Judge Baby Bear doesn’t like overly long pieces for his festival. Courtesy of Mark Simon.

Everyone has a story to tell. That’s great. Just make it short. Oh yeah, and make it good. While you’re at it, make sure you give it a good ending. And… and… wait a minute. I’m pretty sure there’s something else I wanted to say.

Hmm.

Oh well. While I’m trying to remember, I’ve got a story for you. Trust me. It’s a good one.

Once upon a time in a studio not so far away, there lived a girl named Golditoons who loved to tell stories. She would tell stories to her family and she would tell stories to her friends. The only problem with her stories is that they were always too long.

Golditoons wanted to produce animations to tell her stories. She knew it would be a great way to showcase her talent and storytelling abilities. One of her problems was that her stories were so long she was never able to finish her cartoons.

Golditoons spent years trying to produce different animations. One was so long that by the time she got half way through with it, she was a lot better than she was when she started it. Then she went back and started re-doing earlier scenes. It was a never-ending cycle that ended without enough finished material to present to anyone.

Another partially finished short took so long that the people helping her either moved, got full-time jobs or lost interest in working on someone else’s project for free. That one was never finished either.

Inspiration then hit Golditoons. Well, maybe she was just hit with a burning desire actually finish something and make it good. She came up with an idea that was under two minutes long that she was passionate about. She wanted to enter the upcoming Three Bears Animated Festival in the Woods with her cartoon, but she didn’t have a lot of time. Good thing her story was short.

Golditoons enters the Three Bears in the Woods Festival with her short film. Courtesy of Mark Simon.

Golditoons pitched her idea to some friends. She pitched it with all her heart and told them that working together they could finish it in just a few weeks. Her friends were inspired by her pitch and agreed to help. She also asked them for feedback on the story and the ending. Her friends had a few great suggestions that made her concept even better.

She had asked her mother for advice on earlier projects, but her mom would only say, “That’s wonderful, dear. You are so talented.” While it was nice to hear, it didn’t help. To learn and make her project better she now asked people who really knew animation and how to tell stories.

In order to make sure everyone would be treated fairly, Golditoons gave a contract to all the people helping on her animated short. Since she couldn’t pay them for their work, except for a little porridge during those late nights, she considered them investors in her vision. As investors, she offered them all a percentage of any gross income from her toon equal to percentage of the work they did of the whole project. She budgeted her short as if she were paying for everything and determined if someone’s work represented 5% of the budget, they would get 5% of the gross until she paid them twice their normal fee. Everyone was happy.

Soon, Golditoons was in production. She had to keep up her energy to keep everyone interested in completing her short.

Before she knew it, they were done. The short looked great and had a strong ending. Then it was off to the Three Bears Animated Festival in the Woods. It wasn’t far. Just over the river and through the woods.

Once her short was entered into the festival, it was viewed by the three judges. The judges each viewed a different type of project. Papa Bear judge looked at the long films, and there wasn’t enough time to run many of them. Mama Bear judge looked at the shorts that were too long to be short and too short to be long. Most of them seemed to be longer than they should have been and didn’t know when to end. Baby Bear judge got the shorts that were just right. They were concise, good stories and they had great endings. It was also easier to fit these shorts into the festival program, so those entrants stood a better chance of getting into the limited time allocated in the festival.