One Episode Every Two Weeks

The Goal

One of the things I’d love to do is to create my own show. I’d like it to be a bit wacky. Not quite as out there as Tri-Gun, but something along those lines. Maybe between that and Cowbody Bebop episodes before Ed.

I’d like it to have 24 or so episodes a season. That’s one episode every two weeks, with a short break between seasons.

How long should an episode be? I’d like it to be the equivalent of an American 1/2 hour cartoon episode. Say something like Teen Titans. Runtime, total, is between 21 minutes and 23 minutes. Intro is about a minute. The credits are about 30 seconds. So let’s say that the content minus intro and credits is 20 minutes on average.

So 20 minutes of actual animation every two weeks. That’s a ton of work! How did they accomplish this feat?

Breaking Down Teen Titans

  • Character Design
    • Well Defined, but relatively simple, heroes and antagonists
    • Very simple filler character designs
      • The police all have simple body armor and helmets with masks to avoid facial animation
      • The golem in the first episode is mostly cubes
    • For a 3D project it would mean having all the main characters already done
    • It probably means having some recurring background characters done too
      • Minions both for “the good guys” and “the bad guys”
  • Set design
    • The prison in the first episode is very simple
    • The exterior has just enough definition not to look like cylinders at the corners connected by rectangles for the walls
    • When inside often one doesn’t see a lot of detail, just a 2 color backdrop of light and shadow where the wall is and windows and bars are
  • Action
    • Often only one or two characters on screen
    • Very simple but evocative backdrops
    • Instead of animating every punch, kick, etc., often just implying things
      • For instance when beast boy lands on Raven it doesn’t show that, just the dust rising from the bottom of the screen

If one can avoid the impulse to create an incredibly detailed prison structure, and animate what it would actually look like when Beast Boy falls on Raven, that should massively speed things up.

This is still a ton of work, but it’s looking more manageable. Eventually I’d love to get to a Cowboy Bebop level of detail in things, or a Otaking level of care in his Tie Fighter Anime animation, but I don’t think it’s practical for me to take 4 years or more to create less than 1/2 an hour of animation.

The goal is one “1/2 hour” episode every 2 weeks, with about a month off for a break or to allow for an overrun in the schedule.

Pre-Production

I have a very general idea for a story. I love Jack McDevitt’s Alex Benedict novels. A Star Trek like mostly post scarcity society where humans have expanded across the galaxy. Like on earth they had times of expansion, contraction, and (in)famous disasters. Internal conflicts, and a few external wars. I like the premise of archaeology and human colonies or bases that have been lost for hundreds or thousands of years.

I also like the themes of the worlds in Cowboy Bebop, Tri-Gun. I like crazy structures like Howl’s Moving Castle. I like that in the Alex Benedict novels Alex is more often hunting things because he’s interested in them, and that they’ll get a return when he sells them to collectors, than being an Indiana Jones type character working for museums.

I think the protagonists should be a minimum of two characters, and a maximum of five. I need to come up with a handful of regular antagonists too. The main character’s ship/archaeology crawler thing needs to be the most complete thing, but most of the antagonists bases should have at least the main outer silhouette and main rooms defined too.

One of my largest challenges will be keeping everything simple, but interesting. I’ll also need to create an easy to use cartoon like materials, and keep the level of detail in things consistent throughout.

Eventually, say no earlier than season 2, I’d love to do a very anime like thing where the main characters can watch shows so I can vary animation styles while in the same universe.

I think I’d like the thing to be an Adult Swim level of maturity so that I can have horror, if I so choose, without turning off my main audience.

All sorts of things to sort and figure out.

But, focus on the main show, the main characters, the hero assets, and I think that gives me a good starting place to accomplish my goal. . .

Never mind how long it has taken me to create 30 seconds of animation for a group project I’ve been working on.