With a background in Advertising and Master's in Creative Advertising (which was basically a year on how to come up and sell ideas) development always seemed like the sensible choice for me.
Essentially, development is the very start of the process in TV - it's where you come up with your idea(s) and sell them to a production company or commissioner. In scripted, this could be finding or writing a script. In unscripted, it's about coming up with that one idea for a format or a doc that's going to grab your commissioner's (and the audiences) attention.
In advertising, I'd do this on a daily basis. In fact, you'd come up with hundreds (literally, hundreds) of ideas. You'd go into a meeting with your Creative Director or client, and come out with many one or two - if you were lucky. So, whilst it might seem easy and straight forward (we all think we have great ideas, right?) it's actually not that easy.
Coming up with great ideas (and putting them into a format which sells) actually involves a pretty tight process. Whilst I'm by no means an expert at this (I come up with ideas in my spare time and pitch them) I've broken the process down below for you.
Step 1 - Find your idea, and then find some more
Ideas are great, and our own ideas are even better. Usually, you'll need to come up with lots of ideas before one lands on TV.
Every good idea, or story, starts with what we call an insight. An insight can either be a recent stat you've found, or it can be something more profound - something about basic human emoition, or simply someone's story. If you want development to be your thing, then you should be on the look out day and night (ears and eyes open) looking for your next idea.
If you're working in scripted, then this means reading a lot of scripts, plays or books. In you work in unscripted, then you might want to read a lot of news stories to see what people care about. You should always use social media to your advantage. Sometimes, we can formulate ideas and entire shows off of the back of an Instagram account.
If you get the chance to pitch to a channel or executive at a production company, then make sure you don't show up with just one idea. They'll usually want to see a few.
Ideas are great. But, if you want to see your idea on TV, then you'll need to know how to pitch it.
Step 2 - Pitching your idea
So, now you need to pitch your idea. Depending on what your idea is and how genre it lands under, there's different ways of going about this.
If you're working in scripted, then you'll likely be working with script writers and producers to get scripts green lit. If you're the writer yourself, then you'll need to write what they call a treatment.
Treatments
Treatments are an in-depth pitch doc, used to sell scripted shows and sometimes documentaries. They're written by the writer and producers who intend to pitch the show to a Channel or company. They should contain a whole host of info, including the name and genre of your show, the synoposis, the log line and details about the main characters.
If you're pitching a documentary, then you'll want to include a synopsis, a log line and the main contributors.
You'll also want to mention how many eps you want to make, and how long each ep will be. Your treatment should be well-designed in the style of the show (whether that's a horror or a comedy and always sent in a PDF format.
Log lines - a log line sums up your show in one sentence. There's a typical formula you should follow when writing log lines, as shown below....
Synopsis - a synopsis is a symmary of the script, idea or premise of the show. You should explain the set up, where the conflict may be and the climax / jeopardy. You might also want to introduce a few characters. You should try to keep it short and sweet and no longer than a paragraph.
Two pagers
Two pagers are mainly used in factent / docs. They're two pages of info (usually heavily designed) with top line info about what your show is going to be about. Usually, the first page sums up what the show is about (with a synopsis or log line) and then the second page goes into more detail (the way the format will work, the contributors etc).
Two pagers are heavily designed PDFs, which should give your commissioner a good idea of the visual style of your show. The front page should be what the opening titles of your show should look like (or thereabouts). So, you'll need to practise your photoshop and graphic design skills. Whilst they don't need to be perfect, they do need to look neat.
Sizzles
Sizzles are two minute edits put together which gives your commissioner or production company an idea of what your show would look like. You might need to use clips from other shows to demostrate this, or film your own footage (an iphone will do). Again, this doesn't need to be perfect. A decent smartphone and iMovie will do the trick.
Sometimes, some shows will hire an sizzle editor to work as part of the development team - but only when there's budget (which is quite rare these days).
Step 3 - Sending it out
Sending out your ideas can be risky - naturally you don't want anyone to steal them. However, by sending out your ideas over email (so there's always written proof) and sending out an NDA, you should be safe.
You can send them to production companies (although some don't accept unsolicted ideas, so always check) or you can send them directly to the Channel, by emailing commissioners.
Don't be too disheartened if you don't get an email back - remember that production companies, commissioners and development executives hear idea after idea. You can always ask for their feedback if they don't get back to you, which could go a long way.
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