hoping that one of them gets picked up. Obviously, this is a long shot. I mean, if he’s got three scripts, 33% chance, four scripts 25% chance, but really, it’s much less than that, because there’s a good chance the production company rejects all of the scripts that he pitches. But that’s okay with me. I mean, the script is just sitting on my shelf at this point. So why not let him go out and pitch it. And while it is a long shot, it’s better than no shot. So just to kind of take a step back and sort of explain my thinking on option agreement. I’ll just give a kind of a real overview. A basic option agreement on a screenplay is a simple contract that allows the producer to shop the script to production companies to try and raise financing. And it’s also sets out that he has a right to buy that script at a later date for a set amount of money. Usually, the producer will pay something for this because it’s typically an exclusive agreement, meaning the writer agrees not to let other producers shop the script while this producer has it under option. And he gives that producer a set amount of time to go and shop that script where he’s not going to give it to other producers. The producer needs this because if the producer spends time getting financing in place pitching a production companies, he or she wants to be sure that they can actually buy the script for the pre negotiated amount if they get the deal set up. They don’t want to spend all this time getting the deal set up. And then oh, by the way, the script has already been sold to somebody else. So, most of the time a producer wants a exclusive option agreement. And frankly, I usually assuming the timeframe is very short like 90 days or maybe even six months. I usually don’t have a big problem giving a very inexpensive or free or almost free option agreement to a producer as well. But in this case, the producer doesn’t want an exclusive option. And it’s because he doesn’t want to option all scripts that he’s taking to pitch. Frankly, he’s going to get an answer from, he’s going to take it to a production company or a few production companies that he has contacts with. And he’s going to get an answer pretty quickly. So, he doesn’t need the script for a year or 18 months, or anything like that, he just needs it for a few months so he can take it out, pitch it and get a response back. And he doesn’t want to outlay a bunch of money at this point on a bunch of scripts that he knows won’t get produced. I mean, as I said, he’s got three scripts, he’s taken to a production company, he knows two of the three, at least two of the three are not going to get picked up. So that’s why he’s willing to take a non-exclusive option agreement because he doesn’t want to pay for it. That’s sort of the compromise that we’re making. Now, the risk he’s taking is, is that I might find another buyer for the script before he gets an answer back from the company’s pitching. And then obviously, would be embarrassing. If he takes it pitches to accompany, they read the script. And then a month later, they come back and say, hey, we really liked this, we want to produce it. And then in the meantime, I’ve come back and said, oh, sorry, I already sold to someone else. So that’s the risk that he’s taking by not paying. And by not paying for the option agreement and not having an exclusive option agreement. But as a practical matter, it’s really not that much of a problem. I mean, you know, I’m not going to go and aggressively market this script, for the next 90 days, I’ll give him a chance to kind of take it out. There’s really, you know, I’ve got plenty of scripts to try and pitch into market. And I got plenty of scripts sitting on my, on my shelf. So, the odds of somebody just swooping in and optioning or buying this script in the next 90 days, or four months or five months or something is frankly, pretty low. And as I said, I’ll sort of push it down on my list of scripts that I’m sending out, or pitching to people. Just because I know this guy is at least out there trying to do something with it. So, I think it’s a pretty good compromise both for the writer and for the producer. It’s again, this is a script I wrote years ago, it’s not something that I’m actively, you know, pursuing it. I’ve optioned a numerous times. In fact, this might have been one of the first options I ever mentioned, on my podcast, I think I started the podcast. And very shortly after this screenplay, so however, many years ago that was now I started the podcast. And this was one of the first options that I had to another producer who was in Texas, she optioned it, tried to take it and I think she had it for six months or a year or something. So, this is a script, I’ve options several times it’s gotten some traction, but it’s never quite gotten over the finish line. But at this point, as I said, I’ve got tons of scripts. So, for me, where I sort of sit here, I don’t have a big problem with these types of agreements. I know there’s some debate, you know, and I get a lot of questions about obstacles, oh, should I give a free option or this and I just try and look everything through sort of a practical lens. And clearly this producer liked the screenplay. I sent it to him, he read it, he liked it, email me back. So, you know, I could have tried to grind them, oh, I want $500 or $1,000 for the option. But I think there’s a good chance that he would have just said no, and moved on to another script, because he just he didn’t want to outlay a bunch of money at this point. And you can say, okay, well, maybe that means he’s not that serious. And that’s a valid point. I mean, if he doesn’t have even $500 to lay out the scripts, how serious is he really? And so that’s definitely a valid point. But I just feel like, you know, building relationships kind of getting things going is more important. There’s really no cost to me, maybe I could have gotten $500 out of the guy. But I doubt that I could have and ultimately, what would it have really served I mean, it would have gotten the relationship kind of off to the to the wrong foot. I mean, I’m willing to work with the guy, I understand where he’s coming from, I do production myself. So, I certainly understand where he is coming from. And if this was a script I had just finished and I really wanted to get out there and market it aggressively over the next year, I might have been a little bit more reticent to do something like this, but for a script like this that’s been sitting on my shelf really haven’t done anything. I think as I said, I’ve optioned it a bunch of times, but I don’t think I’ve optioned it in at least three years, four years. It’s been a while, where it’s just been sitting, so I feel pretty good about this. He gets a free not exclusive option. If something does turn up and somebody wants the script, all you got to do is email him and tell him and say; Hey, I’ve got some interest from another party. And you know, and at that point, obviously, he would go and contact that production company that he’s pitching and say, Hey, this script got scooped up. So, if you haven’t read it, don’t bother. But I feel pretty good. As I said, just getting a script out there having somebody else go out and do some of that marketing for me. So that’s sort of where I land on these things with the free options and the exclusive versus non-exclusive. Anyway, those are some of the things that I’ve been working on now. Let’s get into the main segment today. I am interviewing writer, director and actor Cal Barnes. Here is the interview.
