Vimeo today launched its open self-distribution service, Vimeo On Demand. Available now to all Vimeo PRO members, Vimeo On Demand empowers creators to sell their works directly to their audiences and retain a 90 percent share of the revenue after transaction costs. In addition to its creator-friendly revenue share, Vimeo On Demand gives creators the flexibility and control to choose their price; select country-by-country availability; customize their page design; and offer content on Vimeo, their own website, or both.

"Vimeo is committed to empowering creators with tools to display and distribute their work in beautiful HD quality," said Vimeo CEO, Kerry Trainor. "With the addition of Vimeo On Demand, creators can now use Vimeo to control the way they earn revenue and retain a significant portion of the proceeds."

Videos purchased through Vimeo On Demand are accessible across devices, connecting creators to Vimeo's 93 million monthly viewers across desktop, mobile (Android/iOs/Windows), connected TV devices (Apple TV/Roku/Google TV/Xbox Live), and major smart TV platforms (Samsung/Panasonic/Phillips).

"What used to be a confusing and labor-intensive process is now open and simple with Vimeo On Demand," said Blake Whitman, Vice President of Creative Development. "We always strive to provide our community and visitors with the best experience possible, and this opens up a new world of viewable content and support for creators. We are proud of this first phase of Vimeo On Demand, and we're already working on another suite of creator-focused features to release in the near future."

Vimeo On Demand will launch at the SXSW Interactive + Film Festival with a screening of It's Such a Beautiful Day, the latest work by Academy Award-nominated animator and self-distribution pioneer Don Hertzfeldt. The film will screen on Tuesday, March 12, at the Vimeo Theater at SXSW from 11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m., and will be followed by a Q&A with Don Hertzfeldt and Vimeo CEO Kerry Trainor. Vimeo is thrilled to offer the newly re-mastered and expanded version of It's Such a Beautiful Day, which brings together the entire tragicomic story of a troubled man named Bill, for $2 rental or $6 sale, exclusively through Vimeo On Demand.

Via: http://vimeo.com/ondemand

Source: http://blog.vhx.tv/post/79165850109/vhx-is-open-to-the-public

When we launched VHX, we never imagined we’d get to work with creators like Kevin Spacey, Dave Grohl, Ira Glass, and Aziz Ansari.

We’ve been in private beta the last two years, helping distribute feature films, documentaries, TV shows, comedy specials, concerts, lectures and more. We’ve helped launch Camp Takota, Upstream Color, Mistaken for Strangers, the Oscar-nominated The Act of Killing, and many more. VHX now has over 300 titles available for sale, over $3M in gross transactions, and almost 500,000 customers worldwide.

VHX is now open to the public. Anyone can sign up and start selling immediately. Our internet-video-shaped doors are wide open: https://vhx.tv

We are lowering our pricing. VHX is free to sign up and use, and we charge just 10% + $0.50 per transaction (down from 15-20%). No extra charges for credit card processing or anything – that’s everything. Transparency? Transparency. If you’re an existing publisher this pricing will be effective as of March 1st.

Anything that used to be sold on DVD can be sold on VHX. Our platform works for a lot more than just film and TV. Faith, fitness, lifestyle, education…the list goes on. VHX also works for organizations both big and small: individuals, distributors, studios, networks, and more. Make a site to sell your work, distribute your project, and own the relationship with your audience. VHX is the technology platform that lets you run your own iTunes or Netflix. Your digital copies replace the old physical, anywhere in the world.

I've worked on two video projects that turned into actual, physical DVDs: A Doll's House, produced by Kyle Cassidy, and Curio's Romeo and Juliet. I taught myself Adobe Encore by designing the menus and assembling the feature and extras into an attractive DVD. Kyle did the packaging for A Doll's House, and I did the packaging for Romeo and Juliet (using his poster photo as the front cover). It was worth the work. It's one thing to put a video onto YouTube and have people post appreciative comments... but it's a great feeling to hold something that looks and feels like a professionally-made product.

But it's an expensive feeling to earn. We used Discmakers for our projects, and although their work was of excellent quality and performed at a competitive price, it costs to make DVDs. To manufacture about 300 DVDs, including a basic package, could run between $700 to $900. This is a very rough estimate, because Discmakers offers a lot of options, and the costs adjust if you decide to get a plastic case or a cardboard eco-case, or just an envelope, or whatever. The nice thing is that economies of scale kick in fast: if 300 DVDs might cost you $900, (that's $3 per), making a thousand DVDs is only two or three hundred more, so your per-unit cost drops very quickly. In some cases, even a really nice DVD package could be made at a dollar-per-unit, but you'd have to make about two thousand of them, and pay between $1500-2000. And if you're selling them at $20, that's a huge profit margin.

