theMazed

Publicity and Marketing
Kerrie Theobald (ABC Publicity)
Topic: Publicity and how to get people to watch your show

It was a nice session and easy to understand with Kerrie Theobald, about the publicity of a project. A project’s success depends on its publicity and how many people are watching it at the same time. Media is a tricky business to follow and a single mistake could be a disaster. As Kerrie Theobald said, “Publicity is purely about public”. This gives publicity a deeper meaning to understand. Sometimes a very good project can not get popularity or make enough money, simply for lack of publicity experience. According to Kerrie Theobald publicity should start six weeks prior to the program going to air. I came from Bangladesh and so far I have noticed that publicity is a bit different over there. If I only focus on film, then probably they do not spend a lot of money for publicity. The kind of industry is a bit different, because we do not get good movies often. But if there is one good movie made, then it is hard to find a ticket to watch it. In this case, most of the time publicists do not use TV as a medium for publicity. Only the newspaper and some radio ads are enough to make the project successful. Probably this is possible because Bangladesh is a small country with a large population, but things have changed recently. These days, lots of good movies are being produced and the style of publicity has changed, therefore TV is being used frequently for publicity.

I had no idea about the photography on set during the shooting of a project. It is really nice to know that on-set photography could be used for official documentation, about how a sequence has been shot. Again these photos could be used for cover pages, for news and for DVD presentations. As Kerrie Theobald said, “Photography is important and imperative”.

Yasmin Kentera (ABC Publicity)

A marketing and distribution plan was a new process for me to learn. Yasmin Kentera from ABC Publicity made it easier to learn. We started our module by learning how to make a press kit, then this lead into marketing and distribution plans. Thanks a lot to Yasmin, who gave to us generously all she had to give. A press kit is an interesting thing and bit tricky to do. A press kit represents the genre of the project and how it will be shown in the screen. It is full of production information including cast, crew and a little biography of the director. We were shown different varieties of press kits, with different types of stories and genres. These were excellent. Here again money is involved, sorry can’t help it, but lucky that we could print in black & white at least.
The marketing and distribution plan was fun. We had to find different film festivals around the world by searching the internet. My distribution plan mainly focused on an animation film festival, which is rare to find, but I was glad to find that these days more or less every film festival asks for animation work, as it is getting more popular.

Working in a company either that is small or big is a great responsibility. Archangel Productions is comparatively a small production company but very progressive and fast in complete productions. I joined with them for work experience on May 2005. I started my job as a technical assistant. The project was a DVD set of 8 volumes featuring First Aid training. The goal was to produce a high quality marketable product that would be a good training resource for businesses, schools and training organizations. Each DVD features a few topics, with a chapters menu to go to each one, and a title page. Each DVD contains only 15- 20 minutes of grouped topics, to simplify the selection process of the huge variety of topics to be found in first aid.

I was involved with this project from pre production by doing shot composition and framing using my technical knowledge and ability. I had to work a lot for this because if the storyboard worked properly and the sequence was right, then the project would be easier to shoot and accomplish. This pre production time took almost two months to finish though we were changing things all the time as new ideas play in the mind constantly. I worked 20 hrs per week though it does not seem a lot of hours of work but I also had to think about the project when I was at home. The truth that I found when working in a positive environment is that love grows for the project. It helped me to work for the project with great passion. Also lot of patience is involved in it.

During the production time my role was frequent in all areas of the production. I assisted the director of photography, worked as camera operator, stage management, lighting, boom and microphone operation. Working in these multi platform environments I learnt how to organize the production step by step during production time. Unfortunate things come up all of on a sudden and that is why we always had a plan B. I found sometimes plan B is rather more supportive then the master plan and also it gives the production a bit more freedom and control. Our budget was tight for this production so we could not visit our location before the day of shooting but we had some stills of the location and we pictured our camera setup in the stills and as planned it worked very well. I think that is very cleaver thing to do. So if the budget is tight we always could ask someone to send us some stills of the place so that at least we could guess how things will be.

The whole October to December 2005 we spent lot of our time for postproduction and we did it successfully and fortunately without any hassle. As I mentioned earlier the more you give effort in the pre production stage the smoother the production and postproduction work gets. We basically used PC computers and Windows software. In this stage I did not really work much but I was with the editor most of the time. As everything went planned the editor did not find the work very tough and eventually we were more relaxed in this stage.

