Postcards make passion profitable
大学生创业出新招 手绘明信片淘金
导读:大学生创业案例屡见不鲜,而安庆师范学院动画专业学生胡茂恳则将自己对于动漫的热情转化为如火如荼的事业,一步步实现了自己的动画梦。
It is lunchtime. Hundreds of students are lining up in front of thecanteen at Anqing Normal University campus. But they’re not waiting for a meal. Instead, they’re queuing to buy hand-painted postcards made by Maoken Studio, a student start-up project.
午餐时间到了,数百名学生在安庆师范学院食堂前排起长龙,但是他们并非在排队就餐,而是在排队购买由大学生创业团队——“猫啃工作室”制作的手绘明信片。
Hu Maoken, the leader of the studio, is a 23-year-old animation major at the university. Though he didn’t expect the postcard project to be so successful, he seized the opportunity to make animation aprofitable career.
安庆师范学院动画专业学生、23岁的胡茂恳是这间工作室的创始人。尽管明信片创业项目如此大获成功完全出乎他的意料,但他还是抓住机遇,从自己的专业中嗅到了商机。
Hard work pays off
付出总有回报
Six months have now passed since the event at the canteen. Hu Maoken is gradually becoming a businessman. He set up his own animation company in July and rented an office space at a start-up incubator in Hefei.
距离上次的食堂售卖明信片活动已经过去六个月的时间了。胡茂恳逐渐完成了向商人的转型。七月,他创立了自己的动漫公司,在合肥市的一栋创业孵化器大楼里租下了一间办公室。
The company’s major business is to design postcards for various universities in Anhui province. With the income, Hu has managed to cover the company’s daily expenses and pay salaries to his seven employees.
该公司的主要业务是为安徽省各大高校设计明信片。胡茂恳的公司效益不错,足以支付公司日常开销以及7名员工的薪水。
Since the company has a reputation for smart designs and delicate paintings, it has started making commercial animations and posters, which have the potential of making more profit than selling postcards. The company is growing steadily and rapidly.
该公司因设计巧妙、绘画精美而广受赞誉。如今他们已经开始涉足商业动画与海报的制作了,这一行业的收益前景要比销售明信片高得多。目前,该公司正处于平稳快速的发展之中。
Behind the momentum is Hu and his team’s hard work. Hu only gives himself three days off each month, which means he spends most of his weekends in the office. But he quite enjoys it.
公司的迅猛态势离不开胡茂恳和整支团队的辛勤工作。胡茂恳一个月只休息三天,这就意味着他的周末大都是在办公室中度过的。而他本人却十分享受这种生活。
“Compared with other start-up businesses, ours is not that difficult,” he says. “Though we’ve had hard times, I’ve never thought of giving up.”
他说:“与其他创业公司相比,我们的路并没那么难。尽管我们也有艰辛难关,但是我从未想过放弃。”
Struggle in school
奋斗在校园
Many people throw themselves into the animation industry with the aim of improving the industry in China. Hu, however, chose the major because he loves painting.
很多人为了要推动中国动漫产业,而投身这一行。而胡茂恳之所以选择该专业,全凭个人喜好。
“I’ve loved painting since I was a kid and I studied it in high school,” he says. Therefore, he cherishes the opportunity of studying animation at university.
他说:“我自幼便喜欢画画,高中时学习了绘画。”因此,他格外珍惜在大学里学习动漫专业的机会。
Hu’s resume is impressive: he is a straight-A student, a first-class scholarship winner, a class monitor, and president of the university’s Students’ Union. Only Hu knows how hard he worked to achieve all this.
胡茂恳的简历令人印象深刻:尖子生、一等奖学金获得者、班长、校学生会主席。只有他自己知道获得这些成就背后付出的艰辛。
“It’s common for us to paint until midnight. If we don’t have solid painting skills or don’t know how to use related computer software, we won’t be able to establish ourselves in the industry,” he says.
他说:“对我们来说,熬夜画画是家常便饭。如果没有扎实的画功,不知道如何使用相关电脑软件,我们就无法在动漫产业中立足。”
Many of his classmates have given up on the way, but Hu is determined. “I believe that as long as I work hard and keep going, one day I will realize my animation dream,” he says.
尽管很多同学都半途而废,但是他的意志十分坚定。他说:“我相信只要努力工作、不断前进,总有一天我会实现自己的动漫梦。”
Difficult skill to perfect
力求尽善尽美
Hu got the idea of making hand-painted postcards after a trip to Xiamen, Fujian province. He saw many beautiful hand-painted postcards there, so he thought, why not paint his university on postcards and sell them to graduates?
胡茂恳在一次厦门之旅后,萌生了制作手绘明信片的主意。他在那里看到很多精美的手绘明信片,因此心想为何不在明信片上画上自己的学校,然后再出售给毕业生呢?
“It’s a good way to express our love to the university while offering graduates a memorable gift,” says Hu.
他说:“这种方式好在既可以表达对母校的爱,又可以给毕业生留一份纪念品。”
He and another seven students in his class formed a team and embarked on the project in April. In order to find the most symbolic places in the university, they walked around the campus many times.
他和班上的其他七名同学组建了一支团队,于四月启动了创业计划。为了找到学校最具代表性的地方,他们一次次地游走在校园里。
“After selecting the places, we spent several days observing and reconstructing the scenes on a computer,” says Hu. Even though the team members are top students in their class, it took them several days to finish only a single piece.
他说:“选定了地点之后,我们用几天时间来实地考察并在电脑上再现了这些场景。”尽管团队成员都是班上的佼佼者,但还是花上几天时间才能完成了一幅作品。
Hu and his team spent an entire month making 1,000 postcards of nine different scenes. They sold out at the event in front of the canteen.
胡茂恳和他的团队花了整整一个月时间,选取了校园九景,制作出1000张明信片。在那次食堂前的售卖活动中,所有明信片销售一空。
Hu is glad that he can turn his passion into a career. “If I hadn’t worked so hard in school, or I hadn’t seized the opportunity, none of this would have happened,” says Hu. “I think anyone who has a passion and keeps doing it will be successful.”
令胡茂恳感到欣慰的是他可以把激情转化为事业。他说:“要是我在学校没有努力学习、或者我没有抓住这个机遇,就没有现在收获的一切。我觉得一个人只要满怀激情并持之以恒就会成功。”