BLOG – Animation Pitch
As promised, here are my first thoughts after having the opportunity to pitch an animated series.
This is not the first time I’ve pitched to television. The first time was a live action sitcom that I pitched to two of the cable networks. There was some interest but no bite, then an animated series to one of the educational networks. No bite or response there.
I can’t tell you a whole lot about the current pitch itself because I expect to hear back from the producer with in the week.
Probably the most frustrating thing of the day was that I was late. Late by only a few minutes, but late all the same. The producer wasn’t bothered by this, but it really shouldn’t have happen. I’m prone to showing up places early, so this was really bothering me as I was stuck in snail crawling traffic. But I can’t let that frustration get to me, admit it, apologize and move on. No excuses.
The next thing that came, as it should, was the casual chitchat. The producer was quite happy to show off how his office was starting to look better since they moved in. They even had their sign up since the last time I was there. We then ended up talking about the fly over of the Space Shuttle Endevour earlier in the day. One of those things that everyone was chatting about that day. (I got to see it while it flew over Disneyland.) He also asked about how things had been with me since the last meeting. I told him about my part time job at the college’s foundation and the scholarships they give out.
Let the producer guide the chat, it’s his time and office, so when the moment is right he’ll ask to know what you brought.
Based on what we had discussed during our first meeting I put together what I hoped would interest the producer. The first was a pitch for a complete animated comedy adventure series. That was followed up with two ‘short subjects’.
I’ll admit right here that I stumbled a bit in my transition between one pitch and another. But once I got past that things went smoothly.
When I was done with my three pitches the producer did mention that he had seen something similar to one of them before. Actually, he had seen it a lot, and he explained when he meant. I’m never one to ride the wave of what’s currently ‘hot’. Know that I won’t be pitching any ‘sparkly’ vampires. The concept of my pitch, however, from what the producer had seen, had been on several people’s minds. Sometimes that happens.
This wasn’t a rejection, and he went on to say that after he read more of my pitch packet, if it had a unique enough hook there was still a change.
Sure I might be disappointed, but I did understand what he meant. I look forward to his thoughts.
He did react and know exactly what I was going after with one of the other pitches. So that was good.
The meeting was short, nice, and very friendly. Even if nothing further comes out of these pitches, it was a great learning experience. I now can put more notches into my animation development belt and work on the next one based on what I’ve learned here.
What comes next? More writing, more developing, and more meetings.
That last part for me is the hardest, the networking and getting to know more people to arrange such meetings, but over the last while I am improving with that as well.
This is all part of #Mission818 and things are going along very nicely.
Right now I’m contemplating if there is a way for me to pitch my novel “Revenge of the Masked Ghost” as a live action series. Now to find the right producers that would be interested in talking with me about it.
Thanks all for your support. Hope to tell you more when I hear back from the producer.
Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
Four Names of Professional Creativity
