So, we have Barnaby and Hazel and two logo designs!
Tuesday 20 September 2011
Wednesday 14 September 2011
Character development...
Our next venture will be to create our characters. So far, Joe has drawn our main Character - Barnaby.
However, apart from knowing what he looks like, we know little else about him yet. (All that we do know is he shall have a female companion - TBA). But nevertheless, here he is....
And here's hoping to some good character development in the future!
Tuesday 13 September 2011
Exhibition and distribution...
If you combine a strong product, with good exhibition and distribution; it's a recipe for success! (Therefore having effective distribution is crucial!) In this post, I will attempt to explore some possible routes for exhibition and distribution of our products.
The Programme (OTS) itself
Obviously having your programme on a child-specific channel is a key thing to do. Channels such as Nick Jr, Cbeebies etc cater wholly for children, therefore receive viewers from within our age range for TA. Children often will have just finished watching their favourite programme on one of the channels, but continue to watch just to see what comes on next. In this way, our show would be introduced to new viewers and would hopefully gain a fan base of regular viewers. Often, a show can not be shown on multiple children's channels (this would have lead us to optimum exposure to TA), therefore we would have to select the channel with most viewers (within our TA age range) to try and maximise our chances of the most viewers.
The Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) have the average weekly viewing time per person (in the UK) for some various children's channels we could potentially be shown on. The viewings are as follows:
•Tiny Pop - 1 minute
•Cartoonito - 3 minutes
•Nick Jr - 5 minutes
•Disney Junior - 6 minutes
•Cbeebies - 22 minutes
As you can clearly see, Cbeebies would obviously be the best channel for us in terms of potentially receiving most viewers. (So this would be the channel we would approach to have our programme on.
The magazine
Supermarkets and newsagents would be the best choice I believe as this is where child's magazine's tend to be sold currently. These places would be the most sensible to sell our magazine because children often visit these places with an adult who could buy it for them. If we placed the magazine at child's eye level they would be more likely to see if (and if they like the programme) would potentially ask the adult to buy it for them. Also, if you include a free gift(s) on the magazine this increases the child's desire for it as they would receive toys/stickers etc.
The DVD
The main place which children visit with an adult which sell DVD's would be a supermarket. (Much like the magazine section, if a child sees the DVD of the show they like, they'd ask their adult for it. And again, placing the product at eye-level would increase the chances of the child seeing it and subsequently wanting it.) Also, DVDs are regularly advertised on television (for children's and adult's channels) to advertise it to the child or an adult (as a birthday gift for example). So having a good marketing and advertising campaign for the DVD would be crucial. Also, with the increase of people using online shops such as Amazon etc, selling our product here would be another effective way.
Looking at distributors of current Cbeebies programmes, I have identified a few potential exhibition/distribution company for our products.
HiT Entertainment - they are distributors for a lot of children's programmes and therefore have good experience.
Universal Pictures - are a very well-known name with good contacts and big budgets and do deal with children's shows DVD releases.
Classic Media - seem to deal with only cartoon/animation/children's programmes so therefor may be the best equipped and used to distributing products like our's successfully.
The Programme (OTS) itself
Obviously having your programme on a child-specific channel is a key thing to do. Channels such as Nick Jr, Cbeebies etc cater wholly for children, therefore receive viewers from within our age range for TA. Children often will have just finished watching their favourite programme on one of the channels, but continue to watch just to see what comes on next. In this way, our show would be introduced to new viewers and would hopefully gain a fan base of regular viewers. Often, a show can not be shown on multiple children's channels (this would have lead us to optimum exposure to TA), therefore we would have to select the channel with most viewers (within our TA age range) to try and maximise our chances of the most viewers.
The Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) have the average weekly viewing time per person (in the UK) for some various children's channels we could potentially be shown on. The viewings are as follows:
•Tiny Pop - 1 minute
•Cartoonito - 3 minutes
•Nick Jr - 5 minutes
•Disney Junior - 6 minutes
•Cbeebies - 22 minutes
As you can clearly see, Cbeebies would obviously be the best channel for us in terms of potentially receiving most viewers. (So this would be the channel we would approach to have our programme on.
The magazine
Supermarkets and newsagents would be the best choice I believe as this is where child's magazine's tend to be sold currently. These places would be the most sensible to sell our magazine because children often visit these places with an adult who could buy it for them. If we placed the magazine at child's eye level they would be more likely to see if (and if they like the programme) would potentially ask the adult to buy it for them. Also, if you include a free gift(s) on the magazine this increases the child's desire for it as they would receive toys/stickers etc.
The DVD
The main place which children visit with an adult which sell DVD's would be a supermarket. (Much like the magazine section, if a child sees the DVD of the show they like, they'd ask their adult for it. And again, placing the product at eye-level would increase the chances of the child seeing it and subsequently wanting it.) Also, DVDs are regularly advertised on television (for children's and adult's channels) to advertise it to the child or an adult (as a birthday gift for example). So having a good marketing and advertising campaign for the DVD would be crucial. Also, with the increase of people using online shops such as Amazon etc, selling our product here would be another effective way.
Looking at distributors of current Cbeebies programmes, I have identified a few potential exhibition/distribution company for our products.
HiT Entertainment - they are distributors for a lot of children's programmes and therefore have good experience.
Universal Pictures - are a very well-known name with good contacts and big budgets and do deal with children's shows DVD releases.
Classic Media - seem to deal with only cartoon/animation/children's programmes so therefor may be the best equipped and used to distributing products like our's successfully.
Friday 9 September 2011
Theme music...
In already existing children's programme opening credits, the music plays quite a significant part in drawing the viewer in to watch the programme itself. In one of my previous posts (link here), I looked at length of time of OTS. There appears to be a massive range of length of OTS. For instance, 'In the night garden' has an OTS of 2 minutes, compared to 'Peppa Pig' consisting of an OTS of 15 seconds! Therefore Joe and I have to make a decision about the approximate length of our OTS. We decided it should be on the lower-mid end of the scale, (30secs - 1min) because our target audience is young (1-4 yr olds) and therefore may not have the attention span for much longer than this, simply on an OTS.
The music itself, Joe and I decided, should be simple and melodic, with an average/upbeat b.p.m. Most existing OTS themes are quite lively and memorable to the show, and this is something we wish to achieve (as it helps towards brand recognition). Our OTS soundtrack would not feature lyrics/singing, but would have a voice over from the main character to make it easily recognisable (much like the 'Peppa Pig' OTS when she introduces herself and family).
The music itself, Joe and I decided, should be simple and melodic, with an average/upbeat b.p.m. Most existing OTS themes are quite lively and memorable to the show, and this is something we wish to achieve (as it helps towards brand recognition). Our OTS soundtrack would not feature lyrics/singing, but would have a voice over from the main character to make it easily recognisable (much like the 'Peppa Pig' OTS when she introduces herself and family).
Thursday 8 September 2011
Animation style...
For our piece, Joe and I agreed on a simple, hand-drawn animation. It would be drawn frame by frame (loosely resembling a 'flick book'). This way, it would be clear that our animation is meant to look hand-drawn, rather than just a bad quality animation. This style is used currently in the children's programme 'Humf' and 'Charlie and Lola'.
See how the style purposefully looks hand-drawn. Also in 'Humf' Joe and I commented on how we liked the stylistic feature of 'rough' colouring of background and may consider using this technique in our animation.
Joe will do a post in more depth on this topic (link here once he has done so).
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