FOCUS: TV Commercial Production - Mainland slowly catching up on production skills

Only recently, 4As agencies in China were complaining about poor personnel skills and lack of high-end post facilities as reasons for not producing more TVCs in China. But now, the trend towards localisation, the arrival of foreign-backed production houses and lower mainland production costs are conspiring to help them reconsider, said agency executives. According to Saatchi & Saatchi Beijing managing director James Keller, "Production facilities have improved greatly along with the quality of local talent and crews", a view shared by Mr Tomaz Mok, MD/ECD of McCann-Erickson Guangming Beijing. "If we had the choice, we should shoot and produce in China," said Mr Mok. The change of mood is partly due to foreign invested production houses, which are now starting to offer the high-end services previously missing. Mr Ian Maycock, managing director of Australian-backed Creative Interface in Beijing, said that his company "delivers the same quality as Hong Kong". "The difference is that clients in China can oversee the production process here without having to fly overseas all the time," he said. Pacesetter Pictures International, also a foreign-invested production house, has been filling the high-end production niche since 1992. Last year, it was the first to introduce motion control to China and flew in talent from Los Angeles to complete a TVC for Sony. "We don't just import the hardware itself, we make sure that the correct artists are part of the package," said PPI director Dan Mintz. Exposure to international talent is vital for further development of the industry, as Frankie Chan, general manager of Grey Beijing pointed out. "Post production in China is still bad; however, exposure to working with different people, especially outside talent will make a big difference," he said. Client demands or the preferences of the director might also rule out the option of producing in China. "You need to negotiate with the director, but in the end you do what he wants to do," said Euro RCSG Great Ocean Partnership Beijing general manager Mason Lin. For a recent TVC for Lintas client Unilever, PPI secured permission to shoot in the Forbidden City, recruited 400 extras and built an indoor set at Beijing Film Studio. However, once the shoot had been completed, Hong Kong director Gera preferred to take the post work back to Hong Kong. While most agencies are positive about the changes, they still produce more than 50 per cent of their TVCs for the mainland outside China. "It still very much depends on the needs of the commercial," said Saatchis' Mr Keller. "While commercials shot in China become more relevant for the Chinese consumer and more cost effective, for technical reasons we might go to Hong Kong." According to Euro's Mr Lin, post-production involving complicated computer graphics and animation are still best done in Hong Kong, Taiwan or Australia. "Often creative directors don't want to risk producing in China," he said. However, he noted, there are also more down-to-earth reasons for the prevailing China-phobia: "(Agencies and film crews) might just want to have a good time going abroad." Source: CMM Intelligence.

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