by Lauren Harbin | Oct 8, 2015 | Audience, Blog post, Entertainment Business, Font Page, Pitching, Presentations, Producer Interviews, Screenwriting Tips, The Expert Network
Inside The Comic Book Industry’s Latest Cool Thing… Let’s transport ourselves to a simpler time for just a moment… Imagine you’re back in middle school and your favorite limited edition comic book has just been released… You and your friends race to the local comic book shop after school to get your hands on the newest edition of “Captain America” or “Wonder Woman.” You wait patiently in line, with 25 cents burning a hole in your pocket… Finally, you get up to the counter and hand your pocket change to the clerk who slides over the goods. At last you get your hands on your coveted new comic book… And as you begin to flip the pages, a whole other world emerges… While this may or may not have been a reality for you, we can all agree that comic books and graphic novels have played an important role in pop culture and media. What you may or may not know is that there’s a thriving digital marketplace for NEW comics and NEW graphic novels with distribution and sales portals populating various corners of the Internet with readers of all ages scrambling to get their hands on the latest thing. And while we all know many of the blockbusters films we’ve come to know and love are based on comics from Marvel and DC, you may not know that comics and graphic novels have paid a very significant role in the development and sale of numerous other movies and TV series, some of which might surprise you… -30 DAYS OF NIGHT -CONSTANTINE -MYSTERY MEN – 300 -HELL BOY -THE...
by Voyage | Sep 11, 2015 | Entertainment Business, Producer Interviews, Screenwriting Tips, The Expert Network
John Crye, Producer Find out how to make Hollywood producers want to work with you again and again by building producer rapport using advice from industry veteran, John Crye. As part of our ongoing series, which asks our producers about their work in the entertainment business, I talked with John Crye, a current Hollywood producer and Voyage team member, about his work in the industry. Here you can read some of his own personal advice on building producer rapport in Hollywood, what a writer can do to make a producer’s life easier–and get them to fall in love with your script while they’re at it. Crye–the former director of Creative Affairs at Newmarket Films, who had a hand in acquiring such modern-day classics as Donnie Darko, Memento, and Whale Rider–has more recently moved on to independent writing, directing, and producing. In his many years in the entertainment business, he’s learned a lot from experience about the production world and the professionals who inhabit it. I asked him about any advice he had to give to writers thinking about entering the business, from the perspective of someone who had not only written himself but also worked extensively with writers as a producer. A common theme tended to reappear in his advice: understanding your producer’s needs is crucial to getting your story made in a way that’s satisfying for everyone. In the most basic terms: you need to make their job as easy as possible. So the question remains: why do YOU need to make their job easy? Aren’t THEY supposed to work for YOU? While a producer is indeed there...
by Voyage | Feb 11, 2015 | The Expert Network
Whether you love to do it or not, marketing your work is a necessity if you want it to reach people. So you’ve got all your marketing materials together, a logline, a treatment, a clever synopsis. Your pitch is ready to go, but you’ve forgotten one vital thing – visuals. We live in a primarily visual age. One where Instagram has overtaken Facebook as the premiere social media platform to be on, and one where Facebook has reinvented itself to showcase user photos in an effort to keep up. Twitter has shown that moreover, people digest text in smaller and smaller bites. They say a picture speaks a thousand words, and if you’re in it to win a shot at seeing your film on-screen, that has never been more true than right now. Why is visual marketing so important? Rouse an emotion. People make choices on feeling – capture a producer’s emotions, and you’ll have a better chance of capturing his signature on an option agreement Complement your worded materials in a way that: A. tells a story and then B. shows a story – this is a winning combo that works! Visuals tell a story in microseconds (a picture speaks a thousand words – multiple pictures can speak millions) Click Here to see examples of visual from our film project marketing Consider the film GRAVITY, directed by Alfonso Cuaron and starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. GRAVITY’s tagline is simple enough: “Don’t Let Go.” It communicates a simple message, and may or may not capture attention on its own. But then let’s take that tagline, and pair it...