Ashley
Welcome Cal, to the selling your screenplay podcast. Really appreciate you coming back on the show with me today.
Cal Barnes
Ashley, thanks for having me. Good to be back.
Ashley
So, you were on the podcast before in Episode 290. So, I refer people back to that episode, we got into your background information, how you moved to Los Angeles and kind of jumped started your career here. So, I highly encourage people to go check that out. Again, that’s episode 290. But today we’re going to dig into your film The Astrid Experience. So maybe just to start out, you can give us a quick pitch or logline. What is this film all about? What is this film?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, so the Astrid Experience is, it’s an independent drama film. And it’s about an artist in recovery, who is kind of bottomed out in his life. He’s made a lot of bad decisions, and he’s trying to put his life back together. And then he meets a free-spirited actress at a casting studio, helps her un-lock her keys out of her car and kind of kicks off this sort of magical all-night adventure through Los Angeles. And it kind of shows him that he has something more worth living for again.
Ashley
Gotcha, gotcha. So, let’s talk about the writing of this script a little bit. Originally, in some of the notes that we had emailed back and forth, it sounds like you wrote a draft of this back in 2012. And then did some revisions as you got more financing in place, as you decided that you were going to shoot this on a shoestring budget, maybe you can talk to that. What was the original draft? What was the original intent? And then how did you hone it down for actual production.
Cal Barnes
This was like my, I think, tense script around their 11th. And I was really wanting to write I was really influenced by like the mumblecore movement at the time, just the idea I was in. I mean, I was mainly acting and auditioning. And I started writing, I found a lot of freedom and control through writing that I just feel felt like I didn’t have as an actor. And I was really influenced by these films of people just going out and shooting, it was mostly DSLRs at the time. So, I started writing scripts. This was before the iPhone and everything before the Blackmagic really… And I just started writing screenplays that I felt that I could produce on a shoestring budget if I got around to it. So, I had this, I think I was dating or I was like seeing this actress at the time, or I was working with her. And we had this like walk-through Hollywood from like Hollywood and Highland to Hollywood and Vine. And I just thought it’d be cool to write like a story around that. So, I basically wrote an outline in 2012. And I didn’t have any financing. I didn’t really have no many filmmakers I was mainly I mainly still am a writer and actor for the most part. And I remember we just shelved it, you know, I kind of just shelved it at the time. And then it’s kind of fun. As you stay here longer. I think I’ve been here for like 14 years now. It’s funny how scripts will come back around, you know, seven, eight years later, sometimes. And I’m experiencing that again, actually, right now. So yeah, so this film I wrote in 2012. And then, you know, through a series of steps, it went into production in 2019.
Ashley
Gotcha, gotcha. Yeah. So, let’s talk about that first step. It sounds like when you actually got principal photography done, you shot it on a $17,000 budget on your iPhone. Maybe you can speak to that a little bit. Number one was, so how did you raise the $17,000, first off, and then where do you actually spend that $70,000? Like, just so sort of viewers can listen, if you’re going to go shoot a micro budget film? Where do you recommend if you only have $15-20,000, where do you recommend people put that $15-20,000?
