Webseries School: Creator Up! [Review]
Webseries are the great Wild West of the film industry, and for new content creators, it can be a daunting plain to navigate. Creator Up is the online Webseries School created by USC alumni who want to bring the joy of collaboration and creation from film school into this new realm of content creation.
Creating a webseries is a great way to get original content out there and create your calling card. But creating a show can be expensive and risky, and if you don't do it right, your audience might as well be a few tumbleweeds.
Thanks to these good people over at Creator Up, I've been able to take two courses free of charge and check out Creator Up's many additional resources, such as webinars, live labs in Los Angeles, and additional free lessons for members.
Here are reviews of the two courses I took:
Develop and Pitch Your Webseries
The course was called: How to Develop and Pitch Your Webseries
About the instructor: This course is taught by Mark Gantt, who created the notable show The Bannen Way on Crackle that won four streamy awards including Best Web Drama, Best Directing and Best Actor. I watched a few episodes of The Bannen Way, and it's a high-quality series with great action sequences. Gantt knows what he's talking about, and the amount of work that he put into his own webseries really shines through in his explanation of the struggle that it took for him to get The Bannen Way made and all the rejections he got along the way.
The course is insightful, and although at times I wished it was more in-depth and less of an overview, it was a good course with lots of great resources and I think it's a great watch if you're looking to create and pitch a webseries.
Here are some of the topics the course covered:
Market research and finding a target audience
How to use your contacts to launch your webseries
What marketing tools you'll need to get financing
The process of developing a webseries
How to create a "pitch deck"
How to set targets and specific goals for your webseries
What you should produce yourself in terms of sizzle reels
How to find actors and crew members
4/5 stars
I recommend this course for... webseries creators who are trying to find financing and a target audience for their show.
Get Your Show's First 10,000 Views
You can find the course here: How to Get Your Show's First 10,0000 Views. About the instructor: Brian Rodda runs his own boutique PR firm in LA and specializes in creating communities around great content. He's worked on shows like Husbands, Squaresville, Skyrim Parodies, and Stockholm. This course is key for launching your webseries, because seeing your show from a marketing standpoint will shape how you launch your series and cultivate your audience. Here are some of the topics the course covered:
Everything you need to know about social media (what platforms to target, how to approach them, the timeline and frequency of when you should be posting)
How to get people excited and talking about your show (starting with your cast and crew!)
How to reinforce your brand through viral marketing
5/5 starsI recommend this course for... content creators of all kinds. The advice in this course is key for building and mobilizing your fanbase to get your content in the spotlight. ...Knowledge is power when it comes to successfully and efficiently launching a webseries, and Creator Up is a great resource to add to your arsenal as you conquer the new frontier of entertainment.
