Ben- Evaluation Question 3

  Distribution is the process for the Publisher to deliver its product to Consumers. The Publisher, or Production Company in the case of Films, is Flying Productions, and the film is Absence.

  The obvious place to start would be a cinema release, where the first place anyone can see the full film is in a cinema. This bottlenecks people into one, cash-grabbing hallway. Distributing this way would require a Distributor to to organise the release to cinema and advertisements such as bus stop posters, trailers and interviews with the cast and producers. Companies like Momentum (now part of EOne) and Metrodome are available in the UK for small budget productions like Absence.



  However this low budget may also mean that it is not practical to release in cinemas. Because of the digital age, it is possible to relatively cheaply, have discs burned with the movie and distributed with full case to stores accepting to buy them like HMV, WHSmith and Amazon. They would buy in large stocks, and sell to their customers at a profit. This would also be the next step would film have been released in cinemas.

  Next step is TV. Broadcasters like Sky and Virgin with their paid subscription TVs receive an early access for their paying audiences. Also at the same time, the movie may become available as a download or stream. Services like Amazon Prime, Netflix and HBO Go receive films to stream. There is no downloading in this process, the viewer merely selects an available film on one of their devices, at which point, the film will be played from the internet onto the device, but not downloaded into the memory. Downloading services like the Apple App Store offer one time purchases (or renting) for the film to then download and play as many times as is desired.

  A popular streaming service is Google product Youtube. Youtube is a free service with advertisements where the videos come from the users of the site. Youtube also provide the ability for revenue to be made from advertisements played and watched on your videos. This provides the capability to circumnavigate all cinemas and DVD releases for a free option that could require very little marketing provided there is an ample fan base on the uploading channel. Furthermore, there is a very marginal chance to gain as much profit as can be had going through cinema, DVD and Streaming but it does not have to stay there. 'Video Games High School' is a web series by Rocket Jump that had episodes originally uploaded to their popular Youtube channel. One year after their season 3 series finale, all their seasons are available to stream on Netflix. This shows that backtracking is more than possible and could be done with any product, once it has reached a certain popularity.

  I believe the best course of action for Absence is to skip cinema release and go into either DVD or Youtube release depending on the budget. A medium budget would be required to produce the discs, distribute them and advertise (Distribution company). However, going to Youtube is free and can save on the Distribution company costs entirely. Once enough revenue is made on Youtube, DVDs would be produced and become available for purchase. Streaming is a goal as it provide near free advertisements as it appears in the recently added sections. Money is a rather important factor. Less money, smaller goals.