The pocket pinch

Creating a web series can be either low cost or exorbitant depending on the scale of a production you’re eyeing. Just like a feature film producer would, don’t forget to take in consideration costs for film festival submissions, social media or other forms of marketing, props, and casting among other elements. The central characters of Indian blockbuster and high grosser

Bahubali returned to the smaller screen (Think: laptop screen, not TV) early this year on Amazon Prime with Bahubali: The Lost

Legends, an animated version of the film. Reports indicate a whopping budget of 10 crores rupees (reportedly, the film franchise cost a total of 430 crores rupees) was spent on the production of the web series helmed by Deva Katta. Apart from good ol’ Netflix and YouTube, there are also popular

video on demand services such as Amazon Prime, Hulu,

Sony LIV, VOOT, and Hotstar. “A lot of businesses do not understand the power of web-based video content and don’t invest much. Web series are giving the film industry a serious run for their money as the masses now have access to an incredible amount of entertainment online,” says Roha Daud, co-founder and head of talent management, Muse Dubai.

Crowd-funding platforms such as Indiegogo, Seed & Spark,

Wishberry, and Kickstarter allow web series creators all over the world to generate funds for their project. As a gesture of gratitude, creators carry social media shoutouts, a video from the cast and crew to thank online ‘backers’ for the donations or allow their audience access to any #BTS material.