June 24, 2015
A lot has happened since we last spoke... an awful, awful lot. Earlier in the year, Steve and I sat down and discussed the proper approach to this film – after all, there is multiple ways to get a film created – but ultimately we decided upon the standard approach. And that approach began with us formally creating a film company and beginning the MASSIVE learning curve that comes along with it.
And let me tell you, the learning has been constant, with each of us learning more every step of the way. And with that learning, of course, comes mistakes. See, when one creates a film company there’s a special type of share that comes with it – one that allows us (the creators) to raise funds but keep the creative control of the project (through voting in the company). In order to do that, there’s a collection of regulations over the types of investors that we can even approach – at least for an Ontario company. And those regulations are STEEP – assets or income per year that places an individual at or near the top 1% of earners in the country. Of course, those regulations are placed to protect investors (although I’m not exactly sure who they’re protecting), so we understand why they’re there – but it took us a bit of time to learn this information.
As a result, we had to alter our approach to fundraising – shifting our focus at the same time – but not before we took some pain. We had approached a potential investor on the merits of our film – a documentary we really believe has an important place in revealing unknown history – and they were on board for 30K, which would have put us in a position to shoot the film at our “optimum” timeline. They had the cheque ready – and then we found out about the regulations, and ultimately how we were not allowed to accept the money on the table in front of us. As you can imagine, immensely frustrating, but at the same time an important learning moment for us.
The issue/hold up for us has been funding thus far – not interest. In fact, everyone we’ve talked to has given us a positive response; they like the project, understand our approach and goals, and want to help us make it a reality – which has been an incredible boon. Some have even donated small amounts to help us make small steps – we’ve been fortunate that much of our research has been made possible by those donations, and has revealed an incredible story that we know is worthy of the screen (and then some). And we’ve began to made some serious inroads with new potential investors, now that we have all the information required. We are hoping to put together the remainder of the funding in the next few months, which would only really be a little bit behind our original intended schedule. It’s just a matter of time before we get that serious investor, and when we do we know that we’ll be making something special with them. This film is an opportunity in so many ways.
Despite that learning curve, we have continued to plug along with the production as we can – which included picking up a few interns at a local high school in London that discovered some of our pitch competition wins and contacted us wanting to learn more about the film. As it turned out, they were very eager and very talented, and created a brand-new poster for the film which builds off the previous conceptual one but includes some of the old photographs we’d discovered earlier in the year. So we are very happy to include that design here,, and you’ll be seeing it pop up as we get further into this project.
They also had two teams create the facebook cover photo on the page’s landing, which you can check out (and don’t forget to like our film!) at this link:
https://www.facebook.com/TheLightDocumentary
Stay strong, my friends. We’ve got everything in place to make this film as soon as we’ve got the right investor on board, and when that happens we’ll be throwing so much information your way you’ll get your history fill every day.
- Mark
A lot has happened since we last spoke... an awful, awful lot. Earlier in the year, Steve and I sat down and discussed the proper approach to this film – after all, there is multiple ways to get a film created – but ultimately we decided upon the standard approach. And that approach began with us formally creating a film company and beginning the MASSIVE learning curve that comes along with it.
And let me tell you, the learning has been constant, with each of us learning more every step of the way. And with that learning, of course, comes mistakes. See, when one creates a film company there’s a special type of share that comes with it – one that allows us (the creators) to raise funds but keep the creative control of the project (through voting in the company). In order to do that, there’s a collection of regulations over the types of investors that we can even approach – at least for an Ontario company. And those regulations are STEEP – assets or income per year that places an individual at or near the top 1% of earners in the country. Of course, those regulations are placed to protect investors (although I’m not exactly sure who they’re protecting), so we understand why they’re there – but it took us a bit of time to learn this information.
As a result, we had to alter our approach to fundraising – shifting our focus at the same time – but not before we took some pain. We had approached a potential investor on the merits of our film – a documentary we really believe has an important place in revealing unknown history – and they were on board for 30K, which would have put us in a position to shoot the film at our “optimum” timeline. They had the cheque ready – and then we found out about the regulations, and ultimately how we were not allowed to accept the money on the table in front of us. As you can imagine, immensely frustrating, but at the same time an important learning moment for us.
The issue/hold up for us has been funding thus far – not interest. In fact, everyone we’ve talked to has given us a positive response; they like the project, understand our approach and goals, and want to help us make it a reality – which has been an incredible boon. Some have even donated small amounts to help us make small steps – we’ve been fortunate that much of our research has been made possible by those donations, and has revealed an incredible story that we know is worthy of the screen (and then some). And we’ve began to made some serious inroads with new potential investors, now that we have all the information required. We are hoping to put together the remainder of the funding in the next few months, which would only really be a little bit behind our original intended schedule. It’s just a matter of time before we get that serious investor, and when we do we know that we’ll be making something special with them. This film is an opportunity in so many ways.
Despite that learning curve, we have continued to plug along with the production as we can – which included picking up a few interns at a local high school in London that discovered some of our pitch competition wins and contacted us wanting to learn more about the film. As it turned out, they were very eager and very talented, and created a brand-new poster for the film which builds off the previous conceptual one but includes some of the old photographs we’d discovered earlier in the year. So we are very happy to include that design here,, and you’ll be seeing it pop up as we get further into this project.
They also had two teams create the facebook cover photo on the page’s landing, which you can check out (and don’t forget to like our film!) at this link:
https://www.facebook.com/TheLightDocumentary
Stay strong, my friends. We’ve got everything in place to make this film as soon as we’ve got the right investor on board, and when that happens we’ll be throwing so much information your way you’ll get your history fill every day.
- Mark
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