Danny Perez & Animal Collective recently premiered their new film or “visual album” as it’s described on their website. I’m really excited about ODDSAC but not just cause the trailer looks dope I’m feelin’ their distribution strategies which for now include special ‘event’ screenings in major metropolitan areas with appearances from the director and members of Animal Collective.

Now that everything is available for illegal download on the internet instantly after it’s released (just Google “The Carter Documentary Part 1” for proof) these “Event screenings” are the future of independent cinema. We’ve already been doing this with The Upsetter for the past 2 years and have traveled to over 15 film festivals worldwide as well as a half dozen art museum screenings at places like the Portland Art Museum, the Yerba Buena in San Fran, the Kumu Documentaal in Estonia and the Rich Mix Cinema in London.

The money trickles in very slowly but let’s be real, six figure advances from distributors just aren’t being offered to indie filmmakers anymore. They want you to take “Zero advance” deals with “profit sharing” at some point after they “recoup their expenses” (which is usually never) and ultimately you get your film up on Netflix and Amazon but you miss out on the most important part of the filmmaking experience which is watching your movie with an audience, interacting with them.

Further to the point last week Manhola Dargis wrote an interesting article on the direction indie-filmmaking is heading in an article titled “Poised for a DIY Revolution.”

The D.I.Y. world isn’t new, but what is novel is how filmmakers and other industry insiders are sharing their nuts-and-bolts experiences and blue-sky ideas both in person and online, creating a virtual infrastructure. But filmmakers who use Facebook to sell their movies aren’t simply partaking in a social-networking fad; they are trying to create a more complex, interactive and personalized relationship between them and their audiences. That explains why more than one D.I.Y. adherent likes to invoke the music world, where fans can become a loyal following, one that doesn’t just download a single song (or, as the most passionate of fans sometimes do, swap bootlegs), but also buys T-shirts, posters, memorabilia, concert tickets and yet more songs.

The frisson of the live concert experience partly explains why some independent filmmakers now show up at some of their screenings in person. Last August, for instance, the young filmmaker Andrew Bujalski appeared at the decidedly low-key Los Angeles premiere of his latest, “Beeswax,” at the Nuart Theater, one of that city’s single-screen art-house theaters. Before the movie began, he chatted amiably with filmgoers in the theater lobby, not far from the concession stand. Along with his producers, he also introduced the movie and, when it was over, stayed to take questions from an audience that now had a sense of the man to go along with his director’s credit.

Shoutout to my homeboy Andrew Bujalski. You’re leading the revolution my dude.