Steambot asks Urbance fans to back the Kickstarter for a project that will start off the transmedia project with a pilot episode.
Steambot Studios has begun its Kickstarter campaign for a transmedia project called Urbance. The studio plans to make the TV series, video games, artbook posters, comics, and original outfits of characters; the Kickstarter campaign, if successful, will enable the production of an animated pilot for the TV show.
Urbance is intended for mature audiences due to its subject matter. In a crumbling city, sex has been prohibited because of the danger of a genetic virus. Men and women grow up separated from each other and form gangs. The youth subculture gathers in an underground nightclub called URBANCE to dance and drink. One man and woman become close to one another despite the gender wars.
Steambot Studios, which is a collective of artists who have collaborated on TRON Legacy, Godzilla, X-MEN: Days of Future Past, Thief, and Batman games from Warner Brothers, hopes to raise a minimum of $189,000 for the completion of the pilot episode. At that amount, the team will make a six-minute pilot. At $299,000, it will produce part one of the first episode (at 13 minutes in length), and at $499,000 it will produce the full first episode at 26 minutes.
Urbance will show a variety of characters’ sexualities, and much of the cast is people of color.
Should the Kickstarter campaign be successful, Steambot will bring on Hiroshi Shimizu to work on Urbance. Shimizu, an animation director and character designer, has worked on Princess Mononoke, Porco Rosso, Michiko & Hatchin, and Space Dandy.
“The character designs and the colors of Urbance are incredible,” Shimizu said. “There is a charm that I don’t have in my designs and I would love to develop.”
The Kickstarter campaign launched yesterday is nearing $35,000 as of publication. In 43 days on November 6, the campaign will come to a close.
Source: Urbance
