How-To Video Challenge: Make Money with Mobile

If the idea of winning $2,000 for making an imaginative “how to” video sounds appealing, the How-To Video Challenge is the contest for you. According to Heather Menicucci, managing producer of Howcast Media’s Emerging Filmmakers Program, the How-To Video Challenge is open to filmmakers, video artists and DIYers “to come up with a fresh, original approach to the how-to video.” howtochallenge

A panel of judges from the filmmaking, online, television, magazine, and DIY industries will review videos from the top 10 contest finalists to select winners, with a grand prize of $2,000. The contest is open to submissions between June 16th and July 28th, and the Howcast community will vote on their favorites from July 29th to August 10th. The finalists will be announced August 10 and their videos will be all of the winning videos as well as many of the finalists will be distributed across Howcast’s distribution network and on MobilizedTV.

“The contest is the perfect opportunity for us to reward the creativity of the filmmakers we work with and to challenge a whole new community of film and video makers and DIYers,” said Menicucci. “Reinventing the how-to video is a fantastic assignment for these creative folks and we can’t wait to see what they dream up.”

Howcast Media produces free how-to videos and guides on every topic under the sun. The videos are produced in-house at Howcast Studios, as well as by media partners, brands, and individual contributors. The videos are distributed across a network of web, mobile, and cable partners, including YouTube, Hulu, AOL, Yahoo!, Comcast, Apple, TiVo, and Verizon V-Cast. Watch one of Howcast’s How-to videos below.

“We’re a destination site but also very aggressive with our partnerships,” said Menicucci. “We’re interested in having a great site where you can find answers. At the same time, we’re about making great content and getting it out there.”

One of the many ways that Howcast gets its content is through the Emerging Filmmaker Program. Launched in February 2008, the EFP offers emerging filmmakers–currently there are 225 of them in the program–the chance to gain experience, exposure, and some extra income by creating short how-to videos distributed across online, mobile and off-line platforms. The parameters are, however, fairly rigid: Howcast provides the scripts, voice-overs, graphics, and access to a music library; the filmmaker is encouraged to work creatively within those limits.

But it’s no-holds barred for the How-To Video Challenge. Menicucci expects parodies and off-the-wall how-tos as well as tamer versions. The contest jury is made up of Peter Baxter, cofounder/president of Slamdance and a filmmaker; Jeff Cooperman, managing producer of The Colbert Report; Justin Johnson, promotions director, Next New Networks; Darlene Liebman, VP of Production at Howcast Media; Charles Merzbacher, Chair, Department of Film and Television at Boston University; Tim Sullivan, director of development at Magical Elves (Top Chef, Project Runway); Katherine Sharpe, online editor, ReadyMade Magazine; and Hunter Walk, director of product management for YouTube.

The first-prize video is $2,000, second prize is a Sony Webbie HD Camera and accessories, and third prize is an 8GB iPod Nano and $50 iTunes gift card. More information on guidelines to the How-To Video Challenge are available here. And more information on the rules can be found here.

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