Mark Simon falling for his newest production, Enchanted Thyme. BG design by Tiger Bells Animation.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. In animation, it's more valuable than that, especially in pre-production.

We live in a fractured world where artists now work long distance... very long distance. You can be anywhere in the world and work on almost any project.

Last year, Sony produced Open Season 2 from Los Angeles using an animation studio in Texas while the director, Matthew O'Callaghan (Curious George), stayed in Los Angeles. Many TV series are developed in the U.S. and the production happens overseas.

Mark Simon on Skype video conference.

I remember when I was at Nickelodeon in the early '90s, we had T1 lines running between the different studios around the country. Nick was spending about $10,000 per month for those video and information feeds. Plus, the equipment costs thousands and thousands of dollars. They were fast, efficient, effective... and really expensive.

Today, technology is making this easier and cheaper for anyone to use.

I am directing an animated pilot called Enchanted Thyme, based on a children's book. The creator, Ariane Smith, is in New York, I am in Orlando and the production studio is Tiger Bells in New Delhi, India. We send stills and video files to one another almost instantly using basic e-mail and YouSendIt.com (which is much faster and easier than ftp). We have realtime video development meetings and conversations using Skype.

Our cost? Skype video conferencing is free. Email is free. YouSendIt, which can send files as big at 2GB over the web, has a free version and versions for $10 and $30 per month. My webcam costs $35.