Cal Barnes
That was mainly finance. It was mainly financed by my co producer, John that who did this incredible soundtrack for the movie with his band Academy, who’s got a couple songs in NBA 2k 2021 and 2022. So that was huge. And he’s been awesome. And then I financed the other about 15-20% of it at the time. And I would say, like, how do we do it? We, I wrote a script. I remember when I when we wanted to do it, he asked me I did a music video for him, I directed a music video and produced in 20, I think around 2016 called hippie girl. And that ended up being one of his best, most popular music videos. So, he kind of came back around is like; Hey, you got anything we can make, you have a script? And so, I was like, let me look through my library because I think I had about 17-18 features at the time. And I knew I had some big budget ones. I also knew I had some smaller budget ones. And I found this and I was like, you know, I’ve experienced a lot since 2012. And I was like, why don’t I infuse kind of take that 50-page 60-page, sort of, kind of like, you know, semi developed script and just infuse the rest of my life experience with it, while also keeping an eye on like writing out a list of like, what do we have available? So, you know, what locations, you know, and I’ve been here for between the two of us for 14, I think at the times, like 10-11 years, you’re going to have a lot more connections and a lot you’re going to know a lot more people than when you first moved here. So, keeping that list, I think is really smart. So, we just like what locations do we have? What talented friends do we have? What talents do we have together? And you know, I kind of rewrote a script around that like with what locations we had plus, like, all my experience that I’ve had since I wrote the original draft And, you know, created the Astrid Experience what became the Asteroid Experience. And so that’s what was key is writing for something that can be made. So, we’re like, alright, so now we have this money between us, and like, what can we get for free? And what can’t we? So, I mean, I think honestly, I’m trying to remember where that money went, because we shot this in 2019. And I think it mostly went to some of the lead casts that we casted, that people like, we didn’t know that we auditioned, just because it’s, you know, to get a certain caliber of talent, I feel especially for lead roles, you got to offer something, I mean, it’s just really, really difficult to get anyone without some kind of rate. So, I mean, just people do make films for where, you know, everything’s deferred, I think we did to sort of defer some cast, you know, cast that we kind of just casted without auditioning, that just fit. But for lead roles, we definitely paid for that. And then food, you know, if you’re getting a lot of people to work for really low is just feed them really good. So, I mean, we spent 1000s of dollars on food, like, every night, you know, eating nice restaurants or getting good takeout. Also, some locations we pay, we probably a few grand on locations, the rest would be like just transportation and crew and equipment. So that was key is like we got the iPhone. So, the iPhone thing, I was really inspired by tangerine by Shaun Baker. And he shot that 4k on an iPhone five, I think or an iPhone four. And I was like, well, the technology has come a long way since then I was like, I wonder what we can do on an iPhone, I think that an eight, I think we shot it on an eight plus, so I was like, we should probably be able to get a much better image than he did, hopefully. And so, you know, the benefits of shooting on an iPhone were fantastic. Because we you know, we went into these huge raves we went into, we shot on Hollywood Boulevard, we shot all over the place, and we really got very little hassle. When people would come up to us, we would just kind of be like, you know, we’re shooting an Instagram video from, you know, we would just kind of say that and people would just leave us alone. And I mean, that’s something that I mean, I look if you watch our film, and you see all the locations, you know, we shot that like on a red or we shot on a bigger camera, it would for sure be you know, the budget would be at least you know, four or five times what we made, or I think just because we have to get the permits, we’d have to get a bigger crew. It would take longer, we’d have more shooting days. So yeah, I mean, just the ability to just shoot and go and then just kind of, you know, that really saves a lot of money and time.
Ashley
Now, I actually interviewed Shaun Baker with tangerine on the podcast years ago. And my recollection is that while he did shoot it on an iPhone, he definitely knew how to get the most out of the iPhone. And my recollection was there were definitely some lenses some after-market lenses and stuff attachments that he put on the phone, probably some sort of a Steadicam. Maybe you can speak to that what other equipment, so obviously everybody has a cell phone in this day and age that has a camera, video camera on it. But what else did you have to get? Was there some software to download? Are there some lenses that you put on the front? Is there some sort of a Steadicam rig that you use to hold it?
Cal Barnes
This is a great question. And I could go on and on about this because yeah, like what I learned from our DP is you know when you’re shooting in 4k, it’s really more about if you’re what you have in front of the camera isn’t good. You’re just seeing more of what’s not good. So, like, that was a huge lesson and really, I mean when people watch our trailer when they watch our film, I mean they no one has any idea. I mean, I think maybe like there’s even some of them trained DPS and filmmakers that have seen it didn’t know they thought we shot and wait nicer cameras so I can’t stress enough like yeah, what you shoot on and like the equipment and then the post production tools just really saved us. We shot on I basically copied Shawn Baker’s rig almost verbatim with just at least the lens, I got the Moondog anamorphic lens, they actually sponsored our film at one point, it basically creates it, it takes a widescreen image 69 And it takes it out to an anamorphic so we shot 2391. So, we shot cinema scope basically which was great I mean that really enhances takes it to the next level. And we shot 4k obviously on the iPhone. And then I would we built a custom rigs for like our DP I kind of we have a couple, I think we had the Oslo trying to remember the name but it was like an electronically stabilized rig so it just gave you a really smooth, steady cam like you could just I think it’s called the Osmo two, it was like 150 bucks and it just created really awesome really smooth electronically stabilized shots like that was key because we shot most of it handheld, whatever we didn’t have control over the location we almost always shot handheld. Some of the interiors we did it and then we built with the Beast Grip which our DP we bought them both for him and he really liked the Beast grip because it just kind of gave you we put an external mic on it. The Rode mic, shotgun mic, we also have lobs, but we use that just because it gives you better sound. And we and then he, we have like a light like an LED light on top of the iPhone as well on the Beast Grip, which just gave like a little bit more light to subject in front. You know, we also have like, guys, you know, carrying. So that’s key to is the iPhone sensor. It’s really important. It’s not that great. I think it’s better now because like, what’s it like 14 now, so I don’t even know what the specs are on those, it’s probably amazing because we shot this on an eight. But the sensor was really the only limitation because you’re shooting 4K, it’s just I think it was an eight-bit sensor. And ideally, you really want like at least a 10-bit sensor, you can get a little more dynamic range. But yeah, like so you know, we had an LED light mat that we would, that’s kind of like this big mat that has lights on it. And it’s really like maneuverable and it gives really good light. So, we’d like tape that to a pole. And our DP would like hold that over the actors that night, which just gave us like enough light, like, like it’s still very Itty gritty is night shots. But I think we kind of leaned into it as part of the movie rather than fighting it because it was just impossible to light those scenes on our budget. So yeah, I mean, just getting good lighting, we got the stereo lights too, which are like these tube lights that are you’ll see him a lot in music videos that like they give off really good color. And so, on the party scene that’s like 20 minutes in the middle of the movie, you’ll see a stairs everywhere and we got incredible light with that. So good lighting, good equipment. Yeah, like the moon, the anamorphic lens was key, a good rig, you’re going to need that because you don’t want to be holding the iPhone, like, you know, like, it’s just not going to give you the smoothest shot. So that was key. And then post we were a little concerned going into post we like we really had some blown out footage from the lights and darks. But what you can do with I learned basically, post was literally nothing less than post production hell, I mean, we were in we were in post for like three years, trying to get through COVID. And I can go later into how we raise more money into that. But basically, the post tools like what you can do with Premiere, you can cut premiere, and then what you can do, which I’m even more impressed with DaVinci Resolve. I mean, what you can do with that is unbelievable. I mean, like, there’s this tool that’s really key that thank God, it exists. It’s called the neat noise reduction tool. And it’s like 400 bucks or something like that. And it’s one-time payment, you download into the resolve and adjust fixes blown out images like these. I mean, we’d have these lights and darks that are just pasteurizing and breaking up like so bad. I mean, it looked terrible. But we’re like, man, it’s really, really bad at this tool came in and the power, the ability to restore, like clean image is just unreal. I mean, I remember when I was color grading it, I think I spent like three or four months taking color grading classes, because we just really didn’t have the budget, we did raise some money, but we raised about half as much as we wanted. So, I had to learn to do a lot of this on my own. And yeah, what you can do with DaVinci Resolve is just truly remarkable.
