This week marks the 50th issue of Plumb News.

That feels like a good moment to stop and say thank you. To everyone who has read, shared, replied, or passed an issue along, we’re grateful you’ve been part of it.

When we started this newsletter, we wanted to create a place that took genre seriously and gave independent filmmakers more room to be seen. Not just after a film was finished, but throughout the process of getting good work made and finding the people willing to support it.

All while seeking Plumb, the question of Truth, in entertainment.

Fifty issues later, that still feels like the point.

A good story matters. So does helping someone else see what it could become.

For filmmakers, that often starts before there’s a finished movie. It might be a scene, a poster, a complete scene, or even a concept trailer. Something that gives the idea a little shape and makes the larger vision easier to see.

That’s what we’re looking at this week: the different ways filmmakers can build interest around a project before committing the time, money, and years it may take to make the full version.

It feels like a fitting theme for issue number 50. Plumb has always been about helping good stories find the support they need. Sometimes that starts by giving someone a glimpse of what the finished thing could become.

The Axiom Chronicles is a faith-forward animated sci-fi about a teenage hero fighting to free his people from robotic rule. Before the full series moved ahead, the team created an 11-minute Angel Studios Torch, essentially a proof of concept designed to show the world, tone, and action of the larger project. The response helped it move forward as an Angel Original. In this case, the pitch wasn’t just the idea. It was illustrating what the finished could series actually look like.

WHERE TO WATCH →

Daniel and the Fiery Furnace brings the biblical story of Daniel and his friends to the big screen. Filmmakers Daniel and Matthew Kooman took a different route to proving there was interest: their Wefunder campaigns raised nearly $2 million from more than 1,100 investors, with an earlier round helping fund principal photography. Now the finished film has secured distribution and opens in theaters September 18. It’s a strong example of audience support becoming proof that a project has somewhere to go.

WHERE TO WATCH →

Ian’s note: If you’re local to The Memphis Film Scene, on Monday, September 14 at 7pm, join On Location: MEMPHIS and Memphis Movie Production for the Red Carpet Screening of the “5th Step” Series. This feature-length presentation completes the journey of the 2004 first episode, about a recovering alcoholic who works through his twelve-step program and must deal with his 5th step and face the complex family dynamics that challenge his recovery.

WHERE TO WATCH →

For filmmakers trying to get a project off the ground, a screenplay can ask a lot of the person reading it. They have to imagine the performances, the world, and what it all might look like once the cameras start rolling.

A proof of concept gives them a little less to imagine.

That can mean shooting a scene or making a short, but it doesn’t have to. Filmmakers have used sizzle reels, concept trailers, look books, posters, and even footage borrowed from other films to communicate what they have in mind. The point is to make enough of the vision tangible that someone else can respond to it.

There are plenty of examples. Before District 9, Neill Blomkamp made the six-minute short Alive in Joburg, which established the core idea and much of the world he would later expand into the feature. Kerry Conran took another route with Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, spending four years at home building a six-minute presentation reel that eventually caught producer Jon Avnet’s attention and helped get the movie moving.

Brooks Elms, a screenwriter and longtime writing coach, thinks filmmakers should consider doing this kind of work even earlier.

He calls his approach “Lightspeed-to-Market.” Instead of moving from an idea to a finished screenplay and only then finding out whether anyone is interested, the sequence looks more like this: treatment, trailer, market.

For Brooks, the trailer isn’t just another piece of pitch material. It’s a way to test demand while the project is still relatively inexpensive to change. Put the idea in front of an audience and look for signs that the interest goes beyond views or likes.

That could mean building an email list, finding potential buyers, or giving a financier stronger evidence that an audience may already be forming around the idea. Brooks has collected examples of concept trailers built around that thinking.

Ian’s note: I look forward to Brooks helping me bring my concept trailer to the next level. Here’s a ripped-footage sizzle reel for Prey for Mason that got 50K views.

Of course, not every worthwhile story will reveal itself through an early market test. Some films need time to find their audience, and numbers alone can’t tell you whether a story deserves to exist.

But for an independent filmmaker preparing to put years of work and real money behind an idea, it may be worth finding out what connects while the project is still small enough to change.

A proof of concept isn’t the movie. Sometimes it’s simply the first evidence that the movie might actually have somewhere to go.

_{*This week’s “Spotlight” is part of a collaborative exchange between Plumb News and Brooks Elms. No compensation was exchanged. We just thought his perspective was worth sharing with the Plumb community.}

The results are in! 44% of you voted for “Toy Story 5” in last week’s poll: Which summer blockbusters did you see this year?

A proof of concept only helps if you know what you’re trying to learn from it.

Before cutting the trailer, building the look book, or shooting the scene, decide what question you want the material to answer. Does the premise make sense? Does the tone come through? Does anyone want to see more? Can this help open a conversation with a producer, investor, or potential audience?

That’s the thinking behind this week’s P.R.O.V.E. Method™:

The takeaway is to know what you want the proof to prove. If it gives you a clearer read on the audience, the pitch, or the project itself, it has already done useful work.

“Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it.” – Habakkuk 2:2 (ESV)

A vision can feel perfectly clear when it lives in your own head. The harder part is making it clear enough for someone else to see it too.

That’s what makes this verse feel especially fitting this week. Habakkuk is told not just to hold onto the vision, but to write it down and make it plain. Give it shape. Make it understandable. Make it something another person can carry forward.

Filmmakers face a similar challenge. A screenplay or treatment may contain the whole world of a story, but the people needed to help bring it to life still have to see what you see. Sometimes a trailer, a look book, a single scene, or another proof of concept can help close that gap.

The point is not to shrink the vision. It is to make it clear enough that others can recognize what it could become.

Sometimes the next step begins when the vision becomes visible.

Until next time,

THE PLUMB NEWS TEAM