Crowdfunding Industry Rolls Out the Red Carpet to Hollywood and Indies with First Crowdfunding Film Festival in California

Crowdfunding Film Festival Set to Roll Out the Red Carpet to Hollywood and Independent Filmmakers to Promote Revolutionary New Public Equity Crowdfunding Finance Tool

By Robert Hoskins

The First Annual International CrowdFunding Film Festival will be held October 2-6, 2013 in San Francisco. The film fest will bring together artists, filmmakers, entertainment and video game creators to showcase their craft, network and  raise money through the new crowdfunding finance tool. The film festival has plans to collaborate with film schools in New York, London and Paris.

Crowdfunding Film Festival Set to Roll Out the Red Carpet to Hollywood and Independent Filmmakers to Promote Revolutionary New Public Equity Crowdfunding Finance Tool

Film students from universities all around the country are increasingly looking to crowdfunding to find backing for their projects. With over countless films successfully funded through crowdfunding portals such as Kickstarter and IndieGoGo, Hollywood is now paying close attention to all this movement.

Director/Writer Rob Thomas has raised over $5.7 million for his movie “Veronica Mars” while Zach Braff’s feature “Wish I Was Here” has raised $2.6 million in donations. San Francisco State Student Sterling Cook keen on exploring crowdfunding of finance for production projects.

“I see in these directors, writers, and cinematographers, the same core passion for innovation. They are not only artists but more importantly, entrepreneurs – they are seeking to touch the world and make a difference through their films. We know of their struggle to find financial backing and I believe crowdfunding will be the answer,” stated the ICFFF’s organizer Sydney Armani.

A film production involves collaboration between dozens of creative groups and getting all the individual pieces to fit together is similar to managing a business. Crowdfunding is changing the production landscape and the movie industry is currently experiencing a real game changer

Ted Hope, advocate of America’s Independent Cinema Movement and Executive Director of the San Francisco Film Society, provides deeper insight into the current state of the film industry in his blog post “Why I Left New York for the San Francisco Film Festival.”

He said, “Our entertainment economy and the art it supports, was built upon the concepts of scarcity and control, but today’s reality is one of super-abundance and access – the exact opposite. To survive and flourish, today’s artists/entrepreneurs–and those who support them–must all embrace practices that extend beyond the core skills of development, production, and post-production of their art and reach beyond the attention and practice of marketing and distribution.” The meaning behind Hope’s words echoes the exact spirit and foundation that is the core of Silicon Valley’s passion for entrepreneurship and reflects the same spirit represented by the film festival.

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Celebrity Face Recognition iPhone App Now Available for TV Viewers via IndieGoGo Crowdfunding Campaign

By Robert Hoskins, Crowdfunding Press Center

Technology startup Skakash LLC announced today the launch of its face recognition iPhone app that allows users to recognize actors and celebrities while watching TV, simply by pointing the iPhone’s camera at the screen. Skakash, the “Shazam for celebrities” app, debuts in a crowdfunding campaign on the leading Indiegogo.com platform.

Bring face recognition technology from the security arena to the entertainment playground

“We brought face recognition technology from the security arena to the entertainment playground,” said Skakash’s founder and CEO Moshe Greenshpan. “We’ve identified a great need among American TV viewers to get an instant answer to the most common question – what’s this actor’s name?” Greenshpan added.

Skakash’s matching process quickly displays the celebrity’s name and biography, allowing the user to focus on the show rather than being distracted while searching for more info on Google or IMDB.

Saving the user the trouble of manually chasing the right frame, the face recognition app automatically captures the celebrity’s face from the screen.

The Skakash app is offered as a part of the company’s crowdfunding campaign. “In addition to the obvious reason of raising R&D funds, Indiegogo is a great starting point to build a community of fans and users from scratch,” explained the founder of the self financed company.

With second screen technology on the rise, Skakash has the potential to become a widely used second screen app that interacts with its users, adds value and enhances the TV viewing experience overall. A recent Nielson survey showed that 41% of smartphone and tablet owners using their devices while watching TV every day.