Praise indeed!

I was delighted that fellow Birmingham screenwriter and novelist Andy Conway had some nice things to say about the Scampenstein excerpt he read on Circalit.

Screenwriter and novelist Andy Conway

Andy has recently had a script made into the feature Arjun and Alison which is just emerging from Post Production in Mumbai. A trailer for the film has just been released.

As well as being the long time moderator of the Shooting People Screenwriters mailing list - Andy has also released a series of novels, novellas and short stories on to Kindle where I'm told they're selling very well.

Here's what he had to say about Scampenstein.

"It's good stuff. I'm really enjoying it....It flows well and you're introducing characters very well and it's got a real Disney feel to it. Very well done."

You can find all the links to Andy's Amazon output on this page.

Thats all for now though I'm hoping to have the meeting with the graphic artists who I'e been in touch with about porting the idea into graphic novel format very soon :-)

Watch this space!

Scampenstein: Small Dog. Big Dreams

This is the new blog for my Scampenstein feature animation project. I'm hoping to port my screenplay idea into a graphic novel with the help of some internationally respected comic book artists with who I am in now in talks.

I then hope to use the resulting graphic novel and long tail marketing (sic) to find the money to make the feature using a UK animation house.

The project has had a bit of a troubled history from when I first tried to push it on Facebook as the first crowd-funded animated feature a few years back.

As is often the case early adopters are often in the right place too soon. The rise of crowd funding sites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter plus the ubiquity of Facebook use means that the possibility of creating the film via social networking and crowd-scourcing is much better than it was back then.

Prior to that the idea had languished on someones desk at Aardman for 18 months where it had been sent by my agent at the time.

Unfortunately this is because the individual concerned went off sick and I was later told actually died which explained the delay in hearing back. They eventually told me they liked the idea but that it wasn't quite right for them.

There was then a short flurry of interest from someone based at Pinewood that eventually came to naught.

I've always believed in the project and have received encouragement from a small cadre of loyal supports who seem to believe in it as much if not more than I do. So big ups to Elinor Perry, Gareth Turpie and Victoria Morton and others who have been there since the start.

Mr. Charlie Natty Dreadlocks  esq.

The project itself was inspired by my much lamented Irish Water Spaniel Charlie who used to jump up and hug me in a Frankenstein's monster sort of a way. i also received some inspiration and the name of one of my lead characters from a BBC story about some dogs who used to escape from their cages at the Battersea Dog's Home at night led by a lurcher called Red.

Canine Escapologist - Red the Lurcher

Please like the Facebook page and watch this space as the project develops.

TAFN

Woof!

Brendan