Nowadays, the budget is a tool of publicity and egos, a series of games the modern producer must play and win. Images courtesy of iStockphoto.

There was a time when budgeting for animation was pretty straight forward, and unknown to the outside. Studio A proposed a project and told the client the price to produce. After a little used car haggling between the two, a final amount was settled on. The studio took the money and produced the project. Aside from popular stories of studio owners skimming money, or actually disappearing with the money, there seemed little interest in budgets. Budgets were just something for the crew to gripe about (being too small) and accountants to worry about. Many a creator had no real idea what the budget was. (And some still do not.)

There was one general rule -- the more money involved the better the final product. Of course features generally got more money than TV, thus features were considered more important than TV. Just as primetime series were more important than Saturday morning. Yet there were plenty of examples that proved throwing money at a project was no guarantee of quality.

I recall at one meeting towards the start of a series, a major exec brought me in to discuss the production. He asked me if we could produce a quality animated series for the money in the budget. I looked at the budget and stated it was a pretty standard budget for TV. "Yes," his tone got firmer, "but can we produce a quality animated series for this money. The owners want a quality series." I sat for a second and then stated, "Well, it really depends on whether everyone has the same definition of quality."

When animation went Hollywood back in the 1990s, budgeting followed along. Suddenly budgeting was drawn into the games of live-action production. It became a tool of publicity, egos and deals just as credits and "star power" did. And budgets were no longer something handled by top execs. The budget was thrust down to the line producers and producers to wrangle with. Now the budget was something everyone talked about, as if it were the Nielsens or box-office. The result had the effect of creating a series of games that the modern producer must play and win.

Some of these games include...

There are three kinds of budget games: The Budget Brag, The Old Army Budget and The Budget Box. All involve the producer fighting the financing entity for the right amount of money to be spent properly.

The Budget Brag
One of the first games to come along was the budget "brag." This became particularly popular in the 1990s as one studio or network after another bragged about how much money their production cost. Networks acted as if the show with the highest price tag won.

Quite frequently the mega-budget is simply a smoke screen for an average or even small budget. Once one looks at the line-by-line, one can find all sorts of money pits. A popular pit is in the exec producer budget lines. Here you will find big name producers getting as much as 25% of the budget for having their names on the project. Or maybe there is a star artist who is receiving two to five times the average rate because the client thinks they are "worth" it. I know of several productions (feature and TV) in which "plain old talented" artists are brought in to "fix" or "complete" all the work done by the star artist. Then there is the lure of the "big name" voice talent or music person.

Years ago, I was brought in on an educational series. The studio bragged it was the highest budgeted show they had ever done. They mentioned the total budget and it was easily 20% higher than any show currently in production at the studio. I began going over the figures with them, when I noticed something odd. "Why is the budget for storyboards less than on series 'x'?" I asked. Nothing but diverted eyes met my glance. Then I noticed that the amount of time and money for props was half the budget of a series that had been in production for over three seasons. "That show," I mentioned, "has lots of existing material, whereas this new show will need everything done by scratch." Looking deeper, I found a majority of the money was going to a research think-tank and advisory group, leaving the show with a smaller budget than the other series at the studio!

This one-ups-man-ship is mostly gone in today's cost conscious (cutting) mood. Yet, one should always be wary of the budget that seems "too good to be true." A savvy producer is not taken in by general talk about how "big" a budget is or how many stars are attached. They look line by line to see how much money is really going into the production. After all, a big budget is only of value if the money is used on the actual production.