Developing Ideas & Building a Pitch Deck
With this post, I aim to discuss the various aspects of developing an initial pitch deck in preparation for the idea pitch in the coming weeks. Having discussed the project and decided to pursue the production of an animated film as a response to the Production Team Collaboration assignment in the third year, we wanted to take initiative early on, with a formal and considered approach to presenting and pitching our story ideas to each other. This would be in the form of a pitch deck, a document comprising of initial mind map explorations of each idea, mood boards, and a brief synopsis and visual concept piece for each of our three narrative proposals. The purpose of this pitch deck is to give us a solid foundation to expand and develop upon if our concept is selected, with these documents being an important part of the pitching process for client animation jobs and freelance work. The ability to present and curate our work in a professional and visually appealing manner is an important skill to practice and work on, something we wanted to put a focus on going into the project.
With each of these aspects considered, however, it is ultimately the strength of the story that each pitch eventually boils down to. The quality and intrigue of that initial gem of an idea, that concept that will drive the entire project moving forward. With this in mind, I set aside a significant amount of time to simply sit down and write: noting down potential story threads, ideas, images from my mind, looking through newspaper articles and headlines for inspiration and poured myself into watching documentaries, films and any narrative-based media that I could find in an allocated amount of time. Throughout my time on the course, I have developed a few potential film ideas, all of which were assembled into a large list of film pitches and synopsis lines. With over seventeen potential story concepts, the main task was to take three that felt the most engaging and original as an animated project, and begin developing them into more fleshed-out story ideas. At this early stage, it was important to still remain loose and adaptable with narrative themes, but also to craft a refined log-line that would sell the project.
When developing these three concepts, ‘Animalia Paradoxa’, ‘Wild City’ and ‘Spinebreaker’, my approach was based on exploring and outlining the key narrative aspects, ideas and images that interested and excited me as a director and animator, developing pitches with strong potential for world building and story appeal, which work well as both enclosed narratives, and fun sandboxes to play around with and explore further. Originality was also a key factor in the development of my initial concepts - whilst I understand and appreciate that nothing is truly original, I did want to primarily pursue narratives and concepts that haven’t been done recently in the form of an animated project. With each concept, I conducted some basic research into similar work in the subject area, ensuring that each pitch presented here would allow for a fun creative spin and response - and allow our work to be fresh and exciting for a Western audience.
Alongside developing a range of visual reference and inspiration in the form of mood boards, we also wanted to accompany each pitch with a rough concept piece, working as an appealing visual to represent and depict each idea. Looking back, I easily feel my concept piece for ‘Animalia Paradoxa’ is the most exciting and engaging as an audience member, with myself completing the pitch deck over a few days in-between client work resulting in less-than-stellar artwork for the other two pitches. Despite this, I was ultimately happy with the pitch deck I was able to produce, making time to develop a considered format and presentation for each pitch. With this, I hoped to develop a visually appealing and engaging design for the document, which we could adapt as the project continues. Happy with the ideas presented in this initial pitch deck, I’m looking forward to being able to present these concepts to teammate Jack and from that discussion, develop a single idea to pursue further.