Distributing a Documentary Through PBS: What I Learnt from the Unconventional Film Distribution Process

While contemplating how to distribute my documentary Cats of Malta, I had some big decisions to make regarding the most profitable way to approach the release. My partner and I figured we had two clear options — go at it alone, or hand the film over to film distributors. 

At the time we had discovered a platform called Show&Tell, run by documentarian and distribution strategist Keith Ochwat. Keith and the platform members believe that filmmakers, particularly documentary filmmakers, should be making money from their films without handing over a large sum of that profit to a distributor. 

I wholeheartedly agree because, even though not all distributors are dishonest, the work filmmakers put in to make these films is endless and filmmakers deserve to get paid, like all artists. A documentary can take many years to plan, produce, shoot, and edit. With most documentaries there can be large costs involved to obtain rights for images, music, extra footage, deliverables, marketing and so on, and Cats of Malta was no exception.  

Read More

YouTube is Bloody Hard

We tried various angles, from posting old films and trailers and even attempting to gain traction with travel videos while living as digital nomads. When that didn’t work, we began incorporating creative educational talk with those travel videos, in the hope of trying to reach a more engaged audience.

Soon it became clear to us that our channel was unfocused and our lack of consistency in posting new videos was not helping either. I had a good chuckle when I saw the banner I had created for the Nexus Production Group YouTube channel. On the right hand corner it states ‘fresh videos every Sunday’. We haven’t posted a new video on a Sunday in over a year.

Read More

How Losing 30 Hours a Week Made Me Value My Creative Time

Last night I signed up for a 100 days of writing challenge with my writing group. However, the challenge began the night before a 6am work start at my day job. The irony was not lost on me. I finally committed to writing daily, something I had been telling myself I wanted to do for a long time, but the night I committed was the night I badly needed to sleep so I could be rested for work.

Read More

The Long Shelf Life of a Feature Film

We just received a lump sum payment via Filmhub for a license deal on our feature film Friends, Foes & Fireworks. The buyer was ReelShort, a new streaming network, which opted to purchase the film upfront rather than paying a percentage of sales or ad revenue, as most platforms do.

This marks the second buyout of Friends, Foes & Fireworks this year. A Belgian streamer also purchased the film for their network earlier.

Friends, Foes & Fireworks was originally released in 2018, six years ago. Back then, it performed poorly in terms of revenue — and, to be honest, it continued to underperform, with only brief spikes in revenue here and there.

But this year, out of nowhere like the RKO, we received two licensing deals that nearly doubled the revenue Friends, Foes & Fireworks had generated in the previous five years. This just goes to show the value of owning the rights to your film — feature films have long shelf lives, even those that didn’t initially succeed.

Read More

The Balancing Act: DIY Filmmaking vs Public Funding

Recently, we attended a screening of our short film Roniti at the 21st In the Palace Film Festival in Bulgaria. Being part of this Oscar-qualifying festival for short films was an honour, and as we watched the other entries, we were struck by their high quality.

However, a trend quickly emerged. As the credits rolled on these films, nearly every one boasted logos of funding bodies from countries like Spain, Italy, and across Asia, alongside sponsorships for camera packages, color correction facilities, and extensive crews.

In stark contrast, our short had a 30-second credit sequence. Our crew of seven managed both production and post-production, with most of us juggling multiple roles. I served as the writer, producer, director, cinematographer, and editor — typical of micro-budget filmmaking.

It made me question how much more viable it is to have funding support for your work. And do films with public funds actually perform better?

Read More

The 3 Pillars of the Indie Filmmaking Mindset: Patience, Flexibility & Compromise

Earlier this month, we drove from Zagreb to Berlin to finish our feature film, After the Act. We were adding pick-ups and filming new scenes, expanding the story after reviewing the edit and realizing it needed more work.

On the way home, we planned to film a new episode in our Life Improvised series, titled Sugar, set in Prague. It made sense logistically: Prague was less than four hours from Berlin, our car was loaded with gear, and Prague is stunning on film. Two birds, one stone—but it meant planning two productions on a tight schedule in two different cities.

Could we do it?

We could and did, but the goal of this blog isn't to brag. It's to explain how we managed it and the mindset that made it possible: patience, flexibility, and compromise.

Read More

The Advantages of Owning Your Own Film Gear

For the past six years, we have produced a feature film every year. In the same period, we have made 12 short films as part of our Life Improvised series. This high output is resource and wallet intensive. But a big reason why we can produce so many films and keep costs down: we own and use our own film gear.

I recommend all aspiring independent filmmakers consider this approach. I didn’t always think this way. Initially, I rented equipment or hired cinematographers with their own cameras for my first short films and even my first feature.

But gradually, I started investing in gear — a cheap boom pole, microphone, made in China redhead lights, and a secondhand JVC GY-HD101 camera. 

I didn’t really know how to use any of this gear properly. I remember filming something at the Melbourne International Film Festival for a film producer and my footage being shaky and out of focus. But though I was inexperienced, owning gear allowed me to practice, learn, and slowly improve. It was an investment in myself and my craft and what I wanted to do as a career.

Read More

My Love-Hate Relationship with LinkedIn

I've been using social media for years to promote my company’s work and occasionally my personal stuff, but LinkedIn stands out. While Facebook and Instagram are playgrounds for memes, shameless plugs and endless debates (that usually degenerate into name-calling), LinkedIn prides itself on being the epitome of professionalism. It's like the corporate headquarters of social media, where everyone wears a figurative suit and tie. 

However, LinkedIn has remained one platform that I have a love-hate relationship with. I can't decide whether to embrace it or delete my account altogether.

Read More
2 Comments

The Battle Over Pennies: Trying to Get Paid by Platforms as an Indie filmmaker

Sometimes I wonder if indie filmmaking is worth the hassle. Every Monday I do accounting, updating spreadsheets, tracking the business expenses and sales. Almost every week there are columns marked in bold and red — money still owed. Sometimes these owed columns don’t change for months. Sometimes years.

As I write this, I have been emailing IndieFlix since October 2023, chasing payments owed since 2021. These payments are pennies, under $100, but since their policy is to payout every quarter if earnings are above a $1 threshold, I think it is fair to expect the license agreement we signed to be honoured.

IndieFlix is a funny one. We have two films with them, Friends, Foes & Fireworks and Daughter, going back to the start of 2019. In the beginning they reported and paid on time every quarter and our films would earn a small amount on their platform, barely over three figures. But then one year into the deal a funny pattern would begin to emerge: every quarter like clockwork they would still send the reports but always forget the follow-up part… actually paying the money owed.

Read More

Breaking The Silence in Brussels: A Maltese Documentary Joins the Fight for Women's Rights

Malta is the only country in the EU where a woman will be arrested for having an abortion. Here, the path to a legal abortion is fraught with barriers: it demands a consensus from not one, but three separate doctors, all agreeing that abortion is the sole measure to save her life. Abortion is illegal even in cases of rape and incest, making Malta one of the strictest anti-abortion nations in the world. 

So when No Woman is an Island was invited to screen in front of the EU Parliament in a bid to help change Maltese law, I was honoured. To screen in Parliament, where MPs advocate, deliberate, and enact laws to foster positive change across all member states, including Malta ... Well, that was precisely one of the motivations driving my documentary work.

Read More