Scott Kirsner’s CinemaTech blog is always a great place to find out about technical innovations in the film world and now he was written a book, Fans, Friends and Followers: Building an Audience and a Creative Career in the Digital Age, that compiles interviews with artists doing great and interesting things with their work and includes lots of useful content for filmmakers in search of an audience (yes, that means you!).

In the introduction Kirsner introduces us to the New Rules:

We’ve entered into what I call the era of digital creativity. In this era, artists have the tools to make anything they can envision, inexpensively…They can build teams and collaborate across great distances, bridging divides of language and culture. They can cultivate an audience and communicate with it regularly, carrying it (or at least a segment of it) with them from one project to another. And they can take control over the transaction, whether it is selling a work of art on eBay, a book through Amazon, or a ticket to a live performance via Brown Paper Tickets.

If you are a glass-half full type, you’ve already realized that the era of digital creativity presents incredible opportunities. You can do what you love, reach an audience, and earn some money. What starts off as a small fan base can quite suddenly go global, enabling you to quit your day job and earn a solid living.

The flip side is that there has never been a noisier, more competititve time to try to make art, entertain people, and tell stories. Everyone is doing it, and so there is an incredible surplus of content in every art form.

In 2000, 973 full-length films were submitted to the Sundance Film Festival, generally considered the best platform for launching a new indie movie. By 2008, that number had risen to 3,624. (Just 121 were accepted.)

And to that I would add that most of those 121 did not receive any kind of traditional distribution offer!

Kirsner includes a list of useful strategies, things he learned while interviewing people for the book (eg. Create Opportunities for Participation, Understand the Power of the Link, Choose the Platforms You’re Going to Use). Some of these strategies may sound obvious but it’s one thing to say them and quite another to actually do them.

The interviews are divided into five sections: Film & Video, Music, Visual Arts, Writing, and Comedy & Magic. The Film & Video section includes interviews with a diverse range of people including: Sandi DuBowski, Robert Greenwald, Ze Frank, Steve Garfield, and Gregg and Evan Spiridellis (JibJab Media).

There’s also a useful reference section in the back with a bunch of great links and some supplemental reading, including links to smart people like Kevin Kelly, Lance Weiler, and Clay Shirky.

You can download a 35-page sample of Fans, Friends & Followers on Kirsner’s website and order the book there too. Or buy it from Amazon using the link below.

Scott Kirsner of CinemaTech was commissioned by ITVS to investigate how indepedent filmmakers are working with new technologies and to answer the following questions:

Opening Up Production to Participation
During pre-production and production, how are filmmakers communicating with audiences, widely dispersed teams, funders and prospective subjects in new ways? What new opportunities for involvement and participation are they exploring?

Finding New Audiences
Once a project is completed and ready for release/broadcast, how are filmmakers using blogs, social networks, games and other technologies to reach audiences that will care about their project?

New Distribution Opportunities
How are filmmakers presenting their work on websites, cell phones, iPods and the new generation of Internet-connected TVs and set-top boxes? Do these distribution avenues create conflict with more traditional outlets? Are there substantial economic benefits or simply promotional positives?

You should check out the suggested strategies for connection-creating, marketing and promotion and distribution.

Case studies include:

Byron Hurt:HIP-HOP: Beyond Beats and Rhymes
Katy Chevigny: ELECTION DAY
Curt Ellis: KING CORN
David Iverson: STILL LIFE
Hunter Weeks and Josh Caldwell: 10 MPH
Tiffany Shlain: The Tribe

Scott Kirsner has a useful post on CinemaTech entitled How To Get Your Film on iTunes (… It’s Not Easy) – which explains how you have to go via an aggregator first. Kirsner says Amazon’s CreateSpace is the best alternative option if you just want to do it yourself (films can then be sold via Amazon Unbox, a digital download service) but “you’ll have to drive customers to your work — unlike iTunes, where the customers are already buying movies in big numbers.”

I went to a roundtable discussion organized by the From Here to Awesome team at SXSW last week. Many topics were covered but one of the things I was pleased to discover is this 1,000 True Fans article by Kevin Kelly. What is really useful about this article is that Kelly is focusing on the possibilities for everyone working between “poverty and stardom” – rather than talking about the Radioheads of this world. This is the crux of it:

A creator, such as an artist, musician, photographer, craftsperson, performer, animator, designer, videomaker, or author – in other words, anyone producing works of art – needs to acquire only 1,000 True Fans to make a living.

A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for your name. They bookmark the eBay page where your out-of-print editions show up. They come to your openings. They have you sign their copies. They buy the t-shirt, and the mug, and the hat. They can’t wait till you issue your next work. They are true fans.

Scott Kirsner feels like the term “fan” is too passive and discusses alternative words that better suggest the possibilities for creativity and collaboration.