Date: Tue 08 Mar 2016

How to create a TV Show - PART 1

Ever asked yourself "how do i create a TV show?"

When it comes to the question of How do I create a TV show where do you start? The reality is that most broadcasters will not commission an idea from a member of the general public. Unless you have a production company attached most broadcasters will pass on commissioning your idea. Many of the emails we receive often state they have approached some of the larger TV networks/broadcasters with their idea but it has been rejected. Often they have been informed that unless a tv production company is attached to their idea the broadcaster will reject it.

Working with us to create a TV show?

The reason that most of the larger networks require you to partner with a video production company comes down to one simple fact; experience.
Broadcasters will have far more confidence in your idea if a video production company have looked at it to see if it is feasible to produce. Ultimately they want to be confident that another TV production company have looked at the idea to see if its actually feasible to make the program. Larger broadcasters also prefer to work in conjunction with video production companies rather than individuals, this is simply their model.


Step 1 - Pitching your idea

When asking yourself; How do I create a TV show the first step is to pitch your TV idea. This process is where you take your idea and really think about how it would work as a TV show. There are several key points that a video production company will want to know about your idea before they consider developing it. This is known as pitching your TV idea. If you go to the Pitch a TV idea section of our website you will see we have listed a number of key questions you must ask yourself when submitting your idea.

The TV ideas that are most likely to be developed are those we receive who have considered these questions before submitting their idea to us. Ideally a TV pitch will be a short one page document. You want to try and explain your idea as succinctly as possible.



Step 2 - Developing your idea

If your pitch is good the next step is to develop your idea. You need to develop your short TV pitch into a treatment. A treatment is a much more detailed version of a pitch. The treatment will list the details of the program, the presenters and what will happen in each episode. It is the blueprint for your TV show.



Step 3 - Budgeting your TV show

The details of your treatment should allow a video production company to form an idea of the budget for your TV show.
Although this may not be an absolutely final figure all broadcasters will want to know how much it will cost for each episode to be made.



Step 4 - Pitching your TV show to a broadcaster/network

Once the treatment is in place and a budget has been formulated its time to take the idea to the TV commissioners. At this stage of the process we will discuss which networks we feel the show may be best suited to. The next stage is to approach commissioners. Normally they respond quickly. At this stage they may choose to pass on the idea, however if they like it, there's every chance they may wish to meet and discuss the idea. In some instances, if we feel the idea is very strong then we may choose to finance a screen test, sizzle reel or pilot episode.

Coming up in part 2

In our next blog article on How do i create a TV show we'll talk about filming a pilot episode and screen test. There will also be some video for you to watch, stay tuned! If you have any questions relating to this article, or any other news articles on our website then please get in touch.