Cameron Van Hoy is a veteran in the entertainment industry. After a stint acting, he wrote and produced films such as Treasure of the Black Jaguar, Tooken, and Sharkproof. He really came into his own producing the hit horror comedy Tragedy Girls, which hit theaters around the world and has gone on to become a cult classic.
His debut directorial feature, Flinch, was released early this year to great acclaim and theatrical distribution before finding a digital home with the tech giants of Amazon, Apple, and Google. The film continues to accumulate a loyal following and Van Hoy has an affinity for gritty stories documenting love, family and crime in an epic and timeless way.
Cameron created the indie film called Flinch that was are released and franchised via NFTs. It’s a controversial method, but we are aiming to be trailblazers of the industry and help mitigate the controversy surrounding NFTs by releasing it with a solid foundation.
It stars Daniel Zovatto, Tilda Cobham-Hervey, Cathy Moriarty, Tom Segura, Buddy Duress, David Proval, Steven Bauer, Michael Drayer and more. It is a crime thriller that tells the story of a young hitman who lives with his mother and a girl who witnesses them commit a murder.
A dedicated audience of nearly 10,000 have an interest in ensuring the film succeeds. Those who hold these NFTs can be verified and are rewarded for doing so. After parties with the cast and crew, special Q&As with the director, early access to the script, visits to set during shooting, and red carpet premiers.
They gain exclusivity. Additionally, as a reward, 50% of the income generated from the movie will go into a shared community wallet. The NFT holders can vote on how to use these funds. They can use it to market and promote the film, create additional IP (comic books, TV shows, etc.), or whatever else they want to do with it! It gives holders “skin in the game” of the art and movies they love.
Joe Doyle (Daniel Zovatto) is a young hitman following in his father’s footsteps. Quiet and reserved, he is observant and careful, making him very good at what he does. While studying his new target, city council member Ed Terzian (Tom Segura), Doyle develops a distant crush on the councilman’s assistant, Mia (Tilda Cobham-Hervey). After she walks in on her boss’s assassination, Mia is caught by Doyle who must decide whether to let her go or to dispose of her for good.
As Doyle aims the gun at her head, Mia doesn’t flinch, bringing him to a crossroads. Unsure of what to do, Doyle brings Mia to his home where he lives with his overbearing mother Gloria (Academy Award Nominee Cathy Moriarty), and holds her hostage until he can gain some clarity.
Doyle’s boss, Lee (David Proval) and his son, James (Buddy Duress), start questioning Doyle about the missing girl, and slowly he comes to find that Mia might not be entirely who he thinks she is. This brings Doyle to make the ultimate decision: does he kill the girl who didn’t flinch?
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Cameron Van Hoy 0:00
When I came in, I quickly realized I'm not going after anyone that's in web two. I'm really going after people on web three.
Alex Ferrari 0:07
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Cameron Van Hoy 1:00
Good, how are you?
Alex Ferrari 1:01
I'm good brother. I'm good. Man. Thank you so much for coming on the show you guys reached out to me about what you guys are doing in the NFT space in the indie film space. And apparently, I have now become the podcast to go to for this stuff. Because I have been doing a lot of these NFT episodes lately. And it's just interesting, man. There's some really cool stuff that filmmakers are finally cracking the code and the technology and everyone's trying new ways of doing things and figuring things out. I mean, it's very, it's it's internet. It's the internet circa 2001. I think with the space.
Cameron Van Hoy 1:35
Yeah, I certainly is. And it's I think it's I think it's the most exciting thing to happen to independent film in a long time.
Alex Ferrari 1:44
Yeah, absolutely. Well, we need some help. That's for damn sure. Drop out there. It's rough out there for the independent filmmaker. So before we get started, man, how did you and why did you want to get into this insanity? That is the film industry?
Cameron Van Hoy 1:57
Well, movies, you know, I love the movies I I always loved storytelling and filmmaking and films and drama from I was very young. I started off as an actor at a very young age, like, you know, I grew up, I was one of those kids in theater and doing all that stuff. And then I this was in San Diego. And then I got an agent and I was on a show called Hey Arnold. And I did some movies. I was I was in this movie when I was 14, where I rob a bank and Burt Reynolds is the police negotiator and Nisha
Alex Ferrari 2:35
Cop and a half?
Cameron Van Hoy 2:37
No movie called Pups.
Alex Ferrari 2:39
Okay, okay!
Cameron Van Hoy 2:40
Movie called pups. And so like I had an introduction to Hollywood then. And then of course, I always had a video camera. I was one of those kids that grew up with a video camera. And then I moved to New York, went to the High School for Performing Arts, continued studying drama theater, really fell in love with movies. They're like World Cinema. Up until then, you know, I was in love with Rambo or Indiana Jones, or just all the great movies that we grew up with. Sure, sure, and Disney movies and all of that. And then in New York, it was at the Brooklyn Library that I started renting like all the great movies and I was going to the theater school, I'm surrounded by the culture of New York City and really dove into like World Cinema and just fell in love with the movies and was making little films with my video camera. And then I decided I was going to move to LA to make movies and so I moved to LA and I've been out here making films ever since.
Alex Ferrari 3:39
Very cool, man. Now what what made you decide to go into the NFT space with the new film Flinch? What are you doing that's unique in this in this space with NFT's?
