Reading time: 3 – 4 minutes

Okay, so the title is slightly misleading, considering this post is about bringing the Ilm Summit documentary to film festivals and there aren’t any tier 1 film festivals in Hollywood that I know of. However, there is a tier 2 film festival in LA!

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WHAT’S GONNA HAPPEN NOW?

Imagine the names Sundance, SXSW, Cannes,  Toronto, Tribeca, or Berlin. Now that would be exciting.

Considering that I practically shot and edited a feature film because of Ilm Summit, I found myself asking,  “What’s keeping me from going all the way with this?”

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A question regularly being asked of the people who attended Ilm Summit was, “What will you bring back to your community?”

I believe the above question is at the core of the AlMaghrib business strategy.

After the tawfeeq of Allah it’s the internalization of this question combined with the systemization of its operations that has led AlMaghrib to grow at the exponential rate that it has.

I honestly believe an organization, company or brand becomes socially successful only when it becomes selfless. Making it’s existence for the betterment of community. Giving to the people before asking for their hand.

I believe what needs to be recognized by people who attend these seminars and are active participants is that initially people don’t care about the company, organization or brand.

Whether it be AlMaghrib, Bayyinah, etc, they initally only care about the potential benefit that can be brought to themselves and their community as a result of them being there.

Only after a relationship has been established will people become loyal.

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WHAT’S THAT GOT TO DO WITH FILM FESTIVALS?

In order for an organization or brand to be successful they must build solid relationships with their market.

One of the quickest ways to build a relationship with people is through stories and characters that pull your emotions. That’s why producing films with those elements can be a major asset to an organization’s marketing strategy.

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Imagine seeing the front page of your local entertainment section covering the screening of this Ilm Summit documentary.

The purpose of putting a film into the festival circuit is to give it exposure and to build its pedigree by getting as many media outlets that are covering the festivals to also do a story on the film.

One of my objectives is to recut the episodes and put them together to make a “feature film version” of the Ilm Summit 2009 experience.

It should be fun submitting this to film festivals and exposing AlMaghrib to an audience that would never have heard of it otherwise.

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How many more new people would be exposed to the dawah?

Think of people attending the film festivals, people in the documentary ending up on IMDB, as well the possibility of getting a distributor to buy the film and air it on television.

I ask again, How many more new people could be exposed to the dawah that would never have otherwise been exposed.

None of us are responsible for the outcome. Just sincere work. The rest is up to Allah.

Comments and criticisms are welcome

Reading time: 5 – 8 minutes

I’m currently spending the weekend in Los Angeles attending Stacy Park’s Going Global Bootcamp hosted by Film Specific. Yesterday was my first day and was quite productive in the subject matters that were covered and what I’ve got to do.

It’s been a while since there has been an update on the progress of this documentary that I started a couple years ago. Currently the status of the film is that its on pause in the middle of post-production.

Updates I’ve Made Since:

If you go to the Tufaan website, you’ll notice there is a space to enter your name and email address to keep abreast on on the project itself.

Issues I’m Dealing With Currently:

I have release forms from some, and not from others who were in the film.

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A movie that does not have release form filled out by the people that are in it, then no distributor will want to touch it. Its a liability on sales agent and on the distributor as well as the company that is producing the film.

My only real course of action is to go back, trace my steps and get the release forms from the individuals who were on screen and interviewed. Anyone who does not sign the release, simply will have to be cut from the film.

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I’m not clear on what channels of distribution would be best suited for this film. Should I aim to distribute it online – fee or free? Via community screenings throughout North America? Sell it on DVD? Would the lack of release forms for all the people limit me from where I can distribute it?

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This is something that can be resolved with doing a 3×10 idea generation campaign. I’ll start this Monday night.

Some of the things that were suggested to me was to hit up “Muslim advocacy groups” to sponsor/support the film as a means of using it to educate people on Islam and Musims. The words that one of the producers gave me was “The movie website can be the premiere resource for Islam and Muslims”

Question is, who are the “Muslim advocacy groups” that we can know of. Some that come to mind are:

• CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations)
• IRW (Islamic Releif Worldwide)

What are some others that come to mind?

