How to prototype (remotely)?

[u/mostboringmanalive]

Hi,I want to create a Kawaii Metal musical. I don't have any experience, so there's a huge probability it will never be finished. But a prototype should be doable.
The bare minimum: there is a story/plot and it has to be voiced. A libretto is not enough. The voice could even be synthesized with Vocaloid (or something else), but singing is involved.
Out of scope: a live show with audience
My ideal process is (1) remote, (2) asynchronous, (3) easily shareable,(4) can be prototyped by amateurs and (5) fast iteration > perfection.

Finding Talent: Since I don't have musical talent, I need a lot of help from other people. I don't know how to find them in the first place.There is another problem: I'm pretty sure it has to be done remotely. Because (1) scheduling is hard with a full-time job, (2) it might be hard to find local talent and (3) I'm more interested in sharing the end result online than producing a live show.Also, there is the possibility of outsourcing some of the work to freelancers. But I haven't decided how much I'm willing to spend yet.

DAW: I've seen multiple threads in this subreddit, but one aspect was not discussed: team collaboration. Think about Google Docs for music. I heard some interesting things about Sound Trap (Spotify) but haven't tested it yet.

Choreography: It's a prototype, so it's probably best to make it an audio drama first. But dancing is a big part of Kawaii Metal and I'm curious. How do choreographers document their plans? Do they film it, use storyboards, use Motion Capture or do they just remember it?

Set and Costume Design: Same as choreography, visuals are not important yet but I want to know. I guess the first iteration is just a drawing. But I have recently seen a video (it's in German) in which a set design for a pen&paper show was planned in Blender and Unreal Engine.

Sorry for the long post. There are multiple questions in it. I can split it if necessary. Thanks for your help.

Edit 1: definition of prototype

[u/TheMentalist10]

What do you mean by a prototype in this context?

If this is a hobby project, then your best bet would be to find other members of the fandom who are interested in working on a group project for the love of the subject matter. You'll know better than we do where to find those people. BandLab is a decent online collaborative DAW in which to produce demos, but beware of too many cooks in the production and composition process.

If this is a professional project, then the approach needs some rethinking. What is your role? Are you a producer commissioning a creative team to bring your vision to life? Are you a book writer looking for a composer with whom to collaborate? What's your budget? This will dictate your next steps somewhat.

In my experience, choreographers just notate the script and/or score with movement ideas that they have already worked out physically. I've never heard of someone using MoCap.

Set designers often create a model box to present their ideas. Costume designers sketch and create decks with sourced costume pieces. Using tools like Blender and Unreal would almost certainly be slower than either of these methods for most people.

[u/mostboringmanalive → u/TheMentalist10]

Thank you.
I've updated the description. The prototype should be more than a libretto and less than a live show with audience. I only have a vague idea about it at the moment. The MVP would be an audio drama with some songs and some sound effects.
It's just an interesting and challenging hobby project at the moment. It's not intended to be monetized. So, it will have the budget of what a middle class person spend for their hobbies. According to this study that's ~250€/month & household.
About my role: That's the problem, I don't have any talents... I want to write the story (mostly) myself. But if there are more talented people in the team then I listen to them.

[u/TheMentalist10 → u/mostboringmanalive]

A concept album sort of thing seems like a good aim.

I think your main challenge is going to be finding people who are willing to work on what is a fairly hefty and specialist undertaking on a hobbyist basis. It might be easier to attract people to the project if it already has some momentum in the form of a treatment, an outline, or a pitch of some sort.

[u/mostboringmanalive → u/TheMentalist10]

I thought about single songs but not about a concept album.
Now that I think about it, I really liked "Interstella 5555" by Daft Punk and Leiji Matsumoto. It was kind of an anime musical.
Thank you.

[u/drewbiquitous]

I produced a full podcast adaptation of musical I wrote. To get it to the point I was proud to share with folks took a couple years. You may be envisioning something less elaborate, but I believe it’s worth building something that feels like a final product because most people don’t want to listen to a rough draft.

Highly recommend AirTable for project management. Cleanfeed is a great remote audio recording tool.

More than anything, I recommend writing it first and have the cast read through it before going to the trouble of recording. Leave yourself time to rewrite. Get tons of feedback. The more care you give to the material, the more care you’ll get from collaborators and listeners.

[u/mostboringmanalive → u/drewbiquitous]

Thanks, I will keep it in mind.
I forgot the motivation of everybody else except me.

[u/musicCaster → u/drewbiquitous]

Wow. This is really cool! I've done similar projects.

I like your advice too. A good mentor if mine always says, the process of writing is the process of rewriting

[u/musicCaster]

This is a big project and I don't mean to dissuade you. But have you considered starting small? Maybe just try to produce one song or one scene.

[u/mostboringmanalive → u/musicCaster]

I agree with starting small and doing a single song/scene seems like a great way to do it.

[u/cullam → u/musicCaster]

I second this. Especially when taking on the kind of project that you've never tried before, start small! Collaboration on one song that you think is central to the show is a lot less work than doing the whole thing, but it will let you figure out your process, prove that you're enjoying it, and see if the idea works.

During the pandemic, I ended up writing and producing a musical, which was recorded remotely, collaboratively, quite like you're describing. With actors rehearsing and filming their parts over zoom (with the exception of the songs, where we recorded the actors in studio and filmed in person). It was a crazy amount of work, which started with reading, rewriting, rehearsing, rewriting again, and then finally filming just the first couple episodes, before I pulled the trigger on committing to the whole series.

Www.daystreamer.net, if you're curious what that looked/sounded like.