Cameron Van Hoy 3:53
Yeah, so I guess Okay, so I made flinch pre pandemic, right, I was making it leading up to the pandemic. And then we were doing post production through the pandemic. And you know, the world really changed during that time. And then I also even before I knew anything about NFT's I knew that I wanted to own my movies. You know, I had done a film previous to this movie called tragedy girls, which did really well was in the festivals that had a great cast Josh Hutcherson Zenit Craig Robinson Zenit Alexandra Shipp, to horror comedy was received incredibly well. It's on Hulu now, you know, have a deal with Hulu. But I you know, before that I did a film that I sold to Netflix or licensed to Netflix and like it just I saw the business get tougher and tougher for independent filmmakers and the streaming deals worse and worse. And then you have these like other companies that come in licensing movies for like 10 to 15 years. It's just not the deal. Suck and so When I knew I wanted to own my films, and I just was like, There's got to be a better way. And I was familiar with filmmakers like Jim Cummings and other people who were owning their films, putting them on iTunes themselves, putting them on Amazon themselves, which seemed really great the idea and spirit of ownership, and like distributing yourself and you know, the technologies here, now we can get our films out there, you know, on our own, we don't have to sell them. But But still, the economics of that is very tough. Those streaming services, those tech platforms don't give you any data whatsoever, right. Their fees are egregious, or just I think, maybe egregious is too strong of a word, but it's not great. And then I learned about and I've been in crypto for many years, just buying Bitcoin and Aetherium and tons of other coins for many, many years. So I've always a believer in blockchain. And from early on and was very excited about I always kept my ear to the ground. And I heard about NFT's and this guy named vol. Ravi Kahn, I like to listen to his podcast sometimes. And he was talking about how the technology of NFT's is really about communities, owning projects, and through that community ownership and involvement, the value that can be created and what that really means for the future and how the future will look more like a world where projects are owned by communities developed by communities, the values are turned back to those communities. And that this is a real paradigm shift. And that was my aha moment. And I said, Wow, you can replace a movie studio with an NFT community. Right? Because when I first heard about NFT's, of course, I'm thinking through the framework as a filmmaker. But you know, my first gut reaction was like, well, the movie can be an NF T. That doesn't work, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yet, yet. Sure. Yeah. But I was more excited about the idea of community. And so I looked at flinch. And I said, Okay, well, I'm releasing this film. And I want to do it as a franchise to crime film, and I wanted to do it as a three part crime franchise. So I said, You know what, I'm gonna release it to an NFT community, I will take the film, I will release it to an NFT community. And then when the mentors complete, we go and make part two, and then hopefully repeat. And that was the initial like thought, it's like, okay, I could build a franchise with a community via NFT's. And then when I started really getting into it, and learning about the space and seeing what was happening in the film, NFT space and just the empty space in general, it started really taking shape. And it's incredibly well.
Alex Ferrari 7:33
So our it's so explicit. So if anybody and by the way, anyone listening who doesn't understand what blockchain or an NFT's are, there's multiple episodes on the show that you can go back to and just do a search. Because I don't want to just every episode explain what it is, in every episode explain blockchain, which is difficult to understand for, for a lot of people. So it's, you got to wrap your head around it. You know, I've, I've done a tremendous amount of research on in blockchain and NFT's I've, I've sold a few of my own ft. NFT's. And it's really an interesting space. But again, it's just very much like circa 2001. Internet, like people are just like, what's a web page? How is the web page working? Like, how can I get how can I get paid to do this? There's so many different technologies that are just starting to try to get ironed out. And there there is literal. I mean, we're in we're in dialogue. Right now, in the scope of technology, like we're in dialogue, we're at a really fast mode, and but we're still not a DSLR a DSL or, or cable or ether, you know, like none of that. So what our internet is our versus the internet analogy versus where we are with NFT's and blockchain, there's still like, really, there is a block in the technology to get it to where we all know it's going to go in 10 years, but it's getting there. It's even in the last three years. It's, I mean, NBC just did a five part series on blockchain and crypto, you know, so it's, it's becoming a more, it's becoming much more in the zeitgeist. So you decided to build a community around a movie? How did you find as the original movie?
Cameron Van Hoy 9:14
I find is that the way that I financed any of my other films with private equity? And some yeah, I've done things that tax credits foreign sales, this particular one I did with private equity investors that I'd worked with on my previous films.
Alex Ferrari 9:28
And then And then while you were in post is when you decided, hey, I'm gonna, I think we're going to try to do this NFT thing. So are you are you, how you distributing this film?
Cameron Van Hoy 9:37
So part one exists as like a utility for this project and for the community. So I've put it on iTunes, I've put it on Amazon. I've also built my own decentralized cinema for this project, which works on Polygon even though the NFT's will be on the Etherium network. So anyone who is in the web three ecosystem and has a smart wall All of our crypto wallet, they can connect to our site, send over to Matic tokens and have access to watch the film there. And also by doing that you are on our whitelist in order to mint or NFT's. So I have like a web three way to watch the film. And then I've put it out domestically via web two platforms like Amazon, iTunes and places like this.
Alex Ferrari 10:21
So what so everybody understands what web three is. Web three is basically the NFT crypto blockchain space. Right? Yeah, I say that. I'm just saying, Yeah, because people I get you, I understand where you're at, but like a lot of people listen to like, what are they? Are they talking another language? Because if we, if we just start going straight geek, we can go hard, and then everyone's gonna just turn off because they're not gonna understand what the hell's going on.
