Some of the ideas we're thinking about for independent filmmakers:
1. It's Not All About You
If your story is more important than the issue itself, then you may be stuck with the old models.
Try thinking beyond your project and start building relationships with the people your media will affect. Your goals and their goals do not have to be mutually exclusive, so find ways to work together.
2. Flip the Model
Finding funds for films is incredibly difficult. Instead of doing this using the usual model of a film followed by outreach, what about flipping the model?
Find partners (organizations and foundations) who are invested in your issue. Ask them not how they can help you make your film, but how your film can help them achieve their goals.
Be sure that the relationship is clear and defined. Once their use has run its course, the media belongs to you, no strings attached. They get the original content around their issue, and you get the footage. Now you've begun. Use that footage to do a trailer, or to produce a rough cut.
3. "Exploitation" Is Not a Dirty Word
When it comes to making a social impact, you have to accept that you'll be exploitative. In a good way.
If you need to repurpose your media for online use by your partners, do it. If your partner needs a special version for an event, bend the rules and make it. The key: make it right for the partners who will use it to further your cause.