In this project the integrity of topic, script and its transformation to video works perfectly. We used voice over and different angles of shots that could explain and demonstrate a situation in detail. For the voice over we used someone professional, because this part is a bit sophisticated. If the audience is not engaged by the voice, they might not find the video interesting. As well as voice over, we used music after every segment of the demonstration so that our audience get relaxed and prepare for the next demonstration. As the whole project is made for business purpose, we made an attractive advertisement to collect our customers. The advertisement is great and gives a clear message to the customers about the subject matter and its potentiality. Again the subtitle option is open for future marketing of this project in different countries of the world.

Definitely I would try to boost the production work by collecting more for the budget. As we know, the larger the budget, the more variety we can create in our work. In some contexts, I would say the lighting was not enough for the video. So we were not in the position to reshoot that segment again for lack of budget. On the other hand we could not use any professional studio and we had to arrange alternative for that. I think that a professional studio with lot of big lights helps the camera to get good view, and the outcome can be great. We also used green screen during some shooting but the lighting was not strong enough in the background. These things happened because of a lack of budget. If only the budget was right we could play around things and take more open decisions to correct mistakes and to move on to the next step.

These first aid DVD series will be sold by Tricord Enterprise Pty Ltd [www.tricord.com.au]. You could buy each DVD by $19.95 AUD or the whole package is only $295 AUD.

The collaborative project was long. People came and left within a particular timeframe. Finally someone had to take the lead and Lindsay was the person. I was struggling to support myself in many ways, so study became my second priority after a certain time, but I was there with the team, all the time supporting them technically and mentally to finish the project as early as we could, with a magnificent story.

In the beginning of this semester Lin and I decided not to make the storyline too complex and to follow one single artist rather than follow couple of them. We agreed about our individual roles and planned the schedule by organizing group meetings. Our first hit came from one of our previous group members who actually denied us of our previous work captured from tapes. That shocked us terribly and thanks our lecturers Rachel and Leo; we managed to get those tapes back. After a close look at our previous work, the storyboard was then customized. We went to different places to get different footage and finally to our artist’s home for a face to face interview. We were kindly helped and supported by our artist in every aspect, which was nice. We spent nearly five hours in there and rolled three tapes all together. Finally our shooting was over officially, which was sweet.

The collaborative project is always tough to finish, but probably the easiest to start. It does not matter where you work, budget becomes a factor after a certain time. I do not want to discuss budget much, but we luckily managed to keep it rolling. “Paying respect to fellow team members” is the best thing that I have learnt by doing this collaborative documentary project. I know that things happen on the spot and also throughout the whole process time after time, but that can be easily handled by showing respect to each other team member. In a situation where we are not paid; also other distinct problems in the life can cause people to get upset easily, but we should support each other. The worst situations happen when somebody is not attentive to his/her role. We should be aware that this is a collaborative matter and if anyone does not co-operate properly, the whole process gets hampered. As a technical assistant, I had not much control over the project, but I made my team members feel good when I was around them. I gave them mental support and strength all the time, so that we could finish the project smoothly. As usual, I said them, BUZZ me if you need any assistance

Stephen Corvini was one of our guest lecturers came at RMIT to deliver us a delightful speech. He works at Film Victoria as an investment manager. I suppose to record his speech in the class but I quit that idea at the last moment because I was thinking he more would be talking about investment and marketing and my research paper was about struggling Australian media industry. But surprisingly Stephen was talking about past history of Australian film industry and eventually he gave us lot of information in his speech. Then my lecturer Elisa Tranter gave me the idea to interview him for my research paper. Then my mission started to hunt Stephen. I did not get any replay against my first mail, and then I tried again. Second knock was successful and by the e-mail we both agreed to fix a day for a phone interview.
I had a question format that I followed to ask question to Stephen and also had to make some related questions on the spot while he was talking. The best thing that I came to know from the interview is every industry has its bad time and naturally it is now for Australian industry. But government is optimistic by funding more to this industry but more concern is needed widely. We can never compete our films with American film because they spend a lot of money only for marketing of the film, which is not possible for such a small industry. But the most important part is, if we can create a standard platform for our exported artists to come here as they are coming and came in recent years and within that if we could make some box office success then faith will come back and this industry could raise again to its high peak. A new generation of film makers are coming who are called “guerrilla film makers” will empower this industry that is positive but this whole process is going to take some time. And again!!! New features like Boy Town, Book of Revolution and couple of more films are coming which might give us a happy 2006 for box office success.

