How One Producer Cracked the Market for Mobile Content

Frank Chindamo knows short movies – or, to be more exact, fun little movies. That’s the name of the company he founded some time ago to make comedic shorts for TV, PCs and, now, mobile devices. In the process, he’s come up with production rules that are a “how to” for creating mobile content. Even better, Fun Little Movies licenses outside content, so if you have a great idea and follow his recipe, you may find your fun little movie on his Sprint channel.
Chindamo started his career by melding film school at Columbia
University with his gig producing stand-up comedy shows in New York. He realized that he could combine the two by acting out a monologue for video. The four-minute “Jelly Donut Saga” is one comedian’s story of how he averted a mugging in the subway by smearing a jelly donut over his own face. It was Chindamo’s thesis film – but it also ended up on Showtime, A&E, Channel 4 in England and Canadian Broadcasting.
Soon Chindamo was turning out dozens of comedians’ two-to-five minute
stories, many commissioned by MTV, HBO, PBS, Comedy Central, and the
Playboy Channel. That gravy train came to a screeching halt by the end of 1999, when the networks realized that they were being deluged by free short content from film students and other filmmakers.
Undaunted, he took his productions to the Internet, where his success
culminated in a sale of 26 short films to WarnerBros.com (he says he
bought his condo in the Hollywood Hills with the check). We all know
what happened when the dot-com bubble burst, and soon Chindamo turned
to the next digital platform: Pocket PCs. That was less of a success.
“It was hysterical,” remembers Chindamo. “I was receiving robust two-figure checks that didn’t even pay the gas bill.”
Right Place, Right Time
Next came mobile. In April 2003, one of his videos was demonstrated on a cell phone at the annual confab of CTIA Wireless, an organization for the wireless telecommunications industry. The idea of mobile entertainment was still an idea ahead of its time, but the seed was planted. At a symposium organized by USC’s Mobile Media Institute, Chindamo again showed a short film, and when one attendee – Sprint – found out he had 150 more, he was immediately offered his own channel on the Sprint video network.
Fun Little Movies premiered on Sprint on December 15, 2004, and on
January 5, 2005, Chindamo launched Love Bytes, a comedic series about Internet dating with a continuous story and cast
of characters. Since then, content for the mobile marketplace has just grown. Fun Little Movies is now a top-tier channel on SmartVideo.com and was also picked up by Microsoft for the MSN Video Download online service. Chindamo says that between producing, co-producing and licensing original content, he’s putting out 350 short films a year, all of them between 30 seconds and three minutes in length.
Not So Fast, Chester
Before you rush out to create your own little 30-second blockbuster, it helps not only to know the rules of production but the likely rewards at the end of your labors. Don’t even think about going directly to Sprint or Verizon. “That would be like calling up Adelphia Cable and telling them you have a good idea for a cable show,” says Chindamo. “They’re looking for really big channels who can give them lots and lots of shows. We’re a little network, but we’ve got lots of shows and we’re getting more all the time.”
If your movie is picked up for distribution by Fun Little Movies, or
any other content aggregator, expect to share the revenues 50-50.
Though your return might be quite low -even zero – at first, Chindamo is confident that revenues will soar in the near future. “The revenue you earn in 2006 will probably be 10 times as much as you could have earned in 2005,” he says.
The following are Chindamo’s tips on how to produce a winning short for the mobile market:
  • First comes the concept. Ask yourself three questions: Is it funny? Is it a series? And will the visuals work on a screen the size of a ravioli? Forget single episodes. You need a series to gain traction and make money. You can try your luck with sports, music videos and even suspense ‘ but not if you’re planning on getting distribution through Fun Little Movies, which is all about funny. “With comedy, it can last and last,” says Chindamo. “You can show it to your friends who show it to their friends. It doesn’t have a big spike like a blockbuster but it can continue to earn little bits of money over a long time. It’s a good investment.”
  • Treat it like a spec commercial, Chindamo advises. “See if you can wrap it around a product or service or lifestyle,” he says. “The way you really make money is a link to sponsors or some service you can call with a phone number.” In other words, set your series in a toy store, and if you can sell it to Toys ‘R’ Us as a sponsor, suddenly you’re making money.
  • Can you tell each episode in two or three minutes? Chindamo thinks that comedy has an edge over other genres. “Just because you missed last week’s episode of Seinfeld doesn’t mean that you won’t understand this week’s,” he points out.
  • Production is the easy part, says Chindamo. But you can’t scrimp on production basics just because it’ll be seen on a tiny mobile screen. “MiniDV is okay,” says Chindamo. “DVCAM is much, much better, and HD is the best.” In other words, don’t shoot it with a cell phone. That’s a gimmick, not a production tool. But don’t let the lack of a professional camera prevent you from making a pilot and sending it in to Fun Little Movies, says Chindamo. “If you can jump through these hoops, please submit it to us,” he says.
  • Use primary colors. Red, green, and blue all show up dramatically on the tiny screen. “The difference between slate and charcoal won’t get picked up,” he says.
  • Go for as many close-ups as you can. “So you better damn well cast good actors,” Chindamo notes.
  • Make the scenarios interesting. Two people talking in a room is OK, but two people talking on a roller coaster is much, much better. “Avoid subtlety,” Chindamo advises.
  • Aim for comedy that’s more dependent on characters, situations and visuals than on words. There’s an awfully good reason for this: there are millions of video-enabled cell phones in Asia and Europe, and physical comedy translates much easier. “If one character wants to jump off the roof and the other one is trying to pull him back with ropes and chains, that’s a lot funnier than two people sitting in a cafà© talking about jumping off a roof,” he says. Yes, “The Jelly Donut Saga” is available on Japanese cell phones.
  • Use your location ‘ especially if you’re in New York or Los Angeles.
  • “America translates very well overseas,” says Chindamo. “So don’t just shoot in a room. Use the city because the city is a very exportable character.”
  • Graphics are great, but Chindamo isn’t very bullish on animated shorts. “At the moment, it doesn’t pay to do animation,” he says. “It’s much more expensive than doing live action. Even at a cost of under $10,000 an episode, it’ll be a long time before you realize profits.”
  • And finally, place the credits at the end of the movie ‘ and keep them very short. “The best would be, A Movie by Us,” says Chindamo, only half-joking.
Got that? It’s a brave new world in mobile content, and Chindamo also likes to point out that content that starts its life on the mobile platform doesn’t necessarily stay there. Fun Little Movies’
Gagsters started life in development as a TV show,
but got kicked off before the first episode aired. Chindamo took the show’s interstitials ‘ little pranks ‘ and with some tweaks created a show now airing on the Sprint channel. Closing the circle, cable network Oxygen loved the Sprint show and aired it. And now the show is in development for WB Kids.