We made it to the CTN Animation Expo on Saturday with our WatchCat postcards in hand and wearing our official WatchCat t-shirts. The Expo was in full swing as we walked around running into old friends and making new ones, building an audience one person at a time.
I had been to CTN in the past, usually when I was looking for work and would sometimes get a little overwhelmed by all the talent there. But this year it was a little different -- we had something to show.
This is the place to network and meet other artists and creators. We walked around -- doing a lot of "stop and chats" -- handing out postcards and telling everyone about our webisode.
The biggest thing that happened to us on Saturday, when Greg was walking along and this guy ran up to him. I thought the guy was security because Greg had his pass hanging on his back. Turns out the guy stopped Greg because he really liked his WatchCat t-shirt and wanted to know where he got it.
My good friend, John Whisler screenprinted them from a design I had created. We only printed a few shirts, but we might print up more if people really like the design.
The guy who really liked the design turned out to be character designer and cat t-Shirt collector, Peter de Seve. You might not know his name, but you have seen his work in Mulan, A Bug's Life, Tarzan and Finding Nemo. He also designed "Scrat."
When we found this out, we
removed our shirts, knelt before this animation legend and offered our
shirts to him. He said he was in a hurry to get to a panel, but
appreciated our offer and asked us to put our shirts back on asap. If you still want a shirt, Peter, email us and we'll talk...
Saturday ended
with us feeling pretty good and only having about 20 postcards left to
hand out. We talked about all the things we had seen that day and wondered
if we should return the next day or not. We're glad we did.Greg and I both went to Columbia College in Chicago years ago and today the world became a little bit smaller. We met John Musker, writer and director of The Little Mermaid, Aladdin and The Princess and the Frog. He's from Chicago and it turns out that Mr. Musker's daughter, Mimi, married my favorite "Film Tech 2" instructor, Dan Dinello!
Then we met James Lopez who also used to work for Disney, but is now working on his own animated series called "Hullabaloo". James gave us some very helpful advice for making our WatchCat series a success.
And now, our WatchCat work has just begun and you can help "Support the Cat" by checking out Watchcat on Facebook and sharing our youtube link with your friends. liking us and letting everyone know that their neighborhood is under his watch...
Send us your WatchCat photos!
Have a Happy Thanksgiving day and night.
Keeping an eye on it.