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This film in a way is a “side” project. To make this film I’m spending out of the company’s pocket while the client projects Leechon services is putting money into the company’s pocket. Its only natural that time and priority be given to that which generates revenue than to that which doesn’t.

In the mastermind session that took place yesterday, I simply need to find an editor to complete this film, and in all honesty will probably be on deffered pay – considering that it’s not in the budget currently. If an editor isn’t brought on board, then in all truth, I don’t see this film completing anytime soon.

Ideally, I’d probably be looking toward assistant editors who want to put their name as a credit on a project so that they may move up the ladder in their career. Some places that were recommended to me to seek out editors are as follows:

• ShootingPeople.com
• Mandy.com
• FinalCutUser.com
• FlashPointAcademy.com
• Local Film Schools

I have a choice of either experienced editors or un-experienced editors. As you can guess, experienced editors can cost anywhere between $1,500 – $2,500 a week which in truth isn’t in the budget, but perhaps the funds can be raised to have it be taken care.

One of the points that was made clear to me was the fact that we’re currently in a recession. People are looking for work and want to work. They’ll take a job that would pay less if it gets them a job. One of the people mentioned that putting together $5,000 would be a fair amount for the current times.

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I’m not clear what the final product of Tufaan would ultimately be.

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To start off, I need to get the releases down solid and cut those people who I cannot get a release from.

Once that’s taken care of, I’ll need to get my clutter organized as well. The footage isn’t all well organized to the point were another editor can come in and take off without much delay.

From that point forward, many international opportunities lay ahead. There are many TV opportunities that can be approached as well. Internationally, TV stations love multi-part series. On top of that, there are also many Muslim centered starving TV channels that can use the content as well.

Ultimately the goals of this film are:

• To establish my name as a producer within the North American Muslim community
• Get my name out on IMDB
• Build a database of 20,000 email addresses.
• Recoup my costs of making the film – Currently it’s $5,000.

A few questions that still remain unanswered for me – and will remain unanswered until the release forms are done are:

• What’s the likelihood this film getting into any of the Tier-One film festivals?
• What sort of cost am I looking at when it comes to running the festival circuit?
• Which festivals should I be aiming for on the different tiers.

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It’ll be great to get your feedback and thoughts on this.

Reading time: 5 – 8 minutes

Last year I wrote a rough proposal for a feature length theatrical MOVIE as a means to get the creative juices flowing. If you want to read the proposal idea, see this: First Impact Movie Proposal (this proposal is simply there to get creative juices flowing)

If I’m going to make a movie, I’m aiming for producing something THEATER WORTHY. I’m talking theatrical release in domestic and international markets worldwide.

In response to the AlMaghrib Movie thread and emails going back and forth on the back end, I figured I’d take the opportunity to drive the development of the movie and take this bull by the horns.

I created a thread which I’ll continuously be updating with possible story ideas worth looking into for further development.

• View the development thread here: AlMaghrib Movie :: Development Thread
• View the story ideas here (they’re actively being updated): AlMaghrib Movie :: Possible Story Items

Either contribute a possible story idea, and state what Marketable Aspect(s) it has (see below for details on what Marketable Aspects are) or simply expand on an a story with further details. I’ll be updating the document regularly so give your input regularly as well.

Marketable Aspects of a Story

In order to develop an AWESOME SMACK DUNKIN’ story, research needs to be done.

Stories should marketable and be of interest to people. The more aspects of the points below a story holds, the more interest and attention gravitates towards it. When sharing yours (or other’s) stories keep in mind the points below.

• :: Timeliness :: A story that really doesn’t get old/irrelevant over time.

• :: Human Interest :: Something that really appeals to people’s heart strings :: ie: Durbah starting the “visit the old folks” project a while back as a result of “Breach of Covenant” seminar and the tears of gratitute that came forth from those elder people.

• :: Prominence :: Producers usually fulfill this by featuring a known star in the movie (ie;Starring Tom Cruise). For documentaries, this is done by having someone of popular on screen (ie;Michael Moore, Leo DeCaprio) or someone with a very sticky personality (ie;Morgan Spurlock-Supersize Me). Also, featuring stories around some prominant people also helps in this area.

