How are indie creators able to get their projects realized and off the ground?
Selling original concepts is impossible.
How are indie creators able to get their projects realized and off the ground? Selling original concepts is impossible.
How are indie creators able to get their projects realized and off the ground?
Selling original concepts is impossible.
Unironically skill issue
Yeah but how is it feasible?
For example Harry Partridge takes half a decade to release one Starbarians episode and so does the Star Fox guy. What do the indie cartoons from the OP have that other people don't?
>What do the indie cartoons from the OP have that other people don't?
They're appealing to a lot of people
That has nothing to do with my question but okay.
He's right, though. If an indie cartoon appeals to a wide enough demographic and the creator runs a productive crowdfunding campaign to utilize that appeal, it gets them both funding AND attention. Production of this stuff is half animation skills and half marketing skills. It's great if you can make literally the best animation ever known to man, but if you can't market yourself then you're fricked regardless of your skill.
>The Penny Arcade morons immediately mocked him and said that it was an impossible fairy tale. "Oh, so everyone gives a small amount of money? And then the money fairies fly the money to the artist, who uses the money to buy unicorn horns used for painting art with rainbows!"
I'm wheezing. The fricking egg that must be on their faces nowadays.
>What do the indie cartoons from the OP have that other people don't?
>MASS APPEAL
>A LOT OF LUCK
>MARKETING BUDGET
>NETWORKING WITH POPULAR FOLKS
>GREAT WORD OF MOUTH
>HUGE AND LOYAL FANBASE
>GREAT TIMING
>SOVL (SOME BUT NOT ALL)
>UNIQUENESS
What else do you wanna know? It's that simple.
Funding, teams, and an organized hierarchy. I’ve seen the behind the scenes of a lot of indie productions. The good ones have a clear chain of command and artists from each “department” report to a department lead who corrals them, assigns shots, manages edits/schedules/etc. Those leads report to the director/producer/showrunner who oversee things but basically allow them to be the boss of their department. In other words, they are trusted to do their job. The people at the very top can chime in here or there, but you generally know who your immediate boss is and most often deal with that person.
The slower working ones or more disastrous productions tend to have a less clear hierarchy where the creator is kind of up in everything and there may be a few people who are in “upper levels” of “management” who can kind of call the shots. These people are usually good friends of the creator so while you know their opinions hold weight, it’s never quite clear who you report to. Things just get posted to a discord channel and like one of 3-5 people may get back to you.
Better organization is usually coupled with better funding since people working on those projects will be more professional and will have worked on mainstream projects where the pipeline is similar. Lower funded projects tend to feel more like a group of friends plus some underlines they bring on to help. This isn’t a hard rule, though. I’ve seen very well organized pro bono student productions, and very poorly organized but heavily crowdfunded operations too.
>produce consistently because the audience stops giving a frick when bored
>consistently produce high quality because every "good" strip/episode/panel bleeds audience members that only liked your "great"
>willingness to change up your workflow to keep the cadence and quality up whenever your life or your business plans change (e.g. everything said - getting blessed with funding and then torpedoing your whole brand because you can't herd your new staff is more common than you think)
What else would you say is important?
There's less risk in using the internet as your platform rather then going Hollywood or even tv.
Dedication
Time management
Money management
Being able to build a team of animators and hopefully get some guidance from a veteran
It won't be immediate but eventually you'll start to garner enough attention and supporters that you'll be able to support yourself and continue making what you want to make.
You won't be on par with Network shows most of the time but I think if you really want to see your vision come true you're better off going indie than trying to rework your idea over and over until an executive says yes and starts reworking your idea more till it's their idea
Patreon and other means of crowdfunding have made it possible for us to pool resources and get something we actually want.
I will never forget how long before Patreon and Kickstarter existed, Scott McCloud theorized that one day artists would be able to produce passion products by means of "some sort of service where many fans can pay small amounts of money that add up."
The Penny Arcade morons immediately mocked him and said that it was an impossible fairy tale. "Oh, so everyone gives a small amount of money? And then the money fairies fly the money to the artist, who uses the money to buy unicorn horns used for painting art with rainbows!"
Scott was right.
McCloud was so ahead of time. I love his books so much. Especially Sculptor (obv, Comics Trilogy as well)
>Scott McCloud theorized
>morons immediately mocked him
Scott McCloud theorized the concept of webtoons/infinite canvas webcomics in the late 90s, or early 00s and was mocked for it... The guy is a freaking genius way ahead of his time.
Close enough.
Monkeys screeching as they watch early man thoughtfully rubbing sticks together.
It's easier than ever with the internet. Back in the pre-Bakshi era it was actually impossible.
fetishes
just look at it, everything is a variation of furries.
I think the bigger issue is most indie pitches featuring humans have absolute dogshit art. It’s like high school deviant art tier crap. Anime inspired character with really awkward body proportions in “show that is basically another thing that was already made but with one small change of setting or some shit”.
The successful ones aren’t necesssarily furry bait, they just have actually good art and trained animators who, due to their artistic skill, happen to be more interested in creating more fanciful designs than “Scott, the wizard”.
Selling original concepts to megacorps is very difficult. So artists are turning to the public, and the very-pissed-off public is reaching for its wallet.
Be a YouTuber and cultivate an audience of drooling tards about wokeness in pop culture, video games, anime, etc. And then use said audience to kickstart a comic to be made in 3-4+ years time
When?
by having it be good
Blender and Unreal Engine are free. You can also make 2D cartoons with Blender as well.
Good thread
by having a big following to prep it up