Task 8 - Distibution & Exhibition

The ratio of shorts making money to those that don’t is diminutive because of the way that they are marketed, and the amount of funding that is injected into the marketing budgets of those films. Unfortunately, short films are not the kinds of creations that will be noticed on an off-chance. The market for short films is niche, but not to a point where it barely exists. Because of this niche audience, a little more attention has to be placed on these short films for them to be sufficiently noticed. This exposure could be through online campaigns, pairing with a distributor, or sending off the short film to be selected for a short film festival. With all of these methods of exposure, there is always a risk. If an online campaign doesn’t work, then a film company will have lost a substantial amount of money on a campaign that hasn’t done what it was supposed to do.

This risk will always be present with short films though. After all, it was once said that many film-makers use short films as a calling card, barging their way into the film-making world.

In the case of Raindance’s “Best of 16^th Film Festival Shorts”, the anthology is released to do exactly what it says on the tin. It was released to be an anthology of what Raindance thought were their best short films. Being featured on an anthology like this does a lot for a short. It means that the short can gain the exposure that it needs, and also means that a production company now has a short that is recognised as being one of the “best” in a film festival.

Short film anthologies are marketed in a number of ways. In the case of Best Vs Best (Shooting People), a small teaser preludes the actual video itself, showing accolades of the films that are shown on the DVD, such as OSCAR nominations, etc. Some distribution companies also prefer to make use of other forms of media culture, such as video hosting sites such as YouTube or Vimeo. However, YouTube and Vimeo have two completely different user bases. The user base / audience of YouTube is aimed more towards a mass market, with users of all ages visiting the site. The site itself hosts all different kinds of content, meaning that a whole range of users will come to the site, including those in the film-making and production industries. Granted, shorts are hosted on YouTube, however, it is on a different scale to Vimeo. Vimeo is aimed directly at a more intellectual audience, an audience that would be likely to enjoy a short film. This poses the question of which would be better to advertise on. YouTube has a mass audience, whereas Vimeo is geared towards the right kind of audience, the kind of audience that would buy a short film anthology.