DSBtheMovie: Crowdsourced film created quickly and with zero budget

While in Amsterdam where I keynoted the Marketing Pioneers event, I met Jan Willem Alphenaar, Producer and Director of DSB the Movie.

The film tells the story of the Netherland's DSB Bank NV which was declared bankrupt by court in October, 2009.

Amazingly, Jan crowdsourced everything for the film including the film's logo, producer, scriptwriters, soundtrack, editor, camera, actors, and publicity. The film will be completed in just four months and with zero budget.

Here is my interview with Jan which includes the film's trailer at 0:55.

Direct link to my video here.

Direct link to the film trailer here.

Jan tells us that no money changed hands in producing the film! People wanted to be a part of the project and to get a credit in the movie.

He put out the call on social networking sites including Twitter, LinkedIn, and Hyves. Then the media picked up on it from the social networking and the project scored a front page story in the largest newspaper in the Netherlands which then generated even more media coverage and social networking interest.

When Jan put out the call for logos, he had 42 submissions to choose from!

Just think about the normal way to do a film. It takes more than a year and a large budget. Jan did his film in just a few months and at no cost.

I agree with Jan that crowdsourcing has huge potential for marketing projects. (I’ll share another example in a few days.)

“Your audience is willing to help you,” Jan says. “They don’t need money, they just want credit.”

Here is some great information (in English) on how Jan created the film.

Crowd Sourcing And Humanistic Psychology

View more presentations from JW Alphenaar | Power PR.

Thank you to Remco Janssen for introducing me to Jan Willem Alphenaar.

Note: When I asked Jan if he had an English language site for the film, he responded to me via Twitter to say that he had crowdsourced a translator and an English language site will be up in a few days! (How fast is your site creation effort?)

Comments

[Greg Digneo]

I think this video provides a new way for businesses to look at the production of any product or service.

If crowdsourcing can be used to create a movie, how about software development? Or PR? Or what about social issues such as Health Care or Global Warming?

This was a really cool video. Thanks for sharing, David.

[Asatiani]

I always have one big question when it comes to crowd-sourcing. How good is crowd-sourcing when it comes to long run, sustainable projects with sustainable results?

On the movie or campaign level it is great. But how about something bigger (e.g. global warming, poverty that are frequently mentioned with it)? Or even some long lasting campaign?

Now, most of the people will say look at opensource software! Linux! 20 years, competitive products, great OS. Yeah. But did you now that 75% of Linux kernel for instance, is written by the programmers who are getting paid for it? Just like programmers at Microsoft or Apple.

I do not mean that crowdsourcing is not great. I just think that it is not as great as many think...

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks Greg.

Asatiani - I would say it really depends on what kind of big project we're talking about. When I was a kid growing up in the USA east coast there was garbage everywhere. Now do to recycling and an awareness of the environment, most people seem to care about how they dispose of trash. Cities and the countryside are much cleaner.

[Monica Hamburg]

While I have my concerns with Crowdsourcing - i.e. it can become problematic especially with regard to low-no payment expectations (I addressed this in following blog post: http://monicahamburg.wordpress.com/2008/02/25/please-sir-can-i-have-another/ ) - in cases like this, it's nice to have people on the project who are all equally interested and passionate. And it's always refreshing to see films with price tags that aren't in the millions or billions (although $0 seems a bit astounding).

As you might know, there are a few indie filmmakers exploring the possibility of crowdsourced content including LostZombies.com
(Interesting podcast interview here:
http://workbookproject.com/2008/06/tcibr-podcast-lost-zombies-skot-leach/ ) In some ways, this "community filmaking" is very exciting.

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks Monica - some good examples.

[Laurent J. Masson]

I had always thought crowdsourcing was for children with a terrible illness, that their parents cannot afford to cure with the right treatment.

So I'm discovering it can also work to make a movie, but I wonder if there was some kind of written contract between Jan Willem Alphenaar and all the people who helped him. The thing that matters, was that there was no money involved. People only gave their time. It would have been much more difficult if he had requested money. From a legal point of view, but also because people would expect a return.

So besides charity, I see crowdsourcing limited to projects that can be realized with... Free time. Virtual projets...

[Nollywood]

great news!
zero budget for a film?
can we see sample of the video?
thanks

[Rick]

I wonder if there was some kind of written contract between Jan Willem Alphenaar and all the people who helped him. http://www.filepasswords.com

[autoboy]

Don't know what is wrong what is rite but i know that every one has there own point of view and same goes to this one..