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Marktoonery.com Rent-A-Toon
Affordable Animation For Local/Independent Producers



Rent-A-ToonRent-A-Toon Television Commercial Animation:
The going rate for animation (according to one of the Cartoon Network VP's) is $1,000 per finished second. That would make a 10-second tag $10,000 and a 30-second spot $30,000!

Most local advertisers are either unwilling (if not downright unable) to budget this much money for a local TV spot. That's where Rent-A-Toon Commercials come in. If you've ever used "clip art" you've already got a pretty good idea how it works. For a smaller price than you'd pay for most local live-action commercials, you simply pay a 6-month licensing fee for an animated video that you're sharing with other producers (in different viewing areas). You can even customize each spot with local video.


 
 
Cartoon Savings
Featuring budget and specialty packages to fit your needs as well as pricing for custom exclusive TV spots and annual contract animation.


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Animation Style/Quality Budget Options
Samples are from cheapest/quickest to most expensive/time-consuming:


Beginner's Budget - Minimalist 50s
Here's a great place to start for someone wanting to do some animated advertising, but doesn't have a huge budget. Here at MarkToonery.com, we like to think of ourselves serving that "modest- to medium-sized" budget production range. The characters are extremely simple. The colors range from black and white to as many as two additional colors, perhaps one for skin color, and another for clothes.

Many times we get kinda tired of people telling us, "I can't even draw a stick figure!" Well, whoever would want to? We prefer to call these characters" Gingerbread figures," or "Body stocking figures," because that's what they look like... someone wearing a full-body stocking that minimizes their features and maximizes their expressive potential.

The backgrounds, also, are sparsely detailed, with 2-3 colors. Believe it or not, in some cases (depending on length of the cartoon), simple animation like this can start in the three figure range.


Moose & Squirrel - The Stylized 60s
Here's the next step up, budget-wise. You've obviously got a slightly wider choice of colors, and the characters have a somewhat wider range of movement. We're still talking limited animation (although the politically cartoon correct term is " stylized animation"), but it's a little more fun to watch!

The characters are a lot more "cartoony" (as we think of the classic sense of the word) so don't be surprised to see talking ducks, mice, and of course, wabbits alongside your next-door neighbor's animated caricature.

The background details are sketchy at best, but very cartoony and quite colorful. As far as budget goes, depending on the length of your project (usually 30 seconds and up, anyway), here's where we step into the four-figure range.



Saturday Morning - The Mystery-Solvin' 70s
All right, if we've got a favorite, it's somewhere around here. The 1970s was the era of the "Comedy" Adventure cartoon." The characters are slightly more" realistic" in their design (although we prefer the term "believable" to "realistic"), and for the most part, you're dealing with a human cast. Sure, you may see the occasional werewolf (until we take off his mask to see who he REALLY is), and one talking dog or gator may be hanging around... but hey, that's animation! Right?

The backgrounds, like the characters, have a bit more attention to detail as well.

So please don't be thinking to yourself, "I can't afford animation!" (Seriously, why do you have to be so negative?) Any business has to advertise to survive. That much is a given, we can all agree. Come up with a production budget you can live with, to be spent on the animation cost. If you're wanting to do a TV commercial, remember to allow yourself enough to actually run the commercial on local stations. If you're wanting to do a web banner or ad, remember to allow yourself enough to pay a website to run your ad (for instance, here in Atlanta, a local consumer magazine charges about $95/month to run an animated banner on their website). Or, if you want to distribute your animated commercial or informational/sales video via business card on mini-DVD, remember to save part of your budget for DVD-duplication and postage.

See? There are so many ways to get your message out there! Please, won't you empower us to help you?

Producer's Budget Package
Here's a set of thumbnails and video samples from the Producer's Budget Package, which is currently available for independent video producers, local cable company offices, local network affiliates, and creative service departments.

Old Furniture "Old Furniture" sample
QuickTime Movie icon
View sample video of "Old Furniture" - 920 KB - QuickTime required.


Car Sales/Rental - Monster Savings - Teacher's Pet
"Extinct Transportation" "Monster Savings" "Teacher's Pet" samples
QuickTime Movie icon
View sample video of "Extinct Transportation" - 1 MB - QuickTime required.

QuickTime Movie icon
View sample video of "Monster Savings" - 1.5 MB - QuickTime required.


Don't Be Late/Penguin's Cool Deal
"Don't Be Late" "Penguin's Cool Deal" samples
QuickTime Movie icon View sample video of "Don't Be Late" - 884 KB - QuickTime required.



Holiday/Wedding Package
Here are a few samples from our Holiday/Wedding package, with intros/tags for Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Weddings, 4th of July, and even a Moonlight Madness Sale.

Christmas Halloween Savings 4th of July Eagle Moonlight Madness
Holiday/Wedding Package samples

Valentine's/Wedding
Valentine's/Wedding samples

MarkToons Custom Exclusive Animation

For Custom Exclusive Animation, as well as Contract Animation, we require a deposit of 1/3 of the budget up front to begin work, 1/3 of budget on delivery of the pose reel (a sort of "onscreen comic book with a soundtrack"--on VHS), and the remaining 1/3 of the budget on delivery of fully-animated tape. Revisions are done at $60/hour beyond pose reel approval, and it takes an approximate average of 2 weeks production per 10 seconds of character animation (not counting special projects such as live-action/animation combos).

If you're interested in any listed or unlisted prices, receiving a demo, ordering either/both of our Rent-A-Toon tapes, or any of our other services, please email us:

email Mark

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