Cameron Van Hoy 10:46
There are it's very interesting. So what I'm finding in the spaces, yeah, there is a whole culture and economy and community in web three, right? There are people with smart wallets, crypto wallets, and Aetherium and blockchains and NFT's and they are operating and they're buying NFT's. They're getting involved in projects, the ecosystem really exists around Twitter and discord, your people are finding out about product projects on Twitter. And then they are joining those projects discords getting on whitelist, which is access to buy the NFT's early on oftentimes for a cheaper price. It's like that, you know, going public moment for a project. And they're, they're, you know, changing their profile pictures, they're building together, they're participating in games together. One thing that we've been able to do, since we have Part One complete as we do movie nights for other NFT communities, because this ecosystem, we're talking about this economy, whatever you want to call it, it's very, like you said, it's closed off, it's hard to get into, you have to take the time to understand the wallet, set up the wallet the right way, get some eath in your wallet and start buying and trading. And then you start realizing the community aspect and how these communities rally together build value by hyping up other projects, so their own projects, and then in turn, you know, their price of their NFT's are rising, and people are playing that game by buying multiple energy, right? So there's a lot of people in that world already. I shouldn't say a lot. It's probably a drop in the bucket. But it's a thing. It's a world. And so, you know, people are building games and Metaverse is in film franchises like what we're doing and clothing brands. And there's insane amounts of value being built around these things. Of course, I think the larger goal is that these things that communities build, eventually are utilized, explored, understood or purchased by the general public, right? But but within this community they're building and so when I came in, I quickly realized I'm not going after anyone that's in web two, I'm really going after people in web three, you know, so it's like, I'm going to a bunch of NFT de gens or tech forward thinking people and saying, Hey, let's build a franchise together. You know, and this is part one, you can watch it. And if you like it, you can be a part of building out this larger franchise. So yeah, that's how I've kind of approached it.
Alex Ferrari 13:07
Do they have part ownership if they buy the NFT?
Cameron Van Hoy 13:10
So the way that it works is they get governance access and value, right? So obviously, anyone who has the NFT owns their NFT. Right? That NFT's on by that are NFT's are generative characters that exist in part one, two and three of the franchise, right that generative. They're criminals, crooked cops, Femme Fatale, we are crime franchises. And so if you hold if you own those entities, you own the IP rights to that character. What we're doing is the franchise the larger ecosystem is allowed to use any of these characters at any time within the films that we're making the games and then any other ancillary that we derive from it. But you as the holder of the NFT also have the IP rights over that character. So you can go make a spin off about that character if you want. Oh, really? Yeah, you can make a YouTube podcast channel where you're interviewing people in Avatar of that character, you can make your own Instagram account around that character and speak and post in the voice of that character. You can do anything you want. The only thing we ask for is like Movie Studio is a first right of refusal with a first look deal with anyone models and NFT. So if you've developed your specific character to a point where you feel there's an audience and a story and lore, you want to go develop it, you come to us first and see if the community wants to use its community funds within the wallet to finance whatever project you're doing with your character. So that's kind of the ecosystem around the NFT's and then there's the central franchise that the project makes. So we already have Part One complete we're going to go into part two we do that with the community. They're involved in the creative process they have access to control the creative meetings, these things are token games you have to hold an NFT in order to get in right so witness watch partake in the discord like I'm there all the time communicating with everyone and there was a real team, it's building and people are coming up with lore and ideas and all sorts of stuff happening. We have like location channels where people drop Location images and ideas and car images and soundtrack, concepts inspirations. So it's really like creating communal creativity. And then a percentage of whatever comes back from these films, the value from their exploitation goes back to a community wallet, that the community governance, so it's the return of value back to the community. And the community can decide if they want to save by the floor price of the NFTs, which is subsequently just boosting their profits like returning it right to themselves almost like a buyback in a way. Or they can put it towards more marketing to get the word out there about the project in a larger way. Let's say we've made part two and we watch an early cut of it and decide that we want more action, well, we can decide to go back in and do some pickup days with that community wall. Right. So that's, that's how the ecosystem works. And then the goal is to make a native token, so that within this franchise ecosystem, we're just you know, X movie, we license Part One and Two to Netflix, say, in a year, Netflix wants to get on the web three thing, they license these two films from us put them on the front page, and it's just throwing numbers out, it's a million dollar deal. They're excited about web three. Well, a percentage of that million will just come right back into the ecosystem going wallets and if we have a native token can just be exchanged for that token and air dropped into everyone's wallets. Same with what three exploitation, right? Like if the film continues playing, or we are able to build out like a play to earn game and there's, there's some form of cash flow from that those native tokens can just automatically no one has to do anything, because of smart contracts in the blockchain, just drop into everyone's wallets. So the goal is that you create this ecosystem and like a real, real value, ultimately, so that's
Alex Ferrari 16:50
So then, so then, if I if I can translate, you're building a community of like minded people who are interested in this franchise, they're, they're buying the NFT's by buying the NFT's, they are not part of this community, that's their entry point to the community. There are smart contracts that state everything, you just said that, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all that stuff. So then if, let's say, you get a million dollars from Netflix, great. A percentage of that, I think, is I think I read somewhere 50 50%. Like goes. So if it's $500,000 goes straight into the community wallet for everybody to kind of govern. And then 500 goes to the you guys that set this whole thing up, which is fine. actually convert more than fair. So then, let's say there's a video game spin off, that video games spin off as bought by by Blizzard for $20 million, 10 million goes to you 10 million goes into the community wallet. And then we start building out what and then everything else other ancillaries other exploitations of the movie, whatever they might be, when that money comes in. It goes in splits 5050 goes into the into the community, and then you start building from there. So you it is in the best interest of the community hold the token holder or the excuse me, the NFT holder to promote the living hell out of this to try to get the word out because the more people buy, they have more control of what's happening with the project. But they don't get a percentage. They're not part owners of it. They're part owners of the community. In other words, is that that's that's the that's how you guys putting it together? Yes. It's a very interesting concept. How many? How many NFT's do you have for this film franchise?
Cameron Van Hoy 18:36
Doing 9999 Yeah,
Alex Ferrari 18:41
Okay. Are they all mented already?
Cameron Van Hoy 18:44
No, we haven't done anything.
