My Animation Era

As time enters March, the temperature in Jiangchuan has also warmed up.

Just in time for the new semester, TV stations all over the country are gearing up and planning to launch a number of new works in this opening season.

Among them, "Electric Shock Boy", which is highly anticipated by Gu Miao, has released its second season!

This is a sci-fi future-themed animation that was aired last year and was well received. Its setting of transforming into a hero attracted many children to imitate it at the time.

Then there is "Fairy Please Stop", which Penguin exclusively broadcasts on its own video website, a daily-style web adaptation animation with a fairy tale background.

This novel is different from previous novels adapted from online novels, that is, the original work is not very popular, at least it is not well-known on the Internet, and it is not as good as the previous masterpieces adapted by Penguin.

But what is surprising is that the original novel was tepid, but after being adapted into an animation, it became very popular. It ranked first in the "National Creation List" and became the most popular serialized animation on Penguin Video.

This has also caused many people in the industry to ponder.

It seems that when looking for suitable animation adaptations of web texts, you do not necessarily have to target those popular web texts for adaptation.

There are some Internet articles with excellent plots and imaginative ideas. The original works may have average results, but the effect of adapting them into animated comics may not be inferior to those of famous works.

The trend of web text-to-animation changes has changed.

In the past, everyone searched for Internet IPs and directly ranked them. All Internet works at the top of the rankings, as long as they were not derived from Infinite Heavens or fandoms, were asked about them.

But since the animation "Please Stop Fairy" became popular, everyone has changed their minds.

It turns out that if you look for books based on the rankings, you may not be able to find an IP suitable for animation adaptation. The Internet novels at the top of the list are popular, but not every adaptation is very effective.

The most important point is that copyright transactions for popular online works at the top of the rankings are expensive!

Instead of squeezing your head to grab an IP that is expensive and you don’t know the specific adaptation effect, why not try some ordinary high-quality online articles in the library?

If you can find a second work like "Please Stop Fairy", wouldn't you make a lot of money?

The ideas of friends and businessmen have indirectly changed the existing ecological environment of online text-based animation.

Take Beep Reading as an example.

As an online novel platform owned by Wanbao Group and invested heavily in building it, although it is currently not as good as the industry-leading Penguin Reading, it also has many high-quality small IPs.

In the past, people paid more attention to the influence of the entire network. If they wanted to buy, they would buy the most popular online novels. Therefore, it was rare for friends to come to Bibi Reading to buy the copyright.

Now there is!

And there are quite a few.

According to Nantong, after the animation "Fairy Please Stop" became popular, Bibi Reading actually sold the animation adaptation rights of 14 books in one go.

These 14 books are generally the kind of "ordinary high-quality" articles that are popular on this site but have little influence and discussion elsewhere.

Under normal circumstances, it is difficult to sell the copyright of this kind of ordinary high-quality online articles. After all, it is not a big hit on the entire Internet, and the number of fans and popularity are not enough.

But from now on, these ordinary high-quality online articles have also become the targets of many friends and businessmen, and the frequency of copyright transactions once exceeded the IP of top online articles that are popular on the entire Internet.

"Okay, okay!"

After learning that Bibi Reading could also export web IP to its friends, Gu Miao was very happy and immediately allocated another 200 million yuan to Bibi Reading with a wave of her hand.

Not only that.

He also attracted a heavyweight author to Bibi Reading, the science fiction writer Da Liu.

With a two-pronged approach, there is no need to worry about Bibi Reading’s business failing to develop.

…

After the replay of the animation "Martin's Morning" ended, Gu Miao has been busy with various trivial matters.

It wasn't until the beginning of March that he got around to joining the animation production team of "Three Thousand Questions of the Naughty Blue Cat" and announced his new work to the public.

Gu Sanshui is a big star!

His new work is of great interest to both anime fans and colleagues.

However, everyone shook their heads after learning that Gu Sanshui was not doing regular animation this time, but instead doing some knowledge animation.

In everyone’s opinion, the knowledge-popularizing nature of “Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat” means it is destined to be a niche and unpopular work that is unlikely to cater to the preferences of mainstream audiences.

The reason why Gu Sanshui's new work is a popular science animation seems to have been hinted at. This is a political mission...

All right!

Everyone can quite relate to it.

Regarding the fact that "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat" was not paid attention to, Gu Miao was not very angry, and her mood did not fluctuate.