Ashley
Yeah, I’ve used it a little bit too. It’s a free software. So, it really is incredible.
Cal Barnes
You know, if you’re serious, you do want to get the full suite because it has just enhanced. It’s only $300 like one-time payment. But the I mean, the tools are just unbelievable. I mean, yeah, I’m still blown away. I get the whole time I was grading it. I just was like I can’t believe this image looks like this from where we started. Yeah.
Ashley
So, let’s talk about the post production a little bit. You mentioned that you cut a trailer and then were able to raise some more money on we funder. Maybe you can speak to that a little bit. Just how did you do that, specifically?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, so we funder came to we were kind of second wave you know, you always want to be somewhere first wave like, but we were kind of second wave and I was listening to a lot of filmmaking podcast while I was making this yours and everybody else’s I mean, all the all of them, you know, and I heard something about filmmakers we funder which is kind of like a Kickstarter for except instead of based on donation based it was equity based. So that to me right away, just solved all the problems inherent with Kickstarter, if you don’t come from a wealthy network, I just think it’s really hard if you can raise some money, but to raise any kind of, you know, I feel like substantial budget, even 50 or 100 grand on there is really difficult. I don’t know a lot of people been able to pull that off. So, I know we did at least you know hopefully wanted to go for 100 grand, we raised 50 on we funder. And basically, we funder is like a Kickstarter, except it’s based out of Silicon Valley, great company, but it’s equity based and you have to have, like the bar for entry is way higher. So you can’t just put one up you have to go through this very vigorous process where they check all your legal, you really have to have all your LLC developed. You got to have all your business plan developed. You got to go through this whole approval process. You got to lay out all the risks and the benefits of doing this is one they don’t take everything so they really look at your film, to see if it’s going to be something that looks like a viable project to their investors, their network. And then the benefit is if you get selected, you’re immediately put in front of high-net worth individuals. So technically, anybody can go on we funder and become an investor, I think you have to prove some, they can only invest up to what your income is. So, I think you have to kind of state your income. But the great part is there’s lots of legitimate. What’s the word for it? Yeah, qualified or US qualified investors, which means they have a net worth of over a million dollars.
Ashley
And so, what do you have to give them back? With Kickstarter you know, it is a donation, so you don’t really owe them anything other than the rewards that you’ve promised them. But with we funder, is there some sort of accounting liability, like you have to keep proper books, and then you’re going to have to send them some sort of distribution in terms of the profits? How does all that work?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, so it’s basically, we structured it just like a standard business model for film, if you were going to get private, it’s basically if we went to, let’s say, we knew private investors, and we were going to just go to them and give them terms, it’s basically the same thing, we offered a standard waterfall contract on the back end, which is basically you know, you know, they buy a certain amount of points, I think we sold, you know, we were selling like, 35% of the project. And for at the time, it was like, 107 grand. And then we readjusted, because COVID, I feel like we would have gotten it all, if it wasn’t for COVID, we launched literally, I think within a week of that hitting, so I think there’s a lot of scared money at the time. But we still managed to raise 50 grand and so we basically sold, I think we adjusted our points, and we ended up selling like, 33% of the project for $50,000. And then the way I think the standard, the standard sort of waterfall, I think some people change it, but the basic waterfall is, you know, from first profits, and once the distributor takes the cut, it’s 50% to the or it’s the standards, like 50% of the investors and then 50% of the producers, in this case, it was the 33% to the investors and then the other 66% to everyone else that holds equity. And then from there, they make 120% recoup on their investment, so on their 50,000, so they get 50,000 back plus 20%, which is I think 60,000 total, and then you go into the profit split. So, then it’s 33% to them, and then 66% to all our other shareholders, which mostly creatives and a few early investors, and but…
Ashley
They get the first 60,000 is the bottom line of every penny, they get 100% up to $60,000. Gotcha.