Alex Ferrari 18:46
Oh, you haven't ment that anything? Yeah. So you're slowly going to be
Cameron Van Hoy 18:48
You just been building our community. So like, obviously, in this space, it's very important to build your community first, it's very hard to just drop something and have it mapped out because you don't have any awareness at first. And the other incredible thing that I've learned about the space is that you're able to build communities of people that want to get in on these whitelists, as they call them, we call ours a hit list, because it's about a hitman, obviously. And so there's real value in getting in early. And so you start getting all of these people that are doing exactly what you're saying. And they don't even hold the NF T's yet. But they're building and passionate about building and supporting and promoting and marketing because having that early access means you're gonna get a lower mid price, right, you're gonna be one of the early adopters. And so we've been able to build out a really large, powerful community like we are one of the leading films in the NFT film space at this point. And, and I think that's because of you know, I don't know what it's because exactly, I think we're doing things right. I think we're using the technology in the right way.
Alex Ferrari 19:49
Well, I think it's also I think, from seeing what I saw of your of your work I mean, it's solid, it's a it's a well, it's Welsh as well directed well shot has a good cast has it's a great genre. So there's, you know, it's not like a period drama piece. Like, you know, it really hits within the niche of people who would be tech savvy, would be interested in a crime franchise. You know, they wouldn't be interested in the dog says, dog sakes that saves Christmas movie. Like that's not probably the NFT ideal. So it is genre based and everything else you I mean you got time so Gordon and your movie, right? I am like the biggest fan of Tom segura. frickin love Tom.
Cameron Van Hoy 20:29
Right! He's amazing. Yeah, he's amazing. We've got Academy Award nominee, Cathy Moriarty, who's got Danny's avato, who's an incredible young actor tilde Kevin Urvi. Putting duress is in the movie. I mean, it's a wonderful cast. It helps us a lot like being able to enter the NFT space and drop the movie and show them say, Hey, this is this is what you're signing up for. This is the team that's surrounding this project that's going to help to spearhead this in the right way. Yeah, it's been really helpful for us, I think we're the first that's done something like that,
Alex Ferrari 21:03
Would you would it eventually, in I'm just gonna like pie in the sky here. Eventually, when the technology gets to where we want it to get to in the in the blockchain and NFT space, would it be simple, it wouldn't be this would be a workflow, let me know I want to just throw it this workflow at you and see if it works. You would create a community based around an IP, whatever that IP is, and you can have images sizzle reel, whatever it is to sell and finance the film through NFT's and smart contracts and get funding that way, make the movie, then release it on the blockchain, where then anybody who buys or rents or accesses it, when they pay all the money automatically gets split among all of the investors and yourselves as a creators, all automatically. And then as new revenue comes in. The smart contracts handle all the distribution, and there is no funny business. There's no Hollywood accounting, there's none of that while and there's no middleman
Cameron Van Hoy 22:08
Is that that's where we're going. And it's all all the systems are in place. The only one that is probably just not profitable yet is the distribution side of it simply because that smart wallet most people don't have smart wallet yet. And they're not operating in this web three world. But what is perfectly in place at this point is communities minting providing the liquidity to the project and then supporting and building together. That's there right now. That's happening. I think over time, as more and more people become native to this yes, then that distribution will we'll probably see a flip at a certain point where more people are connecting wallets to watch things than they are using the username and password to get in to watch stuff. And when that happens. Yeah, it'll be it's going to be awesome.
Alex Ferrari 22:57
But it'll be it's we're still a little while away, because we just need mass adopt adopt, you know, adopting of this technology.
Cameron Van Hoy 23:06
So, and for us, it's important, like, Look, our goal would be to get, you know, like 500 screen release in AMCs for the next year. You know what I mean? Like, and I'd love to see the community like tweeting the hell out of them saying, Hey, we got party ready, let's, let's roll them out name. See, that's a very tech forward thing, you know, with these communities, I imagine a lot of these big corporations and companies are going to want to have a pulse on what's happening with three more and more. So as this continues to grow, and and I want that I want the film to play in theaters. I wanted to play with a major stream where I want it to be accessible to everyone. And I think the community wants that as well. Right? Because that provides more awareness for our project more value back to the community. So we're not trying to say you can only watch it in web three. But yes, but I do believe over time, more and more people will watch within Web three, and then that what you're talking about transparency will become the norm.