This is normal!

If he has not watched this animation and does not understand the story of the animation, he may not be interested.

After all, I can only say that everyone understands the environment of popular science animation.

If you don't get attention, you won't get attention. Anyway, at the official level, it's enough that someone pays attention to "Blue Cat Naughty Questions".

CCTV Children's Channel, which has always supported popular science animation and has personally produced many popular science animations, is very interested in "Three Thousand Questions of the Naughty Blue Cat".

After learning that this is a work that spreads knowledge and is quite similar to the famous popular science book "One Hundred Thousand Whys", they immediately decided to buy the first broadcast rights.

This is a political achievement!

Other TV stations may have to worry about the poor ratings of popular science animations and their inability to attract advertisers.

Children on CCTV don’t have to think so much. Popular science animations have a completely different meaning to them. They even want more popular science animations, the better.

"Ha ha!"

"What even the most popular animations such as "Martin's Morning", "Digimon", "Pokémon" and "Swordsman" have not been able to do, "Blue Cat's 3000 Questions" has done it."

Lao Zhang couldn't help but laugh and said: "We haven't even finished one episode of the animation, but the premiere rights have already been sold! From now on, who will dare to say that popular science animation has no future?"

Do you call this okay?

Do you understand the value of selling the rights to air the first round of animation before even one episode is finished?

Although the transaction price is pitifully low and cannot be compared with Gu Miao's previous works, but if you think about it, besides "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat", what other animation can do it?

Just looking at the planning, the rights to broadcast the feature film can be sold without even making one episode. This is indeed a unique scene in popular science animation.

For other animations, TV stations may have to weigh the pros and cons and take a look at the finished film before deciding whether to buy it.

For popular science animation, just take a look at the plan and make sure it is a real popular science animation.

No need to consider anything else.

Animation of this nature is considered a type of "political achievement" in the eyes of many TV stations, and the ratings are not important.

This is just like a charity animation!

If you make a short animation for charity and don't consider returns, the TV station won't refuse you and will still broadcast it.

In the final analysis, the nature of this kind of animation is different. As long as TV stations broadcast public welfare animations or popular science animations, they can go to the leaders to claim credit. This is a good thing that can make them look good.

"I have already said that "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat" is not a purely popular science animation, but also has the characteristics of a commercial animation."

Gu Miao spread her hands and said, "They don't believe it, so what can I do?"

If you think it’s a popular science animation, then it is!

Only Gu Miao himself knows that the accurate classification of "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat" should be a commercial animation of popular science knowledge type.

Looking at this work based on the standards of popular science animation, I can only say that it is a bit misleading.

But it's not a big problem.

The father-in-law said that the father-in-law was right, and the mother-in-law said that the mother-in-law was right.

The TV stations all recognized the popular science nature of "Three Thousand Questions about Naughty Blue Cat", so there was no need for Gu Miao to argue with them about it.

Although popular science animation is generally cheaper than commercial animation, this is the first season after all, and Gu Miao has no intention of making money from the first season.

Prioritize expanding your visibility!

When the popularity of the Blue Cat series increases, not only the price of the broadcast rights will increase, but also the "Blue Cat" IP will allow Wanbao to make a lot of money.

Gu Miao has not forgotten...

Before the Pleasant Goat and the Bear came out and became enlightened, Blue Cat was the king of IP derivatives. At that time, the schoolbags carried by children basically had the "Blue Cat" pattern printed on them.

Pleasant Goat came later.

Before 2008, the influence of the Blue Cat IP was wider than that of Pleasant Goat, and it knew more people.

The only pity is that no one had much money in their pockets at that time, and children's pocket money was not as rich as children today.

Not even pocket money at all…

So at that time, the IP of Blue Cat was very popular, and there were many peripheral derivatives, but most of them were peripherals such as clothes, shoes, schoolbags and pencil cases.

Toys and dolls are quite rare.

no way!

This is the same as what happened to the American Film Studio.

When animation was most popular, it did not catch up with the era when material life was the most affluent. Everyone did not have much money in their pockets, and there was no way to support it.

Think about it from another perspective.

If Haunted Bear and Pleasant Goat were born 10 or 20 years earlier and became popular all over the country, it would be difficult to persist. After all, at that time, the value of IP would not be maximized.

Therefore, it is really not easy for the Blue Cat series to persist for so many years, from its peak at the beginning of the century to the subsequent nirvana and rebirth of "Blue Cat Dragoons".

