Off Shore Service Deals

When deciding to send some of your post production work offshore one should really look at the value v control and see if this scenario fits for you. My example is an 8ooK low budget thriller starring really no one but has some value already as there has been a commitment from a broadcaster for pay and free TV rights. From this I was able to secure 220K of my budget putting me in a good position to shoot the film in Canada in a new tax zone and get about 32% of the overall budget in Tax Credit rebates that I can also interim finance at about 85% LTV. That puts me at about 400K. 

The interesting part is that I was approached by a VFX company in India that does great work and they are interested in partnering on the film with us. I looked at my VFX budget and found that 300K is based in VFX if it were to be shot here and posted here in Canada. The budget I received from them was considerably lower and I was unsure if I wanted a partner in the film. 

Then I did some research on the market in India for this film and it was basically 10-12K for all rights for India if I were to sell it traditionally. So I called them back and made them a deal that they could have all of India, Pakistan, and few other small territories for them doing the VFX to a level of production value we all agreed upon. 

That got me thinking more about certain places that I don't really like selling to (or trying to monitor pay schedules) and thought.... what if the music was done in Bulgaria or Ukraine, and what if the Foley was done in Columbia? Am i really going to miss those territories? 

Stay tuned as I explore the piece mealing of entire film for rights.