Alex Ferrari 24:00
Yeah, it'll become the norm. It's something that's so I think the studio's will be pretty terrified by it. And distributors will be terrified by it, because it kills the basically, you can start I mean, when you imagine if the Rock who could finance a film if he wants to does this and goes down the road all the way and does everything we just said and he pulls in a couple 100 million himself. That's a better deal than he's getting from studios. It's gonna get to that place, I think, I think eventually will
Cameron Van Hoy 24:34
Not only will it get to that place, but there's something new happening here, which I think a lot of people don't recognize, which is NFT's themselves are a new art form. As it's entered here, there are stories being told to these entities, there's games being played for these entities, just the process of purchasing NFT's, making them waken an avatar representation of who you are giving them life giving them names and backstories. And then like purchasing multiple types of NFT's based off of their rarity within collections, and then the groups that are formed around those specific NFT's. And then serums. Many times like with the port apes, as an example, like ours, our version of a serum is gonna be a burner phone, because in the film, the central character uses a burner phone to get their jobs, there will be a burner phone that has a variety of jobs smuggled across the border, take care of this person, be the getaway driver for this job. And you'll be able to mint one of those burner phones, then if you want to advance your character and have tea, you will have to burn the burner phone, which is getting rid of that NFT sucking it off of the market. But then you advance your character. And this sounds crazy to people who are not in web three. But there's a lot of fun in it for people, it's important to new form of entertainment, and game and investing that we haven't seen before. And I think it's a whole other market outside of just the movies, just what's happening with characters and serums and playing them against each other. And where that can go is a new thing. And then there's this secondary royalty that comes into the project from that in and of itself. So you start looking at a franchise, it's something that has multiple verticals, there's the movies, but there's also just the NFT's are a thing. They're more than just a way to provide liquidity to make the films
Alex Ferrari 26:42
Right. You know, no, it's really interesting, because it's it's the equivalent of where we were, you know, again, I'll go back to like, when people were afraid to put their credit cards on the internet, you know, that they were like, that was the technology like now everybody just literally opens up an app and buys whatever they want, and it's at your doorstep. But I'm old enough to remember where there was no internet. That's how old I am. But But during that, yeah, exactly. So but you look fantastic. So so no, but the but I still remember, like people were like I can't, there was like full full news sections. And like, don't put your credit card on the internet. This is what happened. So that was a complication. I think I think that as we move forward, and if these are pretty complicated right now, everything's a little clunky, the technology is a little clunky, you really need to have your tech in order in order to even buy. I mean, Coinbase has helped a little bit if you want to buy Kryptos, it's become a little easier to buy crypto with with your credit card, which that that's only within the last couple, what, two, three years that hasn't been like that way always. So it's becoming a little bit easier. From what you're saying in regards to the investment and you know, getting residual back and all that kind of stuff and gaming within the NFT space. It's kind of like, you know, you're playing fortnight or Roblox or something like that. But the money that you're buying or selling and making is real money, it's crypto. And you can actually use that in real world purchases while you're playing in the web three space. Is that is that a decent analogy?
Cameron Van Hoy 28:23
That's, that's that is the whole premise of web three is ownership. Right? Web two was reading, right? Right, what one they say was just read, you can just kind of dial up and read things when two is username and password to get into a centralized organization that held and owned everything and you can comment like and share posting videos is a two way street, web three is connect your wallet and own.
Alex Ferrari 28:49
So in, in theory, what we're talking about is that a movie project could be for lack of a better word, a stock, a company that you're investing in. And in the, in the grand scheme of things, let's say I'm investing and I want to get a piece of a piece of you know, there's a piece of the residual payments back kind of like dividends. So I let's say I put in $100 is that, you know, let's say this NFT, there's a lot of shares. So it can go around millions of people to purchase it, let's say, then, as you invest, the movie goes out, it's your best interest to promote it because it's your stock, you're part owner of this. So you're gonna put it out so then the marketing costs start to go way down, because now you're putting it all out there. So it's kind of like creating a word of mouth on a project, but you're getting paid for the word of mouth marketing, and then you can invest in that and then as the movie just continues, it's it's it's pace from now until whenever the world ends, and the computer stopped working. There's a residual payment that is set up through the through the smart contracts that automatically win money. He's made, it goes right into your account. And you could start investing into any kind of projects you want. So if you wanted to invest, quote, unquote, into a Marvel movie, let's say the next Avengers comes out and you can invest $100 In the next Avengers, you might be able to pull $100 back out eventually, or vice versa. But it's an a part ownership of the project as opposed to the norm. The normal way of doing things is that there's a studio that owns everything gets all the gets all the benefits of it, and barely even plays the the creators like they pay them upfront, but they generally don't get paid afterwards because of Hollywood accounting, and so on. So is that a setup?
Cameron Van Hoy 30:41
It's democratized venture capital is democratize, investing and ownership is democratizing filmmaking. And like, it's just democratizing these things that used to be so you know, there's no way into them. They were operating these giant centralized organizations, whether it's a music label, or a movie studio or right, you're a clothing brand. I mean, you see a lot of these projects now that are building clothing brands, and people are going to wear those clothing, because the more again, that they're promoting that as they're walking around, that's, it's it's a direct connection to the value that NFT that you hold, which has a marketplace that you can sell it at any time and see what the market is valuing that at. So yes, communities work together and provide value back to themselves immediately. That's the paradigm shift of it all, you know?
Alex Ferrari 31:31
Yeah. It's it's pretty, it's pretty exciting. I mean, it's a pretty exciting idea. Again, some of the things that we're talking about are available now. But not everything we're talking about, because the technology is not there yet. But this is where everything is going. There's no doubt in my mind that this will happen within the next 10 years, if not faster.
Cameron Van Hoy 31:51
No, I think it'd be faster. I mean, we saw all the streaming. I mean, all the Yes, streaming companies, tech companies, social media platforms just destroy all media or bookstores like old retail, it's somewhat what how long did that take? 10 20 years, right? I think this will move quicker. I think web three will rattle those cages, because again, this is about ownership. So if you don't provide that to people, you have a very hard time iterating. And then also your point about communities and the power that they have for marketing? Well, it's it's almost similar what happened again, with the social media phase of web two, where the people who had the followings who got the likes and got the comments. And they were they became very valuable, right? They were the marketing juggernaut now, so much so that most companies want to spend more on that than they are in traditional ads. Right? That's going to be the other shift that happens where people are going to value communities and projects and brands that hold communities. That's going to be the next wave, right? Because once you start realizing like that you can directly receive value from the things that you're supporting and liking. I mean, that's, that's a skin in the game as a drug that's going to be hard to take away from people once they have it.
Alex Ferrari 33:03
Right! And it's kind of like we're crowdfunding was when it started. But crowdfunding doesn't give you any ownership.
Cameron Van Hoy 33:10
Crowdfunding is patronage, you know, crowdfunding is this is completely different than that.
Alex Ferrari 33:15
Completely. Exactly, exactly. It's more like equity crowdfunding, which is like you're getting a piece of the pie by donor, putting money into the piece. And there's a, but this is done, not by contracts, but by smart contracts, which are interesting.