Cal Barnes
Yeah, yeah. And we’re technically investors, too. So actually, John is an investor. He’s an early investor, and I am. But we’re a different form of equity, there’s two forms of equity. It’s been a while, there’s two kinds and because we’re creative, we were voting equity, we actually get paid afterwards. So yeah, they get 60,000 back, then we recoup our investment, which was like the money we put in, because right now we’re both out, you know, on it until encumbered troops, and then once the film technically hits zero, then you go into, deferments get paid off, and then it’s profit participation from then on out.
Ashley
Gotcha, gotcha. So how do you actually, once you launch this thing, it sounds like there’s some process to filling out the paperwork and all that stuff. But once you launch this thing, how do you get traffic to your page? Like, how do you get people to give money through We funder and I just asked that, as someone who’s done Kickstarters. You know, it’s like an all hands-on deck, you start emailing and texting and, and sending out tweets and just doing everything you can to bring traffic to your page. But how do you do it with We funder? Is there any secret sauce that you were able to discover through raising this 50,000?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, the key thing is we were going in with a much smaller movie there. And there was only like, I think at the time, there’d been like 10 movies. It’s mainly for tech. So, it’s like a tech platform where it’s mostly tech products. And like a it’s any kind of business there’s businesses across the array, including films because an LLC, a film is technically a small business, or especially an indie film, so there’s only a few at the time so the competition was a lot lower. So honestly, just by getting through by getting like by doing all that work, and it was a lot I mean, I think it took me like three months for us to like build the page and satisfy all the requirements. Just by launching. We got a lot of attention because we were the next film on there. I also knew we were smaller movie. There were some films that I think the biggest raise on there at the time was, I don’t know if you’ve heard of Jim Cummings. He made Thunder Road and then he wants South by 2018 for Thunder Road and then he just did this film wolf of snow hollow with a Ryan and he’s one of the more successful filmmakers in the current independent film space. And he did a film on there and he raised like $350,000 on there. And he was kind of a hot filmmaker at the time. So, he was getting a lot of attention. And then we were competing with another film that had a pretty big actor attached that was getting. And so, I knew that and they all had nothing, they all just had, like, their business plan. And like, they hadn’t shot the movie, we shot the movie. So, like, we negated a lot of the risk because the movie was already done. So, I was like; Well, what do we have that they don’t have? I mean, they have like a tier one award winning filmmaker, this other film has like an, you know, a young A-listed actor. So, like, what do we got? Well, I was like, we got to finish movie, so there’s no risk and shooting. So it’s like, let’s just cut an amazing trailer, like none of them have trailers. So, we really put a lot of time into, like a really fantastic trailer that looked really good. I mean, I think when people watch the trailer, and one thing is it looks really professional, like good color, grade, good grain, all those things that you don’t see a lot of times and smaller films and so and gets good music. And so, it was like, let’s just cut a really great trailer and use that. And then, you know, answer all the questions that come in from investors, they asked you all these questions, and through that we were able to form these relationships on there by just I was really attentive, just questions would come in from investors, what’s this was this, I would be on it all day, you know, for weeks and months. And then, you know, eventually over the course of I think it took us, I don’t know, it took us months to slowly raise that. And, you know, through COVID, and everything, but you know, we still managed to raise 50,000. So, for me, it’s an amazing tool, and I would definitely use it again and recommend it. Yeah.
Ashley
Yeah. So that does sound like something to check out. So, let’s talk about your red-carpet premiere, it sounds like you guys were able to do your own premiere at the Lemley’s in Santa Monica. Maybe we can talk about that a little bit. Number one, how do you go about setting something like that up? What are sort of roughly the costs? And then ultimately, what do you get out of something like that? What is the purpose of doing a red-carpet premiere for film like this?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, so part of that, I think the biggest reason we want to do it is just to have the traditional celebration of making this movie for four years. I mean, just I think there’s something about having that premiere, that’s just so satisfying. And also, in our contracts to our investors, part of the deal was that they would, you know, especially at a certain level, I think if they invested over $1,000, they were automatically invited to the premiere. So, we sort of had an obligation there. And I also, we did play a few festivals, we played the Hollywood real festival, sort of incognito before and it was, we’d already announced our premiere when we got into that. So, we didn’t really, you know, we kind of just played that to kind of honestly test our DCP our digital cinema package. And it was fun. They’re, like great people over there. But you know, for this, we really wanted it to be free, like want to be free to the cast and crew, free to the investors and we wanted it to be amazing, you know, we really was like; okay… I think and this is just like filmmaker to filmmaker. And I think, I don’t know if it’s just how I feel about it. Or I just feel that if you throw like I know, a lot of indie films these days are struggling to make a return. I mean, I think it’s a very small percentage that actually do ever break even. But I do think that a lot of investors that get into filmmaking, it’s not always for the money. I mean, I really mean this, I really think they do it for the experience, you know, lots of them have, you know, lots of money already and, and they want to get close to Hollywood, they want to have that experience. So, I think by throwing an incredible premiere, you’re really sort of satisfying. I think a lot of that in a way and people I know that’s one thing our EP said they’re