But this is still a problem. Because now you have boxes of DVDs to get rid of. You have to sell them, market them, set a price, and very likely, you'll have to be the schmuck paying postage and shipping and mailing them out to people. You wind up wishing for two ways of distributing your video: perhaps a service that takes the orders and manufactures the discs upon demand, or pure video-on-demand via a service like Netflix or Hulu. This is when you start to understand why the entertainment industry loves digital distribution so much... and why it's a terrific opportunity to us free-lance videographers.

I decided to test digital video marketing with my ambient video project, Wissahickon Moods. The video is a collection of shots I took in Philadelphia's Wissahickon Creek, which I edited to a rough outline of themes, and scored using music by composer Chris Zabriskie. The main reason for this was that the video was pretty much my own creation; other than Chris's music, acquired through Creative Commons licensing, the material was mine and mine alone.

I found two companies that offered made-to-order DVDs. I decided to not go that route for several reasons. One company had some terrible customer reviews. I could have tried the other company. But it occurred to me that customers might feel more secure in purchasing something from a known retailer, rather than a relatively unknown DVD company. This is not a completely rational and hard-headed market analysis, I admit: but I can always try that company in the future.

Instead, I looked into the major digital distribution channels, such as Amazon On Demand, Netflix, iTunes, Vimeo, and others. Most of these required a lot of advance work and some degree of money. Vimeo's paying service requires purchasing a membership at $200 a year, which is very cheap. On the other hand, Apple charges close to two thousand dollars for the privilege of letting them stream your video onto iPhones, and you have to have four other videos and a history of making good product. Netflix just isn't an option for an independent filmmaker without a studio distribution deal.

I found three outlets that showed immense promise, and I was able to place my film with all three for next to nothing but work. VHX and Kinonation had no up-front costs, and Amazon Createspace was extremely cheap.

VHX (http://www.vhx.com) was the first. This is a distribution company of streaming hi-def video that works with a lot of indie filmmakers: I think I heard about it because they were handling a film David Cross was working on. They seem to accept almost anything-- they're not undiscriminating, just flexible-- and they offer their materials in "packages" akin to a DVD with extra features. You upload your materials, and set up a page for your feature, and you're up and running. They take about 10% of the sale plus fifty cents, which is a small price to pay. (I should mention that, in the first month Wissahickon Moods went on sale, VHX moved six copies. That earned about sixty-nine dollars, and VHX's cut was only nine bucks.) They also recently set up a deal with Roku, so that's a bigger market to reach, and it means more customers for you.

Kinonation (http://kinonation.com/) is a different story altogether. Kinonation takes your materials, and then attempts to market it to larger distributors. Since these include Amazon On Demand, Xfinity, and Hulu, Kinonation can get your material before some very large audiences used to streaming video. There are no up-front costs, but there is a LOT of prep work. Lots of data to put into their system, like IMDb links, caption files, language data, and more, plus several differently-configured thumbnails. And your video cannot be the usual MP4s you've been uploading: Kinonation requires high-bitrate DNxHD Quicktime files, which are massive. This is because they recompile your materials for the various outlets they deal with, and having a high-quality original is a must. (My one hour video was more than sixty gig in size. But their upload interface is efficient and allows for interrupted transfers.)

Amazon Createspace (http://www.createspace.com) is how so many people are self-publishing novels, and Amazon's expanded into video distribution as well. It's a combination of streaming video and made-to-order DVD sales. You have to compile your materials onto a DVD, upload the ISO file to Createspace (or mail them a DVD), provide some designs for DVD covers and thumbnails, and you're good to go. You can market your video three ways: through Amazon, through your Createspace site, and as video-on-demand.

But there's a few things to know in advance. First of all, your video cannot be hi-def. It has to be standard-definition, 720x480, at best. Createspace accepts only single-layer DVDs. Also, the DVD itself can't have more than one video file on it. Createspace takes the DVD and extracts that video for streaming, so you can't sell a DVD that has a film and a making-of documentary. Your DVD has to be No Extras.

After you send Createspace your ISO file, you'll have to wait up to 10 days before they finish their review. At this point, you are asked to purchase a proof to review. This costs perhaps $10-12, so it's not a huge cost, and checking a proof of the disc is always recommended.

What about the money? Well, Createspace takes a much larger piece than most. Let's take Wissahickon Moods as an example. The DVD costs $15. If it's sold through Amazon directly, they take $7.80. If it's sold through my Createspace page, they take $3.30. If the film is sold or rented through Amazon Instant Video, they take 50%. I don't know how you feel about these percentages, but I figure that offering sales to Amazon's massive customer base is worth the cut. It's certainly better than not selling to them.

And if you're interested in seeing the project...

Current Availability:

Trailer, YouTube:

Trailer, Vimeo:

Hi-def Streaming via VHX: http://wissahickonmoods3.vhx.tv

DVD for sale via Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00T8N8N0O/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

DVD for sale via Createspace: http://www.createspace.com/427517

Via: http://videomind.ooyala.com/blog/rise-online-film-distribution-infographic