I’m not dead or sick or anything. Just busy with work and preparing my speech for the Weston A. Price Foundation conference. At this point, that mostly means creating slides and begging Chareva for new graphics to put on them. (I don’t have to beg very hard, for the record.)
Meanwhile, I got a couple of bits of good news – one expected, one not. The good news I expected is that the Fat Head Kids animated film is now available for pre-order on Amazon. Just in time for holiday gift-giving. We don’t run GoFundMe or IndieGoGo campaigns to cover expenses, so I’m hoping fan support is all it takes. That’s the best way to contribute to the blog and my filmmaking efforts. The Amazon widget is below. If you don’t see it, click here.
The unexpected good news is that Gravitas Ventures, our distributor, is also releasing the original Fat Head on DVD. Well, not entirely unexpected. When Gravitas agreed to pick up Fat Head Kids, the acquisitions manager floated the idea of releasing Fat Head at the same time.
As you may or may not recall, the original DVD distributor went bankrupt and never paid us. Meanwhile, a foreign distributor placed Fat Head with TV markets in France, New Zealand, Israel, Turkey, South Africa, Poland and a couple of other countries I can’t recall, then claimed there were no profits. I had paid all the production and post-production costs myself, I was getting fan email from around the world, and not getting paid a dime. It was beyond frustrating.
Gravitas picked up the film for the streaming markets two years after the original release – and shock of shocks, they actually sent royalty checks. I stared at the first royalty check that arrived in the mail, wondering what kind of strange document it was.
Oh, I see! It’s royalty check to pay me for my work! Heck, I didn’t know that could happen …
Gravitas wasn’t a DVD distributor at the time, so we ended up authoring a Fat Head DVD ourselves, getting copies produced at a plant in Pennsylvania, and selling them through the blog and on Amazon.
Between then and now, Gravitas has become a much bigger operation, which includes distributing DVDs. So when the acquisitions manager suggested perhaps they’d like to pick up DVD distribution for Fat Head, I said sure, I’m up for it, let me know what you decide.
I didn’t know they’d decided anything until a couple of weeks ago, when someone at the company sent me an email asking for some artwork for the DVD. I was pleasantly surprised, because I thought they’d ask for all the usual materials and legal paperwork once they decided to produce a DVD. I guess the paperwork for the streaming version covered all that.
Anyway, this means I’ll be out of the Fat Head DVD shipping business, and I’m happy to let it go. The DVD is also available for pre-order on Amazon … you know, just in case you’ve never seen the film. If you don’t see the widget below, click here.
Here’s to hoping the Fat Head business grows enough for me to retire from the programming job …
If you enjoy my posts, please consider a small donation to the Fat Head Kids GoFundMe campaign.
I am seeing quite a few Gravitas productions popping up on Hulu and Roku Channel.
Yeah, they’ve become a big operation, with partners in Europe. Glad I got in with them when I did.
Any material difference between the DVD and the Blu-Ray other than resolution?
Same stuff.
Awesome news Tom! Congrats not only to the pre-release of Fat Heads Kids, but Gravitas picking up Fat Head The Movie as well.
P.S. Not seeing the Amaozn links. Not sure if it on my end or not; I use a lot of filtering plugins.
Hmm, could be filtering. Do you see these links?
https://tinyurl.com/yanxf97r
https://tinyurl.com/y8q4nnx7
Yes, I can see those. Thanks. I must be blocking the widgets.
Those links work. Thanks!
Can I pre-order a downloadable version? I’m not set up for physical media. Thanks, Ray
Not sure there’s any such thing as a pre-order on downloads. I suspect pre-ordering a DVD is way to make sure you’re at the front of the line when the DVDs are produced and shipped.
re: I suspect pre-ordering a DVD is way to make sure you’re at the front of the line when the DVDs are produced and shipped.
It’s also a way to tell the producer how to fine tune the forecast, and not press too few or too many in the first batch.
Our order for a DVD & a BD went in today. In addition to getting early in line, sometimes new media and books are available early, and it’s first-come, first-served on many reseller sites.
DVD and BD? Are you planning a comparison?
And thanks, by the way.
re: DVD and BD? Are you planning a comparison?
One to play. One to loan. We have a BD (UHD actually) player. Can’t assume that everyone does.
Not expecting a UHD/HDR edition, well, until the VR edition anyway.☺
In the VR edition, Marty will slap your face if you flood the bloodstream with glucose.
Hello, any chances the DVD will be available in other languages, life french? I’d like to show to some people, but they’re not good enough in english to fully understand a movie.
That will be up to the distributor. I haven’t heard yet if they’ll be doing subtitles in other languages.
The subtleties of subtitles aside, a more pressing question about the pressings might be region coding.
According to the AMZN pages at the moment, the DVD is to be region-free (which probably means it’s coded for regions 1,2,3,4,5&6). The Blu-Ray page is silent on the matter.
I can’t imagine they’d want the blu-ray to be restricted anywhere.