Jon Reiss Says: Do It Yourself!

Named one of “10 Digital Directors to Watch,” by Daily Variety, Jon Reiss has directed three feature films most recently Bomb It about graffiti, street art, and the battle over visual public space throughout the world. His experience releasing Bomb It with a hybrid strategy was the inspiration for writing Think Outside the Box Office: The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution in the Digital Era, the first step-by-step guide for filmmakers to distribute and market their films. Reiss will be conducting a workshop from July 31^st to August 1^st all about DIY distribution, at the San Francisco Film Society. BTB spoke with Reiss via Skype last week while he was in Melbourne, Australia.

How did you get started with DIY filmmaking?

Jon Reiss is the author of Think Outside the Box Office: The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution in the Digital Era

I guess I got started with DIY filmmaking back in the San Francisco punk rock scene. That’s how I got into film in first place. At the time, I was an Economics major at Berkeley and was a planning on getting a PhD in Economics at Stanford but somehow ended up living in a rat-infested loft in San Francisco shooting punk rock bands.

[I went] to Paris to show the videos and I thought, “Why not go to the rest of Europe?” So, I started booking tours throughout Europe and that was really my first experience with DIY distribution. It was also my first experience with creating events and using non-traditional venues — that I’ve now come to champion — which is, I believe, the future for independent films.
› Continue reading

Tags: Bomb It, digital distribution, DIY, Jon Reiss, trans-media