TV Projects Of The Future: Part 1
Cartoon Forum is an annual event where top animation producers from around Europe have the opportunity to pitch their upcoming TV projects to broadcasters and investors (read our full review here).
As Cartoon Forum states: “it is neither a fair nor a festival, but a co-production forum for animated TV projects. For three days, producers have the opportunity to pitch their project in front of decision-makers, buyers and investors.” – This means that although the shows are pitched and broadcasters show their interest, there is still a long way to go before a show hits the TV screens (and if it can raise the necessary finances).
Among the 68 animated shows that were pitched at the forum, there were:
- 6 adult shows
- 9 family shows
- 29 children’s shows
- 24 pre-school shows
This year, Skwigly have hand-picked a variety of shows that we hope to see on our TV screens in the next couple of years, and have been privileged to speak to the producers, to discuss their projects and find out about their experience of the forum. This article looks at 3 of the 6 projects we are featuring…
Nelly & Nora
About the show
A charming, clever girl and her high-spirited sister stay at their mobile home by the sea, where they have all-weather fun, adventures and a lifetime of memories.
About the production studio
Geronimo Productions (formerly Monster Animation) has 18 years’ experience in creating financing and producing its own shows, including: Fluffy Gardens, Ballybraddan, Punky, and Planet Cosmo.
How long has “Nelly & Nora” been in development?
We have been in development for just over 1 year.
What stage are you at with the project?
We have secured broadcast offers form some major territories but are continuing to complete the financing.
What outcomes were you hoping for from pitching at Cartoon Forum, and was it a success?
We had hoped for pre-sales and we got them.
What are you still looking for?
A partner to help us exploit the series over the medium to long term.
If you could give one tip to a producer who is going to pitch at Cartoon Forum, what would it be?
Love your project and tell the stories.
George & Paul
[vimeo 3395442]
About the show
In the World of George & Paul, everything – including themselves – is created out of wooden blocks. George and Paul have many great adventures in which they use their environment to create things and solve little problems. In this world everything is possible; it all depends on the creativity, the technical skills and imagination of these two friends.
In the end everything comes down to having fun. Enjoy it and think positive!
About the production studio
The concept is created, designed and the series will be directed by Joost Van den Bosch and Erik Verkerk of Ka-Ching Cartoons. They are well known for their creative concepts, strong designwork and for the animation series they directed for the Dutch Theme park “De Efteling”. Their concept of the 3D Machine, a short 5x 2,5 minutes 3D series realised for the Nintendo 3DS, is even distributed around the Globe.
George and Paul is produced by Pedri Animation from the Netherlands. Pedri is well know for their skills in stop-motion animation puppet building. Besides this they realised a lot of different stop-motion animated childrens series like Miffy, Ludovic (they also co-produced with Scopas Medien from Germany and Cite Amerique from Canada), Animal Shelf, and realised many advertisements for contractors worldwide.
The series will be co-produced by Beast Animation from Belgium. Beast Animation is a production company specialized in stop motion animation. You might know them from the feature film ‘A Town called Panic’, the award winning short ‘Oh Willy…’ or from the commercials they did for the international market. The creative team behind Beast Animation consist of Ben Tesseur and Steven de Beul.
How long has the show been in development?
Ka-Ching Cartoons, Joost van den Bosch and Erik Verkerk, came up with the idea for the show back in 2006. Back then they had not yet decided on the technique. Ka-Ching Cartoons is a studio that focusses on digital animation, so stop-motion was not something they did. So when I asked them back in 2008 if they had ideas for a tv show everything fell into place. They must have thought: “What better way to animate wooden blocks then with actual wooden blocks”. Stop motion has a natural charm, any other technique would just be trying to imitate that charm.
Together we developed the animation puppets and created a pilot. When we partnered, we started the tour finding the right dutch broadcaster, and other international partners. The Dutch broadcaster NTR, the Belgian broadcaster Ketnet, and our colleague animation studio Beast Animation were very interested. With them backing us we could go to Cartoon Forum.
