Toonstar CEO, John Attanasio said his aim is to create “a new Cartoon Network.”
Attanasio and his co-founder Luisa Huang used to be executives at Warner Brothers, so they both worked under similar corporate umbrella as the Cartoon Network. Attanasio revealed that the key to Toonstar’s approach is to make animated content that’s “mobile, snackable, interactive.”
Basically, the startup’s iOS app enables users to customize cartoon characters and then animate them with their own facial expressions. The resulting cartoons can be live streamed (both on Toonstar itself and other platforms like YouTube Live, Facebook Live and Musical.ly) and viewers can interact by adding their own animations, such as dropping an anvil into the act.
This is similar to the animojis Apple announced about a month ago. But, Attanasio stated the two services are trying to do diverse things — animojis are communication tools, while Toonstar is all about entertainment and fun. (You also don’t need an iPhone X to use the Toonstar’s app.)
He also claimed that the technology capable to do the facial recognition of this kind has been around for a while now. What’s new, he said, is “this idea of a selfie culture,” which Toonstar makes by enabling users to transform themselves into other characters, and even entire casts of characters.
The app is coming out of it beta testing today. The company says that during its three months beta testing, the app attracted 20,000 users, and the cartoons created got about 50 million views.
The company has also collaborated with Skybound Entertainment, the company behind The Walking Dead, on a proposal to make several Skybound comics into Toonstar shows.
We’re excited to partner with Toonstar because we believe cartoon live-streaming has many unique advantages from both a consumer and production perspective,” said Skybound North CEO Catherine Winder in the announcement. “Realtime interaction allows fans to connect directly with their favorite characters in a ground-breaking way.
Finally, Attanasio hopes that Toonstar does not just turn-out to be another channel for animated content, but also a source of new intellectual properties:
Maybe the next Rick and Morty comes from Toonstar, maybe the next Bojack Horseman comes from Toonstar.
The new project has raised a seed round of unknown size led by Science Inc., with participation from Jon Goldman’s GC VR Gaming Tracker Fund, Manta Ray and Social Starts.
Source; TechCrunch
