Mark Mayerson, a TV show creator, animator, and teacher, has written what may be the single best thing I’ve ever read about the contemporary animation pitching process: Unfortunately, a pitch is a poor substitute for the finished product for a variety of reasons.
It seems like a lot of artists just have it together, never missing a beat in churning out work as if on an assembly line powered by boundless creativity. Of course the truth is, everyone gets in a rut sometimes that can feel like being lodged in the Mariana Trench.
While following in the footsteps of the successful doesn’t guarantee success, it provides a pretty good outline when forming your own strategies. The biography of the late Jerry Garcia points to such an outline of how the Grateful Dead approached their work that might serve useful in yours.