With the support of the Dutch Mediafund we could write the 26 scripts and make the 26 animatics. It is a long road to get the show ready for production, but over the years we all feel the project has improved a lot.
What stage are you at with the project?
We hope to get at least half of the budget financed before end of this year. We hope we can manage this with the help of the Dutch funding system and the Belgian funding system. For this our partner broadcasters are very important. We are really happy to have two well know broadcasters on board already, they play a very important role in getting the series realised. After the Cartoon Forum we also received serious interest from several other European broadcasters. This was a very big compliment as well.
We are also talking with other possible co-producers and had a lot of positive but also some critical feedback that we are working on as we speak.
Ideally we hope to start realising the series in July/August 2014
What outcomes were you hoping for from pitching at Cartoon Forum, and was it a success?
We hoped to get in touch with a lot of people who could have influence in helping us getting the series realised. We also hoped to gain more knowledge about the animation market itself. And the way the different attendees see and behave in this market.
But, in the end, we were also there to enjoy the forum and have fun with the other attendees!
Yes I do think we reached al our goals. Also thanks to the Cartoon Forum crew (and the also the cartoonies) it was a very well organised and successful Cartoon Forum for us.
What are you still looking for?
- An enthusiastic and very motivated distributor of the series.
- More broadcasters who are willing to do an actual pre-sale. We have all 26 “animatics” of season 1 ready to be judged by them.
- Other enthusiastic companies who also see the high potential of the characters for their products. After all it all depends on the creativity, the technical skills and imagination of these companies.
If you could give one tip to a producer who is going to pitch at Cartoon Forum, what would it be?
- Pay a lot of attention to your teaser for screening during the croissant show. A lot of people will make the decision to attend a presentation at that time.
- When you have an audience at your presentation, then really try and get the audience to feel the same enthusiasm you feel about your project. Don’t read your presentation from paper, don’t learn it word for word, but try and talk about it in a relaxed and confident way. You know best what your project is about.
PIXS
[vimeo 67288884]
About the show
The PIXS are four digital creatures with the ability to transform themselves into everyday objects. They live in a digital world in which everything is white and virtual. They hunger for discovery, and love going on missions in the real world. And this is what they do: in each episode they answer a new challenge, be it making a cake, singing, counting, painting, dancing… In short, all the things children love to do!
About the production studio
The CG animation studio being used for The PIXS is Royal Post. It’s a post-production company based in Paris and London. Royal Post is a branch of the production company PARTIZAN. PARTIZAN has offices in in Berlin, Beirut, Dubai, London, Los Angeles, Mumbai, New York and Paris.
How long has the show been in development?
We’ve been working on the concept of the PIXS during 2011, and for that, we received the support of the CNC Nouveaux Medias (French center of Cinematography) in December 2011. The PIXS is a transmedia project. We developed during 2012 all the different aspects of transmedia (ebook, augmented reality book, apps, and the TV show).
In January 2013 we received the support of the CNC which partly financed our trailer, and we presented the PIXS at the Cartoon Forum in September 2013.
What stage are you at with the project?
We’re waiting for answer from a French broadcaster, and others possible partners. So we’re still in the funding part of the show.
What outcomes were you hoping for from pitching at Cartoon Forum, and was it a success?
Since we were hoping to gain attention from a french broadcaster, we can say that Cartoon Forum was a success. We had a lot of interest from other possible co-producers (from Turkey, Italy and Belgium), and several 3D studios came to us.
Several distributors are waiting our call… so it was quite a success!
What are you still looking for?
We’re waiting for the green light from that French channel… and we’re working at the same time on a stand alone game of the PIXS. We’re trying to develop others part of the transmedia project to be ready when the time comes.
If you could give one tip to a producer who is going to pitch at Cartoon Forum, what would it be?
A Belgium producer talked to us about a book from Dan Roam: The Back of the Napkin. It’s supposed to be the solution when you have something to present.
Our tip is: be truthful to your project. This is the only time you could be yourself.