• :: Novelty :: Stories that really haven’t been told and are new in their nature. Michael Moore taking a serious issue of 9-11, politics and Iraq War and making it into a satire was very novel in his movie “Farenheit 9/11” No one really took that topic and presented it in such a way, and the stories presented in that movie were stories not covered by other filmmakers and/or media outlets.

• :: Weirdness :: Some stories can have such attributes to them (ie; jinn/black-magic experience of LOG and LUL students classes that can be relayed — like the taweez w/ a calling to jinn names)

• :: Conflict / Conspiracy / Controversy :: Fights always attract attention. The AlMaghrib student getting run over in Toronto seminar by crazy racist guy, the nutty sufi guy from toronto (all the conflicts are in toronto )

• :: Impact :: Gas prices going up or falling drastically, Fannie-Mae going defunct, Credit card companies going out of business — These are stories that affect a LOT of people. What specific story(s) of AlMaghrib or its students can be told that has affected a LOT of people.

• :: Proximity :: Stories can excite interest based on how they’re close to you geography. New Yorkers will give more interest to a story about 9-11 cops than people in Seattle Washington.

By the way, these elements of newsworthiness and marketability will be taught in detail in a future Message Mastery course launching March 09 inshaAllah.

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As much “hype” and excitement that goes into making a movie professionally for a theatrical audience — We need to have something REALLY developed in areas of:

• Story
• Budget plan
• Adequate Production Plan/Schedule
• Distribution Strategy

The STORY is the most important part of any production/movie/film. What’s the story(s) that we’re telling the audience that is really of any interest to the general muslim/non-muslim populous? The proposal that I had written up lacks tremendously in this area (but it helps in getting creative juices flowing).

Filming a documentary is a LOT of work. Doesn’t matter if its being made for a theatrical release or being made as something amaturish to pass around to family/friends — the work and time that goes into it is the pretty much the same. What’s different is WHERE (pre-production, production, post-production, or distribution) that time is spent.

In making a PROFESSIONAL Theater Worthy low-budget movie ($10,000,000 – $50,000), 80% of the work is in pre-production. This involves:

• Getting an idea
• Researching it for marketability and developing the story
• Outlining – Scripting
• Budgeting for producing the script
• Incoporating and funding/financing the movie
• Developing production schedule/plan
• Assembling team
• Executing plan officially moving into “Blink! Production“

For the moment we’re in the research phase and in the process of collecting story ideas that will be further looked into and developed based on the marketable aspects listed above.

Read this post again, see the thread I created on the AlMaghrib forums and the google document I made (both of which I’ll continuously be updating) and reply accordingly.

• View the development thread on AlMaghrib Forums: AlMaghrib Movie :: Development Thread
• View the story ideas here (they’re actively being updated): AlMaghrib Movie :: Possible Story Items

Reading time: 1 – 2 minutes

It’s with great excitement that I write this post. Several months back sister Shirien had given a speech at her school about Muslims, their image, and the media. I had the opportunity read her speech and suggested that it be turned into a PSA of sort, after which I formatted it into three different PSAs.

Shirien explain more about the background of the development of this PSA on her blog post titled, “Why do you wear that rag on your head?”

When one of my good friends Ahmed Eid read the formatted PSAs, and decided to make the videos. He went out filmed and editing the videos and the following was the result!

This PSA is only the first of three. There are two more to come (which haven’t been produced yet) so stay tuned

Also, I want to say a HUGE jazakallahu khairun for all people on and off screen to make this PSA happen. After the taufeeq of Allah-swt YOU made it happen. May this be on your scale of good deeds on the day of judgment. Ameen.

Reading time: 6 – 9 minutes

One of my goals is to be able to provide content in the following quality:

My first experience in producing a lecture was The Strangers, followed by Desert Rose and Darkness2Light. Although with time the standards for Islamic video content has been rising I don’t believe the standards are where they should be. The above video should be the standard for Islamic content in terms of production quality. No less.

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The next logical step toward setting that standard was the birth of IlmCast.com. AlMaghrib in their efforts to reach out to more people and deliver the knowledge further and wider than ever before started a project called “AlMaghrib Radio on Demand” where they would post a new lecture every month.