like, this is amazing premiere like, thanks, you know, thanks for doing this. And yeah, I mean, kind of I think it’s really important and I think it was really amazing how we went about that as just you know, we created like a really awesome, you know, step and repeat. We got like a red carpet. We bought that we bought the velvet ropes off Amazon, we rented the lamely Noho from them for the night was the sort of the best location and the best deal we could find. And then we, so, Getty Images, I really wanted Getty images to be there just to really, and that’s really basically the kind of the main photographers that are at big events like big A-list events, and it kind of solidifies your, your premiere in the zeitgeist. So, I really wanted that and I want it for everybody. So, we made a deal with Getty and I got one of I got Paul Archuleta who she was my first time as an actor on a red carpet. He was the first person that shot me, so I thought that was kind of cool. Having that full circle moment. So, we had Getty, we had the step and repeat, we had the theater. And then what we did is I wanted to be big so I didn’t just want to be one photographer like Getty Images there. I wanted there to be a bunch of photographers. So basically, I went on staff me up we went on Craigslist, and, you know, we just wanted to all cameras, so I’m like, you know, like let’s get a couple two or three videographers, let’s get five more cameras and let’s just blow it up. Let’s make It looked like this huge event, right on Santa Monica Boulevard. So, I was like, you know, the rate wasn’t much because our budget was pretty strapped at that point. But I was like, hey, you know, if anyone wants to come out, you want like cool shots, and you’re maybe not if you’re an amateur photographer, like, it doesn’t matter. If you want to come shoot, or you want to build your portfolio, you know, we can pay you a little something, and just come shoot for an hour, just for like, from six to seven, the red carpet. And that was awesome. I mean, we just had like a bunch of people there. We were, like, right on Santa Monica Boulevard, there were cars just driving by like causing traffic jams. It just looked like this huge event. And so, when I think we have like, 100-120 people came, so we basically got, you know, we’re like, 70-80% capacity at that theater. And so yeah, I mean, it just was awesome. Everyone loved it. And it really, we had people rolling up and Uber blacks, and just, it was it was great. And then our investors were really happy. And it was a night to remember, you know, we I mean going through, I think, you know, you made these indie films, and it can be a real, real heavy process getting through it.
Ashley
And cast and crew screenings like you’re describing that is, in some ways the reward for a lot of it, because a lot of the actors, the crew, they’re not making much money. So, it’s a celebration of the thing, and they’re always super fun. So, it sounds like you did a great job with it. So, let’s talk about distribution for this film. In the notes, you said you were going like YouTube channel, your YouTube channel, you’re putting it up there. But where else can people get this? Did you go down the typical distribution routes and decide against them? But just talk to that? What’s the distribution light look like? And why did you choose what you chose?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, that’s a great question. So, I did that we did the full rounds. You know, we went through the sales agent as distributors, we got a few offers mainly split rights. And I just heard, like, our kind of our decision was, you know, and this is just part of state of the industry right now. And it’s just, I think a lot of people have different opinions. I know, filmmakers that still go the traditional route, but then, you know, I know some really good filmmakers, some award-winning filmmakers, and they’ll be like, you know, why didn’t you take these deals? And I’ll be like; well, are you guys making money with these companies? Like, I just don’t, there’ll be like; no, we haven’t seen a sense. I’m like; Well, why are you so adamant that this is the way you know, I mean, that’s just my as my producer brain being like…Yeah. And was like, when What world do we spend and I’ve been I tried to say to stay positive, you know about it, it’s not really like, I’m slammed, it’s just more of like, from a business perspective, it’s like, In what world do we make a really good film for and spend, you know, 50 to $100,000. And then it’s just normal that you make, that everybody makes nothing, and that there’s really no chance of ever making money or ever seen $1 for your investors and it’s so we were kind of already open to the idea of not doing that, you know, unless you get like an MG, that’s really, you know, really substantial. I mean, I know a filmmaker that got offered an MG that was literally just his budget, but it was back literally so they would have broken even and made not $1 more because there’s like a 15 year deal or something and I’m like well, even that it’s like okay, so you made your film your money back but you spent all this time and nobody made anything and you have basically 15 years until you ever hope to make a cent off it because they’re going to recouping that and plus everything else they’re going to tax on that’s probably never going to happen. So, it’s still even things like that it’s like what we were kind of already open to this idea of like we got a couple offers from honestly some companies I liked some of their movies and I just was you know they we weren’t we didn’t get an MG, we got split rights offers but I was like, you know why so low? That was my question is like so much is happening in our industry, so much is happening. Like there’s so many new companies coming out, there’s so many new ways to distribute and there we are in a sense at an all-time low. I mean we are content has ever never been worth less per view like the total valuation of like where we’re at from the Blu-ray price to the Apple iTunes 99 cent price per view, to like the streaming now we’re you know, got Amazon pay in less than a penny per view now, there’s I mean, it just keeps seeing seems to keep getting worse. So, like my whole thing was like, why sell now? Like what if we, I think we did we just did a film hub on so first we did a we distributed on YouTube, because we our production company channel has like 2.5 1000 subscribers. So, it’s John’s noble hooks, his production company music channel. So, we put it out on there and right now we got like 6000 views or something. And it has great analytics.