Year 2006! I don’t really know if this is a lucky year for me or not, because the start was not as significant as other years. Anyway, finally I am preparing to go back home after completing my MS. I have learnt a lot during these years. Especially I learnt a lot about people and I updated myself academically through study. I feel excellent because I know that now I am able and certified to do something that I always wanted to do. I believe that confidence and patience always beats academic certification and probably there are many examples that we will find in our busy life. For some reason I feel great to address myself as a guerilla filmmaker. During my bachelor degree couple of years ago one of my lecturers said that TV is the most powerful medium, but I always believed and still believe that film is the most powerful medium. And my future plan is to make film as a way of entertainment to educate people. I think people in my country need some social education in a different context. TV as a medium is very strong in Bangladesh, as lots of new channels are coming and production companies are busy making lots of drama and others programs. But as usually the parameter of the quality is going down day by day. The only thing that Bangladeshi audiences get engaged in is the latest news updates.
The film industry used to be very rich in the past and currently it is booming again, which is great news. New studios are opening soon with latest technologies and hopefully more and more good productions will come in near future. I probably will start my mission two years from now. For some reason my passion for media at this time, does not glow anymore, but I know that this is just temporary. I might join in a TV channel, and the opportunity is on its way but I also might join an Airport to get some different sort of experience. Whatever I do.. I will come back again!!!

It was always a dream to visit a studio where access is not that straightforward to attain. On March 19, 2006 we went to Melbourne Central Studio as a part of our MS field trip project, which is also a part exercise of the media production industry subject. I always heard about Warner Bros or Fox studios but never saw them and it is honestly very hard to predict how big a studio is unless you have seen one. Melbourne central studio has five studios, which are not all the same size. We visited studio one which is the biggest of them all. Before I went there, I was expecting to see something inside the studio, but it was an empty place. As I visited couple of TV studios, I saw cameras on the spot, some TVs and lots of other stuff, which is needed for a production. I had no idea that a studio, especially where the big production companies come and make movies, would be just an empty place. Then I understood, because the tour guide (Rachel) said that a studio is like an apartment. Companies come and lease the studios and they bring all of their stuff, including sofa and when they finish their project they have to remove everything and leave the place as it was before. Now I know why access to a studio is almost impossible when work is in progress.

I was really surprised to know that working with a big production company does not mean that one is safe with his job. One single mistake is enough to get fired and American production companies are very strict about that, although Australian production companies are a bit flexible (nice to know that). Just out of curiosity, I went to see the rooms where Russell crow and Nicholas Cage lived during a shooting of a film. I was expecting to see a five star hotel comfortable room but it was just a simple room to live and probably I was thinking ridiculous. I never heard of sound lock doors, which was a good thing to see and experience through out the tour. At the end of the tour I was thinking that one needs to be really rich to work in this industry unless he/she is an actor/actress. At least that is how I find myself. I was listening about how this industry works from the tour guide and I was really surprised that it is all about money. For example a production company wants to have the studio and they book it, but after a long delay probably 3-4 months they may say no, then the studio owner has can do nothing about that, and simultaneously the studio owner will lose his other contracts from other production companies who were willing to have the studio at the same time. Only goodwill and the nature of business, decide if the studio owner will get or loose business.

The Australian film industry is one of the oldest film industries and it has had a glorious past. The Story of the Kelly Gang is a perfect example, which was called the world’s first full-length feature film in 1906. It was a huge success in both the Australian and the British market. The Story of the Kelly Gang ended up launching a new genre of bushranger stories. Unlike every other film industry in the world, the Australian film industry had to go through a rough time in early 1920-1960s.
A new era of filmmaking started in Australia when the Australian Film Television and Radio school was established in 1972. The school boosted the level of confidence in many Australian artists, which was significant for the industry. As a result Australia produced nearly 400 films between 1970 and 1985. This is a substantial figure in the history of the Australian film industry. ? Why in 21st century, is the Australian film industry so fragile?
According to Australian Film Commission release of a record of successful Australian productions, we come to realize that the Australian film’s share of the box office went from 4 per cent in 1998 to 8 percent in 2001. The overall box office increased but attendance at local films slumped to an all-time low in 2004, which came as a big shock for Australian film makers. It is true that the Australian film industry is distinctively small, but it has the availability of high tech studios in Sydney, Melbourne and the Gold Coast. I would say these studios are no less resourced than any American studio, and already some American movies like Mission Impossible 2, Star Wars 2, The Matrix…were made in these sutdios through casually employing Australian artists and lots of crew.
According to Stephen Corvini from Film Victoria “There is no doubt that it is difficult to finance a feature film out of Australia. Part of the reason is the lack of box office success in the last few years, which made the international market less likely to provide pre sales internationally, which previously were there for Australian filmmakers to help finance a feature film”.
The Australian Government provided direct support, training and industry development and investment agencies (a total of A$136.4 million in 2004–05). If we can only create a proper platform for our exported and local Artists then they will return and love to work here in Australia and with that couple of box office success can raise a new wave for a shiny Australian film industry in future.