Cameron Van Hoy 33:31
Anyone, you didn't have to trust the company to make sure that the funds go here. It's, there's no, it's trustless it just happens.
Alex Ferrari 33:39
And I think that is how that's going to how the governments of this world are going to allow this to continue is fascinating to me, because they're literally starting to, I mean, once you decentralize money, which is the power of a government essentially used to control their money. Yeah, you know, it's, it's pretty interesting.
Cameron Van Hoy 34:01
I was buying Bitcoin at a very low price. And I was afraid of this every step of the way. I was always I was a big believer in Bitcoin and blockchain but I was every step of the way, just going, they're gonna they're not going to allow this right for that exact reason, right dominance over the dollar. And it's so interesting how all these combos ultimately become like an economic even political conversation certain point because it's such a thing. But you know, they haven't stopped it yet. It's very hard to stop. And I hope they don't because, you know, America has always been strong because we've been able to innovate. And I mean, look what um, tax it right, they gotta get the they gotta get their tax dollars, let them tax it, but hopefully, they let the innovators just, you know, play within the rules, but but, you know, continue to grow and develop,
Alex Ferrari 34:46
I think, I mean, yeah, just El Salvador just made Bitcoin their national currency. So that's pretty insane.
Cameron Van Hoy 34:54
Yeah, yeah, it is. It is for sure. I mean, I think America's stance has been pretty cool with it also. Far scary games there seems to be pro Bitcoin and watching. We'll see how it shakes out. I think it's I think the cats out of the bag.
Alex Ferrari 35:09
Oh, no, you can't you can't put you can't put the genie back in the bottle with this. But now Now we got we got institutional investments into Bitcoin and into crypto coming in I mean, we're talking about like, you know, there's there's funds, there's crypto funds by major, major financial institutions, so they're all gonna get into it. So in we're talking about crypto a little bit guys, because that's kind of like the blockchain is the base, but in order for money to be made, you can't send dollar bills back and forth.
Cameron Van Hoy 35:39
Yeah, through swift systems or through these old systems with middlemen, right, like it's just it sucks value out of it. It's, it's it's friction.
Alex Ferrari 35:50
Exactly. I mean, where you can have a where you can have a crypto wallet that's earning you five to 10%. In Me, I mean, I have I have crypto right now that's earning 5%. That's better than any bank just sitting there. Now mind you, the crypto is a little bit volatile. So that's that's just a little, just a little on the points.
Cameron Van Hoy 36:11
But you know, there's another cool thing to speak about as well that's happening. It's also a paradigm shifts and a revolution outside of blockchain, which I think is two things happening in conjunction with each other as enabled. What's going on here to be so strong, which is Twitter spaces, Discord, right? It's again, it's the communication, it's the ability to communicate. But within Twitter, there's these things called Twitter spaces, which is so much of the in the NFT world called Alpha sounds like such a general I'm a film guy just talking at a theaters now. But you know, people get together in these Twitter spaces, it's like clubhouse, and they're talking. And they're just communicating, sharing ideas. And that ability for us to share ideas so quickly. Just communicate and like work together and pick up on trends and execute on those trends. Is fire right? It's really amazing. And then these these platforms like discord that allow communities to be whole and work together and organized with channels and like execute on things as groups, but from around the world. I mean, Twitch at this point has a team of filmmakers, Blockchain developers, collaborators and marketing people, devs, moderators, mods, I mean, just so many people from all over the world, and we are every single day like it just doesn't end it becomes like hive mind, where there we're using the discord as the centralized operating space. We did a table read for someone else's screenplay and a lot of directors writers people send me their scripts to look at and now my go to is always just jump in the discord get involved. So we've always called filmmakers that are jumping in there. One of them wanted me to read the script. I said, let's just do a table read with the community. We can talk and get it from the community right. And so they they jump in, we cast out of the community with one of the actors from flinch and amazing actor Michael Dreyer has been everything he came out, read the lead role in it. And then like the rest of the community was like, filled out the other roles. And we read this person's screenplay and gave them some feedback. And for them to hear it. We did it just like we're doing right. So it's like, we're working together to build and support each other. And that communication, that connectivity, coupled with like live value, whatever you call it, like the NF T's being able to, in live let the market determine the value of what it is that you guys are doing as a group. It's just wild.
Alex Ferrari 38:37
Yeah, it's pretty insane. Now, I also saw that you guys are doing practical, or real world products, like VHS and a couple other things. First of all, where do you get your VHS? And how are you getting done? And secondly, how is that connected to the NFT space?
Cameron Van Hoy 38:56
It's just merch. Yeah. Collectibles. So yeah, we made a VHS. We made a VHS. We've made VHS. VHS. We made a tape cassette. Yeah. And it because it has like a digital download. So you can also get the soundtrack digitally our soundtracks done by Miami knights 1984 One of my favorite synth wave groups, awesome. Fire. We've got CDs, posters, shirts, like and the community just bombed them and loves them and is wrapping them. So yeah, it's just it's merch like anything else.
Alex Ferrari 39:37
You know, it's connected but it's connected to NFT's as well. You have to buy NFT to get it or how's that work? No, no, just normal normal just normal merch. Merch is just accessible. So where do you get your Where did you get your VHS is paid. I have to ask.
Cameron Van Hoy 39:49
There's like one VHS manufacturer left in America. I think they're in America. Again. You want to remember off the top my head. But we dealt with that. Oh, we did a vinyl Press two we have vinyls of the sound. Yeah. Right. It's also tough to get like a good vinyl press. There's not a lot of companies that
Alex Ferrari 40:07
For independence, but like as I see vinyl everywhere now,
Cameron Van Hoy 40:11
Maybe for independence, I don't know. For us it was there was back halt, you know, and everyone was back halted, when might it be a COVID thing as well.
