Welcome to Cryptid Cape
My name's Victoria and I'm the creator and producer of Cryptid Cape, a fictional podcast about a young woman finding a new start in a beach town full of cryptids. We've produced two 10-episode seasons and bonus content over the past two years with an incredible cast and crew, and we need your help to make this next season better than ever!
We want to improve our audio quality, streamline our process, and fairly compensate our cast and crew going forward, but we can't do it without some help from our friends. And the best part is that if you contribute almost any amount, you'll be invited to an online live show we're putting on just for you!
Cryptid Cape began as a passion project of mine, but in just our first two seasons, it has grown so much. We have hundreds of regular listeners and an enthusiastic team excited to keep breathing life into this story. By donating to this campaign, not only are you helping improve a podcast, but you're directly helping our team do what we love.
A Breakdown of Our Goal
We've done the research and crunched the numbers (and re-crunched, and re-crunched), and found that we need to raise $1000 to make this season the best it can be while still keeping a tight budget. That may seem high for a podcast, so allow me to break it down for you:
- $600 will go towards paying all of our actors a fair hourly rate for their work.
- $100 will go towards hiring a sound designer to create custom foley for our podcast (free SFX libraries don't really have cryptid sound effects)
- $300 will fund an in-person recording session for the majority of our actors (COVID-willing, as discussed in a later section)
If we don't raise enough money to match our goal, we will still use everything we have to make this season excellent.
Perks!
You want to hear about perks, don't you?? Well, we've got some pretty great ones, if I do say so myself. Here's some more detail on all of them, and keep in mind that every tier receives the perks of the less expensive tiers below it as well.
Tier 1: Your name (or pseudonym if you prefer) will be listed on the donor page of cryptidcape.net
Tier 2: You get a ticket to our online live show! (more info in next section)
Tier 3: You get a digital download of a Cryptid Cape-inspired painting by Melody Hardegree-Ullman, perfect for a desktop background.
Tier 4: Your name (or pseudonym) will be mentioned in the thank you section of our credits at the end of every episode in season 3.
Tier 5: One of our cast members will send you a short video personally thanking you for your generous donation.
Tier 6: For your super generous donation, a minor character will be named after or by you, whichever you choose.
Tier 7: Honestly, we highly doubt anyone would be crazy enough to give us $200, but if you do, you'll get to hang out with the entire cast and crew of season 3 at a Zoom party online celebrating the premiere of season 3!
We also have a secret, special add-on perk that is available in the checkout!
What Did You Say About a Live Show?
We're having our very first live show of Cryptid Cape on Friday, April 30th through YouTube Live, and if you donate at least $5 to the campaign, you're invited! The show is at 9pm Eastern Standard time (6pm Pacific time) and will feature over a dozen of our recurring characters in a never-before-heard story. With a ticket, you'll get to join us live for the show and will have permanent access to the video recording so you can re-watch it any time you want. This show will never be released on our public podcast feed, so this is an exclusive event you don't want to miss!
Tickets will be delivered to email inboxes on April 1st, the day after the campaign ends.
How Do I Know This'll Be Good?
Great question! If you haven't yet, you should check out the first two seasons of our podcast. There, you can see how hard we've been working on this little project for the past two years. Cryptid Cape delivers on all fronts, from our excellent voice actors to our intriguing storyline and our dedication to representing diverse voices and stories. We need more fiction in the world for those who don't see themselves in pop culture, or who get pushed to the sidelines. In Cryptid Cape, we strive to bring those characters to center stage.
What Are the Risks?
To be honest, we don't have that many. We've been making this podcast remotely for the last two years and, no matter how much money we make in this campaign, we will find a way to do it again.
However, our biggest potential problem is recording in person. A large part of our budget will be going towards the expenses necessary to make an in-person recording necessary, but we're living through a pandemic. We want to get the season out in July as planned, but do not know how the spring will play out. I value the safety of my cast and crew more than anything, so if it is determined that we cannot hold in-person recording sessions, we will go back to remote recording. If this happens, we would allocate the money raised for this section of the project to the resources we would need to improve our remote recording process.
This is Cool and All, but I Just Can't Contribute
That's okay! We totally understand that right now is a tough time financially for so many people around the globe. Please do not donate if it would put you in a difficult position.
If you still want to help us out, though, please share this campaign with friends and family or on social media! Also, listen to and share the podcast! Every new listener we get is so incredibly important, and reviews on various podcast providers will help us climb the charts as well!
Thank you so much for reading this whole thing. If you've decided to contribute, thank you so very much. This podcast means the world to me, and your contribution is directly supporting an artist bring her art to life. Thank you. :)