It’s not like there weren’t animations as popular as Blue Cat at the time, but they were all out of date.

Only the Blue Cat series has survived, and is surviving well with the help of the Dragoon series...

"Dragon Riders is a great piece of work!"

Gu Miao thought to herself.

I have to admire the vision of the director of the original Blue Cat series, who used children's natural curiosity about dinosaurs to give the Blue Cat series a new lease of life.

If it weren't for the special sentimental bonus towards "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat", to be honest, the Dragon Riders series would be Gu Miao's best choice.

But feelings are also a kind of power.

Three Thousand Questions may be slightly inferior to the Dragon Riders in terms of story brilliance, but after all, these are Gu Miao's childhood memories.

He will do his best to make this animation so that Three Thousand Questions can be reborn in this parallel world and become a childhood memory for a generation.

…

The first season of 3000 Questions, also known as the opening series, is the "Humorous Stage" series.

This season, each episode is an independent story.

Most of these stories take place in children's daily lives. Through these short stories, animations convey to children knowledge about astronomy, geography, philosophy of life and other aspects.

Animated children's encyclopedia!

In addition to the "cat and mouse" pairing of Blue Cat and Naughty, the main characters appearing in the animation also include animal anthropomorphic characters such as Feifei, Fatty and Curry.

Among them, Feifei is more famous.

To be precise, Feifei, the fox, can be regarded as the "supporting character" of the Blue Cat series to a certain extent.

On the other hand, naughty...

It's a bit different.

Gu Miao didn't mean to belittle naughty, she just wanted to describe a fact.

At the beginning, the animation was set up with the dual protagonists of Blue Cat and Naughty. Naughty and Blue Cat are complementary characters like Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf, Tom and Jerry, Bald Qiang and Big Bear.

But it was not difficult for everyone to find out later.

Naughty, the second male lead, has become less and less valued, and his status has plummeted.

Why is it called the Blue Cat Series and not the Blue Cat Naughty Series?

This is mainly because the original naughty second male lead was far less popular than the first male lead, Blue Cat, and was even regarded as a supporting role, so he was omitted.

In fact, Gu Miao was surprised at the beginning when Dragon Riders was first aired.

Why the Blue Cat Dragoons instead of the Blue Cat Naughty Dragoons? The second male lead who complements each other is not even worthy of mentioning in the title?

All right!

From this point of view, Naughty has indeed been marginalized and has lost its previous status and glory.

This is what happened in the original version.

Gu Miao would not let such a thing happen in the Wanbao version. He wanted to make Naughty more popular and no longer be reduced to the background of Blue Cat.

Sanqianwen was fine in the early stages.

But in the later stage, "Cat Brother" was too dazzling, and his naughty aura was gradually obscured. By the time of Dragoons, Naughty was completely reduced to an ordinary supporting role.

The naughty issue was actually foreshadowed a long time ago.

Smart, naughty, and full of adventurous spirit, there is nothing wrong with these characters individually, but when combined together and applied to Naughty, there is a problem.

His mischievous and high IQ is reflected in the animation, but there are slightly fewer opportunities to reflect it.

The naughty childishness, putting his companions in danger because of his love for adventure, is something that needs to be revised.

Don't let him be disliked by the audience.

Sometimes, the audience's favorable impression of an anime character is accumulated bit by bit.

And it's easy to destroy this goodwill, all it takes is a plot that's not mind-boggling, or a detail that doesn't fit the character.

Just like Boiling Sheep, he was brave and reliable for so many episodes, but the image he created was destroyed in just a few episodes.

Who still remembers that Feiyangyang was a very reliable partner at first, but they only remember his dog-licking attitude toward Meiyangyang.

A lifelong good person will be praised as a heinous person if he does a bad thing. A lifelong bad person will be praised and whitewashed after doing a good thing.

This kind of thing is too common!

The reason why the character Naughty is not as lovable as Blue Cat, or that the impression left on the audience is not as profound as Blue Cat, is ultimately ruined by the details.

If the details are done well and the characters are enriched, Naughty, the second male lead, is still very stable, at least he will not be marginalized, let alone be demoted to a supporting role.

It's such a shame to be naughty.

A good twin star setting was reduced to a supporting role in the end. This may be what many fans feel regretful about.

Even Feifei is liked by so many people...