Alex Ferrari 40:18
But that's really that's so and it goes along with the kind of film you're doing. So VHS makes
Cameron Van Hoy 40:24
The movie, the movie flinch has a very 90s vibe to it. Right? It's like, it's got that vibe, and like a crime film from the 90s, you know, an era and a genre that I personally love. And so all of this plays into the aesthetic of the movie.
Alex Ferrari 40:39
Yeah, that's, that's awesome, man. Now, at the end of the day, what's the goal with the NFT's and the community, you just want to build out two more films. And then let's say let's say you get the other two films done. And you've got a three part you know, trilogy, what next? What do you do with this? One that's all played out? What do you do with this community?
Cameron Van Hoy 40:58
Now the goal is to do a full year, and then let the community just run wild with it.
Alex Ferrari 41:04
It's not just about Flint, you're building a community based around projects that you want to continue to build out and build out as a community.
Cameron Van Hoy 41:12
So I want to see flinch, go on and become this kind of epic crime web three franchise that was birthed of the metaverse, but enjoyed by the world, that the community is constantly adding to I think very soon the future is going to be like imagine a writer who wants to write for film and television now and they're not they're not in the film business, what do they have to do move to LA New York, write spec scripts, try to get an agent try to get them in front of people making these TV shows and movies and then get hired on to be a staff writer get their thing picked up to be turned to have. So I think the future is going to be binding 50 to a film franchise get in right lower for that franchise, get involved in the creative process of the franchise, get hired to write part eight of the franchise, and then maybe direct part nine, you know what I mean? Like you're gonna work your way up within these communities that you're actively involved in that you understand the lore and the characters of we're already seeing it and flinch. All sorts of creative people are coming in, that are actors and writers and directors aspiring or working and going, Hey, like, Let's build this together. And yeah, I'll read a role here. And can I put myself on tape for that? You know, and I'd like to write some lore for this character, I have an idea for part two. So I think it'll, I think it'll continue, I think that's the plan is that it becomes, it takes on a life of its own so much to the point where I can step away and go do whatever it is that I want to do next. Outside of the flinch thing, although my focus now is executing this successfully. But yeah, that's that's the vision for it. And that's why you give people IP ownership, so that they can spin off. Imagine a world where the way that like Blumhouse wants to go to a Halloween movie, they have to negotiate the rights for Halloween. Well imagine a future where they could just buy several NFT's from these characters and make films around those characters within the universe of free lunch. Right? If a studio wants to build a mini major, like, who knows, maybe it'll get there to that point where this IP has such value that people are, you know, you want to make your first film as a first time filmmaker, make it with in a franchise that already exists that you own an NFT and, you know, like it's it's kind of a different way to think about it. But I think you can get there.
Alex Ferrari 43:23
No, I agree. It's like, well, it's kind of like what Stephen King does with his his short films he gives you you can license his short films for $1 and make a short film out of it. I didn't know that. Oh, yeah. See if it's he's been doing it short stories, any of his short stories that are not already licensed, or you know, sold. You can license it for $1. And all he asks is that you send him a copy of it when it's done. So then you can so you can you can direct a Stephen King short film to get your stuff go. So it's a franchise, which is Stephen King's cool. And he's been doing that for, I don't know, 30 years. I mean, Frank Darabont did one when he was starting out that's how old this this Oh, yeah, that's how we got started with with Steven was Frank Darabont did the one short film for and Steven loved it and then he came up in the business and he called up Steven again. It's like, Hey, can I can I look at that Shawshank Redemption thing.
Cameron Van Hoy 44:20
Well, that's, that's awesome. And the man's a genius clearly, and that's what this tech is enabling. I think that's where these call them NFT franchises are gonna go. I think creative people, aspiring filmmakers and working filmmakers. I mean, imagine when a really cool filmmaker with a track record comes in and does Part Four on the franchise for us. The community hires someone dope to come in and take over the you know, it's like, and they take their crack at it. Like I think that's where this can all go. I hope it's work goes That's certainly what I'm gunning for.
Alex Ferrari 44:52
Yeah, it's really it's a fascinating placement. It's a fascinating it's a fascinating thing that's happening for independent film and I agree with you at this point. Probably the most exciting thing to happen independent film. This is worth it since I don't I mean, cat since the 90s. Essentially.
Cameron Van Hoy 45:10
I always say this, like the revolution isn't in digital technology. Everyone's like, oh, anyone can get a camera and make a movie. Now we've had that for 30 years. Yeah, I mean, like anywhere people are cameras are accessible. The revolution is going to be in this distribution and financing. We can make these things outside of the centralized systems, and hopefully, wonderful originality comes out of it, you know.
Alex Ferrari 45:32
Right, because you don't have
Cameron Van Hoy 45:34
Studios or they're afraid of originality. You know, they're afraid of everything.
Alex Ferrari 45:37
They're afraid of everything. And nowadays, you can't say anything, you can do anything. And you can be as outlandish as you want. You can go as far off off the reservation as you want on on these projects, because it's the only person you're beholden to is the community.
