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The Atx Television Festival is establishing a Showrunner Award this year, and its first recipient is one of the people for whom the term was invented.

David E. Kelley will receive the first Showrunner Award at the festival in Austin, Texas, which is set for May 29-June 1. He joins fellow Atx Fest awardees Christine Baranski (the Achievement in Television Excellence honor) and The Diplomat creator Debora Cahn (the Impact in Storytelling award, presented with Human Rights Watch) at the 14th edition of the fan-centered festival.

Along with the award, the festival will present a screening of Kelley’s Apple TV+ series Presumed Innocent and a discussion of that series and others from his prolific career, which ranges from L.A. Law to Big Little Lies.

“David E. Kelley’s impact and influence as a TV creator, showrunner, producer, and collaborator cannot be overstated,” said Jennifer Morgan, vp programming for Atx TV.

The biggest challenge for indie filmmakers is getting your movie funded — unless it’s figuring out what to do with it once it’s done. Neither is easy, but two companies that specialize in each are teaming up to make both a whole lot easier.

Crowdfunding platform Seed&Spark and community distribution platform Kinema have launched “The Independence Partnership” which provides filmmakers with a suite of tools and resources to move from getting your movie funded to finding an audience.

Creators who crowdfund their movie through Seed&Spark gain access — in some cases, with fees waived — to Kinema’s distribution platform, which provides creative control over distribution rights, screenings, and virtual events. Kinema tools also will be integrated into Seed&Spark educational workshops and digital distribution materials.

Those who fund programs on Seed&Spark get a dedicated Kinema account manager and custom distribution consultations. Fees are waived for filmmakers with over 500 followers or over 1,000 campaign backers.

The question Seed&Spark founder Emily Best often gets from indie filmmakers is this: “What the fuck is happening in distribution, and what are we supposed to do about it?”

“They weren’t even asking at this point, ‘How do I get distribution?’ said Best, who launched the indie film crowdfunding platform in 2012. “They were like, ‘Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. If only I knew what are the tools and what are the things that I need.’”

Best described the situation as a “black box” for creators who felt stuck and powerless as to how they should navigate distribution, with a few companies acting as gatekeepers. She said more people kept entering that box: As distribution became more challenging for everyone, even established filmmakers were now asking questions.

So after years of calls, seminars, and panels at film festivals, Best assembled everything you need to...

The new feature documentary “Half the Picture” explores gender equality, discriminatory hiring practices and the struggle for female creatives in Hollywood through conversations with dozens of top female film and TV directors. The film has spent over nine months in production and features over 40 interviews, and now director Amy Adrion and the rest of her team have turned to the Seed&Spark crowdfunding community to raise $30,000 to complete the principal photography. Watch a series of brief clips from the film below.

Read More: Female Directors in Hollywood Share Their Stories in ‘Half the Picture’

“‘Half the Picture’ is the culmination of my lifetime as a film lover,” says director Amy Adrion, “and is a tribute to the women who inspired me to make films. Also, it was important to me that we ‘be the change’ women filmmakers and film lovers want to see in the world. On the production, I...

Seed&Spark CEO and founder and Indiewire influencer Emily Best delivered the closing keynote address at Art House Convergence on January 21, during which she announced the company's expansion into distribution with L.A. Film Festival favorite "I Am Thalente." Read highlights from Best's speech below. Read More: "Exclusive: Film Crowdfunding Platform Seed&Spark Launches Distribution Arm" I believe my work at Seed&Spark dovetails nicely with the future of the arthouse cinema. My team and I are dedicated to two core values that I believe, increasingly, must influence theater programming if we want to show great films to big crowds: sustainability for artists, and diversity of content for audiences. I got into filmmaking because I was tired of the way women were represented on screen. But in making my first film — "Like the Water" — I faced what distributors still consider an inflexible fact:...

Ready, Set, Fund is a column about crowdfunding and related fundraising endeavors for Austin and Texas independent film projects.

At South by Southwest this past March, I came across a new project funding platform called Seed&Spark, which was launched in December 2012. Founder Emily Best was inspired by her experience making her first feature, Like the Water, to team with other independent filmmakers to create this funding platform for filmmakers and their audience. The name comes from their philosophy that "films are not just art, they are business ventures. They require the seed of an idea and the sparks of human and capital investments to bring them to life."

To participate via Seed&Spark, a filmmaker posts his or her "wish list" of items and associated costs needed to complete a film project. Donors can choose to either donate funds or loan an item from the project list in exchange...

When Emily Best spoke to Indiewire last month about her new crowdfunding platform, Seed&Spark, which also allows for online distribution, we were intrigued by her story of receiving support for her film "Like the Water," in unexpected packages, namely in donated services, loaned locations, and goods needed for production. In the following first person article, Best explains the Diy lessons she learned from crowdfunding before crowdfunding was "a thing," and how that led her to found Seed&Spark. Towards the end of 2010, Caitlin FitzGerald was making "Newlyweds" with Ed Burns. She was also starring in a site-specific production of "Hedda Gabler." This is where I met her (playing Thea to her Hedda), along with Caroline von Kuhn and three other remarkable women who would change my life forever. Together we wanted to make more work, possibly theater. And over drinks one night Caitlin would convince us all, thanks to Eddie’s.

When Paste last checked in with Emily Best, she was producing Like the Water, an independent film starring Caitlin Fitzgerald. Inspired by some of the experiences making that film, Best and two of her Like the Water co-conspirators, director Caroline Von Kuhn and first assistant director Liam Brady, decided to create Seed & Spark, a new platform that would combine crowdfunding and crowdbuilding. In the midst of preparations for their Dec. 1 launch, Best took a few moments to explain it all to Paste....

With the new Seed&Spark, Emily Best and a group of fellow filmmakers want to make it easier for filmmakers to raise money, complete productions quickly, and have control over their distribution. When Emily Best was working with her team on their film "Like the Water," they set up a registry for the things they would need for their production.  This was before, as Best told Indiewire, Kickstarter was a big thing. When it went live and her team passed it around to their networks, they were surprised that letting people see exactly how the money would be spent -- and exactly how expensive making films is -- led to friends, family and strangers being more likely to buy goods, donate money or (and this was the big surprise) lend goods and services. With the Seed&Spark platform, filmmakers are able to use one of two services -- a crowdfunding...

Above: Still from Like the Water Editor's Note: It seems that every week brings new developments in the evolving world of crowdfunding and distribution. In keeping with our ongoing effort to inform the Future of Film community about new platforms, Seed and Spark caught our eye with its commitment to filmmakers and community-building during all stages of production. Founder Emily Best fills us in. On December 1, we will launch Seed and Spark to correct a fundamental misconception of the film business: raising money is not the hardest part of making a film. The hardest part is getting anyone to see it when it's finished. As filmmakers, we're usually so preoccupied with getting a film made we forget to think about getting it watched, which is why it's crucial to use the fundraising process as a powerful audience-building tool. Taking that further, we believe you should also be able to deliver...