by Voyage | Aug 13, 2014 | Entertainment Business, Producer Interviews, Screenwriting Tips, The Expert Network
An expert producer’s look at the past, present, and future of serial programming Last week, I had the pleasure of talking with Kelly Hayes, a current Hollywood producer and Voyage team member, about what it’s like to work in all corners of the industry, and how the classic forms of development for network, cable, and film compare to the emerging market of digital streaming. This is the first of an ongoing series that asks our producers about their work in the entertainment industry so that YOU can learn from their wealth of experience! Hayes’ many credits have ranged from formats in scripted and reality television, film, and digital streaming series. Today, he has a lot of plates spinning in every market you can think of, with ongoing projects in half-hour comedy, hour-long drama, reality, and feature film. To say he’s got a bit of experience is an understatement. Although Hayes started his career in film, an economic downturn coupled with the WGA strike of 2008 served to destabilize the film industry, and prompted Hayes to look into other options. Television was his next best choice to keep following his passion—and it took some relearning to make it work. Looking Ahead The biggest change to the process of development in film and television was the notion of planning much further ahead into the future of the project. “It’s ’where do I see this show at episode 100?’” says Hayes of the development process for the life of a series, “versus, ‘I have 90 minutes to tell my story and then it’s done.’” The core of making a great...
by Voyage | Mar 2, 2012 | The Expert Network
5 LASER-GUIDE BUSINESS TOOLS FOR SUCCESS Millions of people love movies and TV…hundreds of thousands want to generate work for the screen themselves. But of those, only a few ever will. And the number of them who will end up with successful careers? Well… Only about 10% of movies that make it into Sundance get distribution. Only about 50% of screenwriters in the Writers Guild will earn any kind of money as writers, and of those, only about 1% will make over half a million dollars per year. The statistics are daunting, but the real question is this: What are the 1% doing that you aren’t? The odds are just as bad for them as they are for everyone else, and yet somehow they convince others of their value, and you can bet that in 2012 they’ll be reaping bigger rewards today than ever. What’s the secret sauce? Well, here’s my opinion-and this is from our observation of hundreds of our successful TV and Film clients over the last decade: Having a clear vision; a realistic plan; and the right habits to execute that plan day after day after day Success stems from consistent professionalism in a number of different ways, exhibited on a daily basis. It’s about constantly planning, pushing forward, investing in yourself, thinking big when necessary, thinking to scale when necessary, taking action, and making ALL the right moves so that you deliver the goods and build upward momentum with every deadline, meeting, and screening. The truth of the industry is that it’s not about overnight success-because even when you get that, if you don’t handle...
by Voyage | Nov 5, 2011 | The Expert Network
JUST KIDDING. THAT’S NOT HOW IT WORKS. There’s a reason why they say “There’s no time like the present.” The present is what determines and shapes what’s to come. So take action! If you think you’ve got something that connects with today’s audiences and trends, act on it! If not, demand and trends might change, your work might change, and you might change. Don’t assume opportunity will stay constant. Instead of waiting around for an opportunity to come along, create your own opportunities now. Many of us hold back for different reasons, and one of those involves fear and doubt. There’s the fear of rejection (“I’ve had so many doors slammed in my face, why bother knocking on another one?”). There’s the fear of being accepted and then having to follow up on a promising proposal (“What if I don’t have enough to back myself up? They’ll be disappointed!”). And then there’s the basic fear of the unknown (“What will happen to me if…?”). Let’s face it. You (and we) are not getting any younger, and you never know what life-altering changes may be waiting for you around the corner. The wants of the entertainment marketplace are constantly changing. Therefore, there really is no better time to break out of your shell of insecurity with an idea you can share with others who can help you turn your vision into something real. So write your idea and find your talent. Don’t forget to make a sizzle reel and a pitch book. Hit the print button. Compose an email. And send it out into the universe. You just never know....