Cameron Van Hoy 45:53
By the way, that's what's working in this space right now. Anyways, okay, we're not seeing the Looney Tunes NFT's popping off, right? It's doodles, it's board apes, it's ZooKeys. It's like, you know, kaiju kings, it's original things, because they're able to provide ownership to people, it's when you provide that ownership, that you rally communities around them. And so we're already seeing the birth of originality. So I think it's going to be really exciting. As more and more films and filmmakers come into the space and use this tech in this way. The originality is going to be off the charts against the like the 90s. Again, we're just we're going to be come out with bangers left and right. That was dope, you know,
Alex Ferrari 46:34
Back back in the day was with me back in the day in the 90s. I mean, it was like every month, there was a new there was there was there was Robert and there was Tarantino and there was burns, it was Spike Lee and, and the list just goes on and on the list goes on the course, like every month. So it's like Aronofsky and like,
Cameron Van Hoy 46:55
Just like everybody weird little franchises like spawn and like the way of the god and like just
Alex Ferrari 47:03
Yeah, it was the wild wild west. Yeah, it was, and they could do and they could do whatever they wanted. Because it was kinda like what happened in the 70s when they when they let Spielberg and Lucas and Coppola and all those guys. They're like, we don't know what the kids want. You guys go all out, we'll give you the money. And that's basically how that all that cool originality. And now we're gonna get to that place as well. I have to ask you. So let's say a filmmaker wants to start this process. I got a project what do I do? How do I start this whole process like what you did?
Cameron Van Hoy 47:35
Well, you got to learn you got to you got to take the time to learn went through. Right. That's the thing is you have to and there's a lot of people that hate it's okay, I see vitriol in people's posts, even celebrities post about it. Like our artists who did our art is a very popular artist online. She's got a big following. For a long time. She's incredible talents, fetish Avena kindred are NFT designs. And she when she posts about it, like there's so many little NFT we're gonna hate you, you know, like just vitriol. And so I would just encourage anyone to like can't try to look past that look past the hype. There's a lot of crazy hype, we hear these stories about apes JPEGs, selling for millions and millions of dollars. And it's just like, what, and explore what the technology is, that's the first step is exploring, getting involved getting jumping to our Discord, just meet the people in their talk, you know, like try to take the time to learn it. It's probably one of the best investments that you can make in the world today
Alex Ferrari 48:34
Understanding the web, the web through space, but also then to just getting a general understanding of blockchain getting a general understanding of crypto if you don't want to read there's a ton of documentaries really great Doc's about this
Cameron Van Hoy 48:47
YouTube videos of the best authors. It's our matrix that's like plug in the back of your head and just like get like, just everything has culminated for us to just like have this leap this quantum leap as a society between blockchain communication those YouTube videos, I've learned so much from YouTube videos, if you can just like Be your own algorithm and like kind of search what you need and put the keywords and fine and then you get all the info that you need. I that's that's how I did a lot of my education in space was YouTube videos.
Alex Ferrari 49:18
Yeah, and there's and there's documentaries on YouTube about these spaces as well that just kind of like feed you're gonna give like a 30 minute doc on blockchain real produced because I watched all of them. I literally watch almost everything. I literally went and like for like three weeks I just went and just got I went down the rabbit hole on crypto and down the rabbit hole on blockchain and really tried to and I read books about it. And I really tried to understand what was going on with it because it just seems so exciting. And then it's like, okay, we're not there yet. But again, it's just like the internet circa 1990s. Man, it's just it's worth it. We'll get there. We see it. It'll get there much faster than the internet. It'll get there much faster than that. Stream ended,
Cameron Van Hoy 50:01
I think when you see what people are building in the space and the amount of value that's being created around projects, right? I think the creation phase is here. And I think it's just the early adopters are going to have a leg up because they're in a building. Right? So I think there are certain brands, many that are being established in the space that are going nowhere. They're going to be here for the for a long time. So yeah, I you know, I think it's happening.
Alex Ferrari 50:29
Now, I'm gonna ask you a few questions. Ask all my guests, sir. What What? What advice? Would you give a filmmaker trying to break into the business?
Cameron Van Hoy 50:36
You have to put all of yourself into it. You can't, you can't dip your talent. Really want to do it? You have to go on.
Alex Ferrari 50:51
What what is the lesson that took you the longest to learn whether in the film industry or in life?
Cameron Van Hoy 50:55
Make sure you have a really solid second act.
Alex Ferrari 51:01
This is as you get older, you you start thinking about the second act. You mean, like in life, or in or the actual project? And three of your favorite films of all time.
Cameron Van Hoy 51:15
Godfather one, Godfather two,
Alex Ferrari 51:18
That counts as one.
Cameron Van Hoy 51:20
I agree. I don't know. Apocalypse Now is coming to mind. So Coppola stuff. And then also third, it's impossible to say I guess, easy, right? It was very informative, for it was like a big part of my life, even though I wouldn't call it a favorite film. But it's one of those.
Alex Ferrari 51:39
It's one of those movies that when you watch it, it hits you. Especially if
Cameron Van Hoy 51:43
Yeah, that's the independent spirit. You know, like that charged me as a young man.
Alex Ferrari 51:48
That was the movie that scared the hell out of the studios with that came out and that was like a three or $4,000 movie or something like that, at the time, and it was going to completely independently it made millions and the studios were like, making Heaven's Gate. You know, like making bottling complete bombs, like wait a minute, we got to let these kids these kids know what they're doing. Let them go off. So and where can people find out more about your NFTs and what you guys are doing with Flinch?
Cameron Van Hoy 52:18
flinchthemovie.com is probably the best source for our Twitter Flinch NFT.
Alex Ferrari 52:24
Cameron has been a pleasure talking to NFT's in crypto and blockchain and all sorts of geekiness with you today, brother. Thank you again, man. I appreciate you coming on the show and helping you know hopefully inspire some other filmmakers to go down this space because it is an exciting space and that's why keep keep doing episodes about different aspects in different ways people are using it because there's not just one way there's multiple ways you can use this technology to to make your movie so I appreciate you my friend.
Cameron Van Hoy 52:53
I appreciate you and all that you do. I love I love the hustle and really glad to be here.
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