Ashley
Is it like on YouTube where people pay per view? Or it’s just you’re using the ad revenue as your monetization?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, right now we’re actually you have to get 4000 watch hours. So right now, we’re up to like around, we’re getting close to 2000. So, we’re going to be in monetization really soon on that platform. So right now, we’re just working towards monetization. We’re It’s getting washed, which is great. And we own it. I mean, I think that the main thing right now is that we own the product that we made, and we didn’t just give it to a company, when we kind of know we’ll never see $1 for five, seven years minimum. And, you know, if we kind of just betting on ourselves. So, the whole point of doing that is what if, like, the whole, we’re kind of looking into the future, like, what if, because right now, where we’re at just not sustainable, everybody knows that. It’s just, that’s why the strikes are happening WGA. DGA is trying to end, then sags probably going to strike if they don’t come to an agreement here three weeks. So, like, that’s why this all this is happening is it’s just the middle class is gone. It’s not a sustainable career. So, we’re like, why sell our movie. Now, if maybe we come to some kind of new, there might be a new contract coming out, or some kind of new sort of legal minimums, these companies have to pay that are making tons of money off our films and paying us nothing. Or if there’s, let’s say, a new company that comes out that has a new model, that all of a sudden, we can make money, like it’s the 2000s again, like and we own our movie, and we can go right to that we don’t have to get out of a contract, we you know, they’re not going to take so I think it’s just this idea that you know, not selling low, like if the company is offering you literally no money for your film, the way I see it is they don’t believe it’s worth anything. Like if they’re going to take it and put it up on their library, but they’re not even giving you five or $10,000, just the way I see it is that they’re really saying, like, we’ll take it and we’ll make money on it, if it makes money because it’s costing us nothing, but we don’t believe in it. So that’s really how I feel. So, I was like, you know, I believe in the movie, so I’m gonna keep it. And then I’m also kind of betting on myself as an actor. I’m starring in the movie, I got some big stuff happening coming up in the next few years. I mean, if myself or John or anyone else in the cast elevates. Well, now we own the movie. And potentially the movie might also be a lot more from just the level of the of the artists. So, I think I think that idea of selling at a low and that fear that big rush to distribute something for, I think it’s kind of a big trap. That still a lot of filmmakers haven’t seen. And so, I don’t know if we made the right choice. All I know is I don’t think we made a mistake.
Ashley
Yeah. And you mentioned film hub in there, have you started to push it into film hub?
Cal Barnes
Honestly, I just launched literally last night on it with I just finally we did all the QC stuff and we kind of want to be everywhere, I think I think it’d be cool to also be on Tubi, you know, be on Amazon. But the cool thing about film hub is that we still own the movie. So, we can pull it in at any time if we want to take in a different direction. So, I think it’d be smart to just because YouTube I think is great because you have the most eyeballs on one platform, but it’s still sort of new, a new paradigm. I think it is kind of where the industry is going a little bit. But it’s not as established. So, I think being on some more traditional platforms is a good idea. And I hear Tubi from a lot of people is kind of working for some people. So, I’m interested try that out.
Ashley
Yeah, definitely Tubi, I mean, for my two movies, The Pinch and The Rideshare Killer, Tubi has definitely … I don’t know about The Pinch, because The Pinch was a few years ago, but certainly for The Rideshare Killer, most of our revenue has come from Tubi, that’s definitely for these low budget indie films. That’s definitely the platform.
Cal Barnes
Definitely. Yeah. So yeah, I’m excited to get on there. I think it’s going to be fun.
Ashley
For sure. So, I just like this… Thank you, again, for sharing all this information. Being so candid, really is appreciated. So, I just like to wrap up the interviews by asking the guests, is there anything you’ve seen recently that you can recommend HBO, Netflix, Hulu to are mostly screenwriting audience?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, I watched this movie. And I’m trying to remember how it came to me. But it’s an 80s movie called runaway train. And I don’t know if anyone’s seen it, but it’s got Jon Voight and Eric Roberts. And anytime I watch these movies, I’m just blown away. I mean, that it was shot on film. There are no special effects. It’s the acting superb, it’s a great concept. And the filmmaking is just so like, they’re out in this frozen. I don’t know where they shot it, but in Canada, but I’m just thinking of how they did this back then. And just I guess, the commitment and sort of the way films were made, like back then when it was just all out, it had to be on location. You couldn’t do anything with a computer. I just think it you know, it leads to such authenticity that I that I just love. And I mean, my favorite, definitely my favorite decade of films is the 90s for sure. That’s definitely my favorite. And then probably the 2000s and then then the 80s. But the 80s is just this movie is unreal. And Eric Roberts is I mean, you’re like seeing where this guy like kind of films he has done at one point and you’re like, wow, I mean, it’s just incredible and John Voyt’s.
Ashley
Yeah, that’s a good recommendation if people haven’t seen it. I have seen, it’s been a few years. But yeah, I saw it years ago.
Cal Barnes
I mean, it’s a great film. And I feel like people watch it, they can really be inspired be like, look, man, this is where we came from. So, I feel like any way we can kind of try to get back to that, that is good.
Ashley
I agree. So, this interview won’t be published for a couple of weeks. So, it sounds like you’ll be pretty far into the film hub distribution. But where can people expect to see the Astrid experience? Or where do you? Where do you think they could find it? And maybe even give you a recommendation? Where do you want the most to go watch it?
