 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS: The 5 Best Ways to Use Social Media to Build an Audience For Your Movie
By social media strategist and NALIP conference speaker Sheri Candler. Excerpt from The Film Collaborative’s upcoming book, “Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul.”
Some filmmakers start the social media process very early in production (Nina Paley started blogging three years before she released “Sita Sings the Blues”); some begin only after their films hit the festival circuit. However you do it, social media isn’t just setting up a Facebook and Twitter account; social media means anywhere you can share a link, comment on a post, or self-publish content for everyone to read, watch or listen. And it’s always a work in progress.
Here’s five of my best tips on using social media to build an audience.
1) Don’t spend all of your time talking about your film.
Constant selling is boring and that’s counterproductive: You’re trying to build interest. This is why you should be careful about entrusting outside agencies with building and maintaining your social media presence: They can’t effectively be the voice of your work.
Think about what interests your audience in their daily lives and why they would be attracted to you as an artist and to your film; then, present them with news and information that aligns with it.
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 Call for Submissions: The Heineken Voces Grant
TFI has made it a goal to not only seek out unheralded projects from around the world but also help foster the development of filmmakers living and working here in the United States. That’s what brought the Tribeca All Access (TAA) program into fruition and what’s propelled it to advocate for idiosyncratic and refreshing subject matter.
Over the years, TAA’s succeeded in highlighting stories that go beyond common parameters of theme and characterization. Having seen this continued investment towards underrepresented works pay off through the years, TFI’s now expanded on this idea and launched the Heineken Voces grant, which supports US-based Latino filmmakers working on a feature-length narrative or documentary project that offers a new perspective on their cultural experience.
Submissions close on October 10th.
You can apply for the grant here.
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 Call for Entries: JC PowerHouse Short Film Festival
JC PowerHouse Short Film Festival, taking place Sept. 30 – Oct. 2nd, 2011 in Jersey City, NJ is accepting submissions for short films!
FREE to submit your film!
Entries accepted:
– Narrative
– Doc
– Animation
– 30 mins or under
Deadline to submit: Sept. 16, 2011
Please visit: www.jcpowerhousefilmfest.com
Click on “submit” for rules and regulations.
 Gomez Joins Valiant as Trasmedia Producer
By Dave McNary, Variety
Starlight Runner Entertainment topper Jeff Gomez has come aboard as a “transmedia producer” for Valiant Entertainment’s efforts to build up its superhero characters across films, vidgames and other digital formats.
Gomez has worked on the “transmedia” elements for “Avatar,” “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “Transformers,” “Tron” and “Halo” with the idea that the concept of the bible – a document containing backstory information that film and TV writers rely on for building plots and characters – is taken to the new level of developing a piece of intellectual property in a consistent manner across multiple media platforms.
Gomez worked at Valiant between 1992 and 1998 as a writer on “Eternal Warrior” and “Master Darque” and line editor on “Ninjak” and “Bloodshot.”
“This is a homecoming for me,” he told Variety. “When I worked there previously, we were already paying mind to the fans and exploring that the young people would want to interact with the characters more extensively.”
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 Zoe Saldana to Produce, Star in Thriller ‘Dominion’ at Paramount
By Borys Kit and Daniel Miller, The Hollywood Reporter
Just as her action movie Colombiana opens across the country, Zoe Saldana has set up the supernatural thriller Dominion at Paramount.
The pitch hails from Dean McCreary and Chester Hastings and while plot details remain sketchy, the story centers on a woman (Saldana) who is half-human, half-angel.
Saldana will also serve as a producer on the project, alongside Robbie Brenner. Brenner is a producer on the Gerard Butler drama Machine Gun Preacher, the story of drug-dealing biker-turned-children’s crusader Sam Childers and it was on that project where she first crossed paths with McCreary and Hastings; the duo had worked on an earlier incarnation of Childers’ story.
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