“Bright” that’s the word most often associated with the future of Indian animation. True the future looks promising, but how the promise will take shape of reality, is something that one has to wait and watch.
The session ‘Future of Indian content’ at NASSCOM Animation India 06 was a series of presentations by the brave heads of the animation studios that had blazed the trail of original Indian animated content in the past couple of years.
The session was moderated by Dhruva Interactive CEO Rajesh Rao and the presentions were made by Graphiti’s Munjal Shroff, Greengold’s Rajiv Chilakalapudi and Dawsen Infotech’s VC Bhalotia.
A common issue that emerged out of the presentations was the need to create a funding model for creating local animated content. Said Graphiti’s Munjal Shroff,” For the local content market to grow, producers and broadcasters have to work at a funding model where at least the basic production costs have to be covered by the broadcaster”
“True that broadcasters will not recover their investments in the first airing itself but over time they will surely get extremely attractive returns. As producers, we in turn realise that we have to focus more on low budget yet high impact shows with good attention to design” he added.
Greengold’s Rajiv Chilakalpudi in his presentation titled ‘Feedback on past broadcast and lessons for the future’ said that,”We are terribly short of Indian animation content. On an average every kids broadcaster airs at least two hours of fresh content every day, there are three major kids broadcasters who air animated content, that makes it 2000 plus hours of fesh new animated content in a year. That’s the potential. Now compare this to the fact that in the past 5 years we have had a total of about only 20 hours of original Indian animated content being aired”
“Another point I’d like to highlight” added Rajiv, “is that original Indian content has been garnering very high ratings and comparing well with the best animation shows despite being produced under constraints”
“As I see it there will be a lot of shows on Indian heros and mythology in Animation and then we will witness a gradual transition towards original Indian characters” he added.
Dawsen Infotech’s Vanchandra Bhalotia made a case for regional animated content. Quoting current statistics Bhalotia pointed out that, “There are sixty regional channels in India currently and the number is set to double in the next few years. With Thakurmar Jhulie we have proven that one can produce low budget animated show and be profitable right here in India. The future definitely looks bright”
Session Moderator Rajesh Rao surmised thus:”Most TV Channels in India are currently based on advertising model, but as the pay TV environment grows and people pay to watch content we can be sure that local Indian animated content will gain more prominence. Meanwhile producers and broadcasters need to collaboarte and work out a model that works for everyone involved”