Personally I thought that the concept of extending the “free-line” in Islamic content was great but the approach wasn’t great. I proposed setting up a separate website that would act as a brand in and of itself. Sort of like how EmanRush is for AlMaghrib. The advantages being that it was web 2.0 friendly.

• Content can be syndicated to the people via RSS, iTunes, and Facebook
• There would be a sense of social community where people can post comments and feedback as well as blog about it on their own blogs.
• People can share with other people through services such as Digg, StumbleUpon, or simply email.

The initial approach didn’t give this level of usability.

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As we progressed into the third month of IlmCast, one of the things I wanted to do was to systemize the process. Initially I figured what we can do is simply have the video recorded. I can take it and encode and compress it to a specific size, after which it would be uploaded so that editors can get the footage to edit and finally out put it up for me to format it for final distribution.

I decided to test the process on IlmFest. After a couple weeks — one thing I’ve learned was, double handeling video is a BAD idea. In order to make the best of everyone’s time the work flow process from event to ilmcast will be as follows:

If there is going to be video recording of a lecture event, there should be a dedicated person responsible for this task. Their job is to make sure the video gets recorded, edited, and put online on the IlmCast server for later portion where the video is encoded for online distribution.

Development Stage:

• Dedicated individual should be in charge of video, just like how there is a person for food, hospitality, etc.
• proper equipment and should be secured: microphone, cables, camera, lights, as well as human resources for tasks such as doing the recording, lighting, editing — the event organizer should set aside a budget for this just like they would for food and other aspects of the event.
• Permission from the speaker and location should be sought out before recording takes place (usually done with release forms)

Production Stage:

• Standard should be a two camera shoot. (if they cannot find a second cam, then 1 camera can work). Camera 1 takes a medium close up (shoulders up) at a 45-degree angle, camera 2 takes a medium long-shot (thighs up) at an opposite 45-degree angle. — – Ideally it be great if 3 or 4 cameras can be brought in to get some b-roll footage. Cam 3 would be audience from behind the speaker and cam 4 would be extreme long shot from the back of the audience in the form of a tracking shot.
• Lighting should be adequate. The ideal setup for lighting is to take the wedding video approach. About 6 tungstun lights around the room on stands that position the lights 12 feet above the ground (see image below), giving a 3-point look on anyone in the room.

• If they don’t have that option then getting simple lights that light up the speaker from the sides can work. — – If the organizers and producer is on a shoe-string budget, then make the best of in house lighting as they can, like using lamps, mirrors, sunlight, etc.
• Audio needs to be fed directly into a Camera. There is no excuse for not having this.

Post Production Stage:

• Audio Cleanup – this requires adjusting the background noise levels, as well as EQ settings. If they don’t know how to do this, then simply ask! It literally takes 10 mins to clean up the audio if it was captured properly, just a matter of knowing what buttons to push.
• Color Correction – Whether it be the brightness, contrast, color balance, hue, saturation, etc. All of this should be adjusted. Purpose of this is to balance the video to give it it’s proper look, or to save it from its horrible look (which usually happens due to bad lighting). If shooting was done properly, then hardly any color correction should be needed.
• Titleing and Letterboxing — This is part of the IlmCast branding. Always opens and closes with the ilmcast title screen, and has the slight letterbox on it.
• Encoding — The final output should be encoded in WMV format at 640×355 deinterlaced, 1.5Mbps CBR (constant bit rate), 128kbps audio CBR.
• Delivery — After output, the WMV file is to be uploaded onto a server so the distribution and marketing guys can handle it.

Distribution and Marketing:

• Syndication — Once the video is on the server. The marketing and distribution guys should download it, encode for purposes of online distribution and syndication: FLV, MP4, MP3 — after which our brothers and sisters will rip it off the website and put it on youtube, post it on their blogs and forums. (which is great for producers of IlmCast lectures since it brings back links to Ilmcast website and more people hear about it and subscribe to the RSS and iTunes feed.)
• Facebooking — Major releases should have a “launch/release” date where events can be made.
• Emailing — Qabaail leaders can be encouraged to send out an email to their lists and get everyone to subscribe and stuff.
• Blogging and Reviews — bloggers and the people in the video can post it on their websites and other such places.

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Every step of the way there are lessons. It will be great to see IlmCast turned into a well oiled machine.