Cal Barnes
Yeah, I mean, you can you guys can watch it anywhere. I mean, we got it free on YouTube. And I think that’s a great spot. It’s in 4k. I mean, the great thing about YouTube is you can upload I think it’s like a 400 up to 250 gigabyte file. So, it’s Pro Res lossless on there. And yeah, you just type in on, just type in the Astrid Experience. You’ll see it come up for movie 4k. That’s a great place to watch it. And then if it’s anywhere else by then, I mean, if you just Google, it should just show right up for you
Ashley
perfect. Perfect. Well, Kyle, what’s the best way for people to keep up with what you’re doing? Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, anything comfortable sharing? I will put in the show notes.
Cal Barnes
Yeah, Instagrams great, it’s pretty much the only social media I really do it just at Cal Barnes. And yeah, people can DM me. And you know, they can also email me if you have IMDb Pro, you can get in touch with my company on there. If you have any questions, or want to collaborate or know what I’m doing in the future. I got some big stuff coming up.
Ashley
Yeah, so perfect. Cal, I really appreciate your coming on the show and talking about this project. Good luck with finishing up this project. And good luck on your future projects as well.
Cal Barnes
Ashley, thanks so much, man. It’s always great to be on here. And I love what you’re doing. So, I appreciate it.
Ashley
Thank you. Yep, yep. And I’m sure I’ll see you again. So good luck.
Cal Barnes
Yeah, we’ll talk soon man, take care.
Ashley
Take it easy bye.
SYS’s from concept to completion screenwriting course, is now available, just go to www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/screenwritingcourse, it will take you through every part of writing a screenplay, coming up with a concept, outlining, writing the opening pages, the first act, second act, third act and then rewriting and then there’s even a module at the end on marketing your screenplay, once it’s polished and ready to be sent out. We’re offering this course in two different versions, the first version, you get the course, plus, you get three analyses from an SYS reader, you’ll get one analysis on your outline, and then you’ll get to analyses on your first draft of your screenplay. This is just our introductory price, you’re getting three full analyses, which is actually the same price as our three-pack analysis bundle. So, you’re essentially getting the course for free when you buy the three analyses that come with it. And to be clear, you’re getting our full analysis with this package. The other version doesn’t have the analysis. So, you’ll have to find some friends or colleagues who will do the feedback portion of the course with you. I’m letting SYS Select members do this version of the course for free. So, if you’re a member of SYS select, you already have access to it. You also might consider that as an option. If you join SYS select, you will get the course as part of that membership too. A big piece of this course is accountability. Once you start the course, you’ll get an email every Sunday with that week’s assignment. And if you don’t complete it, we’ll follow up with another reminder, the next week is easy to pause the course if you need to take some time off. But as long as you’re enrolled, you’ll continue to get reminders for each section until it’s completed. The objective of the course is to get you through it in six months so that you have a completed power screenplay ready to be sent out. So, if you have an idea for a screenplay, and you’re having a hard time getting it done, this course might be exactly what you need. If this sounds like something you’d like to learn more about, just go to www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/screenwritingcourse. It’s all one word, all lowercase. I will of course, a link to the course in the show notes and I will put a link to the course on the homepage up in the right-hand sidebar.
On the next episode of the podcast, I’m going to be interviewing Kurt Weiser, who was on the podcast a number of years ago in Episode 135, where he came on to talk about his feature film Cam Girl. Well, next week, he’s back to talk about his latest project of Voice in Violet, which is a dramatic podcast he wrote and directed and edited as well. He and his team put together a really a great cast, a great project. One of the cast members is Bronson Pincho from the 80’s sitcom Perfect Strangers. So it’s a really interesting project. I think, just you know, obviously I’m a podcaster I do this. This is not a fiction blog is a nonfiction podcast, sort of as a more typical in the podcasting genre. But I think there’s enormous possibilities for podcasts for writers, because you’re just dealing with audio so it’s very easy to do a story and audio story. You could certainly do this in the comfort of your home. You can have some friends come in, doesn’t take a lot of you know equipment to get really high-quality recordings, you know, a few $100, you can buy probably buy a really high-quality audio recorder, you can obviously edit this stuff now on your computer. And we talk about a little bit next week with Kurt, I dig into some of these details. But I just think it’s a really great opportunity for writers because it’s an easy way to get something produced. There’s not a ton of money in this. And that’s another thing that we touch on briefly next week as well. I don’t know that people are making tons of money from these, you know, fiction podcasts. But there have some big been some examples where and Kurt mentions this next week, where one was a, it was a podcast, and they got picked up into a TV show and stuff. So, it can be kind of a proof of concept. But maybe as this medium develops, maybe there will become more of an appetite for that. And maybe there will be some opportunities to monetize this. But in general, I just think it’s a great opportunity for screenwriters to get something produced to just get something out into the world that they wrote a story. You know, a creative work is a pretty easy, cheap and easy way to do it. And I know I talked about short films, and that’s one of the same thing can be said for short films. It’s a cheap, easy way to kind of just get something done and get something out into the world, which I’m just a big proponent on. So, anyways, Kurt Weiser is back next week to touch to talk about his narrative podcast called a Voice in Violet. So keep an eye out for that episode. That’s the show. Thank you for listening.