How to Make an Animated TV-series on a budget

What makes a great character? In this chapter you will learn the basics to approaching a character creation using personality traits and physical appearance.

In this exercise you will get hands on creating a character by using a specific questions. This is a very useful tool to get to know who your characters is and even lead you to creating a better stories and design.

Learn from an already existing character and how I approached creating him.

Why you use a so called Character Sheet and how you go about creating one.

In this lecture we will create a very simple character. This has the purpose to make you see that even a very simple character design can have a very complex personality. It is important to simplify your characters if you are on a low budget. So, here you will see that this is very much possible.

Here we will create a Character Sheet for Joe the Cowboy. Even if the character is very simple, it will have his own body language which will bring out his personality. With this exercise you will see that you can be creative with your approach and fit your design to the budget you have.

Use those simple questions to design your own character. Make it as simple as possible and try to put attributes and personality traits instead of heavy design features.

In this Story Introduction you will get some useful advice on what makes a good story, how to think and approach storytelling and how to set problems and obsticles for your character to drive the story forward

Sometimes it is difficult to just start the process. In this lecture I´m going to give you some simple tecniques on how to tackle the first "stage fright" of starting, how to beat procrastination and how to start writing.

How do you write an outline and why do you need one?

You will follow me, step by step to create the first episode. The purpose of this is to encourage you by doing.

You will learn what is a screenplay and what is the difference between an Outline and a Screenplay

There are many ways to write a screenplay. You don´t need to have an expensive software. But there is still a standard, accepted by the industry of how the formating of a screenplay should look like. I will give you some tips of different althernatives you can use that are costeffective.

Most often, you don´t have a problem with coming up with the ideas, but as soon as you face the blank page, you freeze and don´t know what to write. Follow me while I write the first episode in a screenplay form. It is simple, and everything is changable at any point. This gives you the freedom to just do it.

What is Storyboard and Animatic? In this lecture you will get my own tips and approach on how to simplify your process, how to use free apps and work from anywhere you want to start designing your story.

Let´s start drawing the Storyboard and Building the Animatic for our new TV-show Joe The Cowboy. This is the first scene of the first Episode - The Evil Bunny.

We continue with making the Storyboard and Animatic for The Evil Bunny, Scene 02.

This is Scene 03 from our First Episode of The Cowboy named Joe TV-series

Scene 04 of our First Episode

We continue with Scene 05 and 06 of the Animatic for the First Episode.

We are almost there with the whole Animatic.

Final Scene. Here you will also learn how adjust the story from what you´ve wrote in the Script to what feels better for the story. The Script and even the Animatic are not final, they are a blueprint for the final film, so when you see that something is not working, you can change it at this early stages.

Use iMovie to edit your Animatic. It is easy and it doesn´t cost any extra money except for the price of your iPad.

Music and Sound are very important for the Success of your show. How to add a quality sound and music when on a small budget.

Who is your main target group. Why do you need to have a target group and how to decide who you want to make the show for?

How to choose your style and what can drive your decision? What are the pro´s and con´s with more simplified style and a more polished style of 3D or 2D animation?

How to find funds, where can you look for it and how to think when crafting your funding plan.

How you approach and craft your budget.

What do you need to put in your budget and how to calculate what you need money for.

We continue with adding more items to the budget. Why are some things important even though not necessary, like a lawers fee.

How to design a Production Schedule for your TV-show and why is it important.

We continue to talk about a Production Schedule. It can make or break your production if you get in people to work for you too early, or too late.

How to track your progress? What do you need to know when on a small budget.

How do you pitch your show to producers, investors and distributors.

Here is an example of how your so called Pitching Bible must look like to be presented to distributors and investors.

Who to approach to distribute your TV-show and what can you do yourself to help the process.