Does a Producer Have to Option Material Again if There Is a Remake
The most exciting and hardest part about the content business is that it's an industry that is primarily rooted in creative ideas. We aren't selling widgets, regime backed bonds or anything that can exist measured by a P/Fifty. Equally nosotros discussed in the last blog, this makes financing difficult and risky. So how can we take our original ideas and make them feel more tangible? We tin can exercise so by backing them up with already existing intellectual property. David Kaufmann goes fifty-fifty deeper in his book, The Producer's Brain. Get it on Amazon now. One of my favorite commercials ever, from the brilliant Beth Comstock at GE, is well-nigh a very ugly looking monster called an "Idea" being shunned from the world. Information technology'due south just after the proper care that people begin to encounter its dazzler. Y'all can watch the spot here: People are often turned off past ideas that seem different, especially when they are coming from unknown sources. It's much easier to sell high-level artistic pitches when you are already viewed as an expert. I learned early on in my career as a producer that if I wanted to be taken seriously, I needed something more than my own original thoughts. Luckily, I had spent most a decade deep in the intellectual property licensing business at Major League Baseball. I could write a whole other web log about career-change and identifying transferrable skills, but generally, think about skills that you already possess and how they can elevate you towards your goals. You take to be a hunter. For most of us, the content that we'll be able to acquire is going to exist establish on a road less traveled. As much as you might dear the new Dan Brown volume it'due south probably not realistic to think that you are going to win a bidding state of war against the major players in boondocks to learn those rights. That being the instance, nosotros need to take a Moneyball (a film about and honey to my heart) mode approach when thinking virtually IP. As quoted from the motion-picture show: "There are rich teams and in that location are poor teams. Then there is 50 feet of crap and then at that place's us. Information technology'due south an unfair game." As Billy did with the 2002 Athletics, we've got to look for opportunities in the places that no one else is searching. There are a lot of strategies as to how to go nigh this, merely generally, mining for older titles or articles that have been disregarded or forgotten is the best place to start. Another strategy is to recollect of a great artistic idea for a script and so expect for a piece of IP that you tin back into it. Say you lot are obsessed with the world of professional person bull riding…well, there'south likely been a dandy feature commodity or biography written. Go observe it! You've got to research the author or publisher and hunt them down. You'll probable have a lot of fake starts when you set out down this path. The textile that you seek might take already been optioned. The author might not have involvement in working on a moving picture projection or the rights might be complex and split amongst many parties. Yous besides might not be able to find the rights holder. Pinning down an IP owner takes a lot of hustle and a piddling flake of serendipity, but if you love the piece of work that they've done, yous'll find a way. Which brings me to my next point… You wouldn't like it if a producer optioned your script and and then did absolutely nothing with it. It's non fair to you or your work. Have a real plan for how you lot'd similar to arrange the cloth before you reach out and be serious about executing it. In this business it's impossible to know where a given project will go, so commit to promising what you can control: Maximum Endeavor. If, in your heart, you aren't willing to hope this, keep looking. You need to memorialize your understanding with a contract. I know contracts can be scary just they are just English, same as a script. Yous can either do an option understanding where y'all formally take command of the material, normally with money involved, or a shopping understanding, a looser understanding that allows you exclusivity for a catamenia of fourth dimension while y'all effort to hustle your project to reality. I normally opt for shopping agreements because they are fast and unproblematic and allow you to get to work right away with a basic understanding. At that place are many templates bachelor that y'all can download and piece of work with on your own, or you lot can hire a lawyer to assistance you out. Legal piece of work is a bit expensive merely may be worth information technology (at least initially) to develop a personal agreement that you are comfortable with. In the cease, all the contract represents is a written understanding of what you've agreed to on the phone or in person, and then try to keep things as uncomplicated as possible. A contract is only worth every bit much as the personal trust you place in your partners and they place in you lot, so be the type of partner you'd like to have for yourself…difficult working, honest and kind. Finding and acquiring rights takes a lot of legwork, but when you take your IP based idea out into the world, it'll announced a little less scary and yous'll be well on your way to making something beautiful. Adjacent time, we'll explore how to think about budget and genre selection before you start writing. For all the latest ScreenCraft news and updates, follow united states of america on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. 
And then how exercise you become about finding intellectual holding?
So you've found something that you lot love, at present what?
If you are going to ask for someone else'southward IP y'all need to be committed to doing the work.
I've found material and talked with the author. We definitely want to work together, at present what?
Where do I find ane of these agreements?
David Kaufmann is an independent motion picture and television producer living in Los Angeles. He began his career every bit an NBC Folio at Saturday Nighttime Alive . He spent over nine years handling motion picture and tv set licensing and development at Major League Baseball where he helped create critically acclaimed films like Moneyball and 42 . He has an undergraduate caste in Journalism from the Academy of Richmond and holds an MBA from NYU Stern with a focus on the media business concern and creative producing. He is an agile member of the Producers Guild of America. For more than on David, please visit his IMDB or LinkedIn.
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Does a Producer Have to Option Material Again if There Is a Remake
Source: https://screencraft.org/blog/from-producers-perspective-how-to-find-and-acquire-intellectual-property/