6 October 2014: Broadcasters in Asia are celebrating the 10th anniversary of a kids content co-op set up to explore Asia through the eyes of children’s content creators. This year’s theme – “Children’s Mental Growth” – focuses on experiences from kids’ daily lives.The annual Children’s Drama Co-Production Series, organised by the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU), this year involves 10 broadcasters in Asia, all of which have created a 15-minute drama for kids between seven and nine years old. The dramas star kids below 10 years old.The ABU initiative was created so that “children can watch age-appropriate drama especially created and customised for them and at the same time learn the colourful cultures of each country in the region”, says Hanizah Hamzah, senior executive (TV), ABU programming department.Over the past 10 years, 90 children’s programmes from 18 countries and regions have been produced and broadcast as part of the initiative. These are shared among member broadcasters. This year, for the first time, Japanese broadcaster NHK, has made the dramas available online.New participants in the programme this year are Indonesia’s state-owned Televisi Republik Indonesia (TVRI), which produced Stick Math; Thailand’s Thai Public Broadcasting Service (Thai PBS) with Our School; and state-owned national TV station Bangladesh Television (BTV), which contributed Two Brothers.Regular members this year produced Willow Tree (Bhutan Broadcasting Service, BBS), Three Friends (South Korea’s Educational Broadcasting System, EBS), Vacation (Mongolian National Broadcaster, MNB), A Little Samurai (Japan Broadcasting Corporation, NHK), Intan (Radio Television Brunei, RTB), Dhia The Puppet Master (Radio Television Malaysia, RTM), and Water Turbine (Sri Lanka Rupavahini Corporation, SLRC).Executive producers of the shows talk about the challenges of bridging different languages and cultures with a single show. In Brunei, for instance, stories cannot feature puppies as pets. For Malaysia, story tellers and producers need to avoid pork. Meanwhile, the language issue is dealt with by having as few spoken lines as possible."To create and to develop a good storyline for mental growth of children was the biggest and hardest challenge because there are very few stories which focus seriously on the subject matter." Kamarudin Ambak Head of Television Drama, Radio Television Malaysia (RTM)NHK’s programme production department executive director, Yoshinori Komiyama, who is also the executive producer of A Little Samurai, says special emphasis was placed on keeping spoken lines to a minimum while delivering a storyline that could convey itself to children from other countries with different languages and cultures. A Little Samurai tells a story of a young boy Yuta and his ambitions to be a strong kendo sportsman.“The biggest challenge was how to produce a story that would convey itself to children of other countries with different languages and cultures... and conveying the theme of how the heart grows through the children’s acting,” says Komiyama, who is the assigned executive producer overseeing production of all 10 ABU participating dramas.Kamarudin Ambak, Radio Television Malaysia’s head of television drama, says finding a relevant story line was the biggest challenge this year.“To create and to develop a good storyline for mental growth of children [was the biggest challenge] because there are very few stories which focus seriously on the subject matter,” he says.Acting was a concern for the producer of RTM’s Dhia The Puppet Master, Magesh Arumugam.“The girl character Dhia, was played by a novice actor. It was a real challenge to make her deliver in front of the camera. However, we are quite happy to see the final result as we managed to capture her natural expressions in most of the scenes,” she says.Dhia The Puppet Master is a story of a young girl named Dhia, who is passionate about shadow play puppets and overcomes difficulties and obstacles in the quest to make her own puppets.Arumugam shot the drama using a DSLR 5D Canon camera, which she says is a first for long-time participant RTM. She plans to shoot her next ABU drama using a prime-lense camera. Each drama is monitored closely and guided by NHK’s Komiyama and his team, who babysit all the projects from start to finish. “We have to ensure that every programmes works well for everyone,” Hamzah says.The technical gap between production teams from across the region also needs to be bridged in presenting the final projects.“There are still substantial gaps in terms of the equipment and other drama production systems available to the various Asian broadcasting stations and it has been a challenge to tailor the advice in ways that would make it suitable to all,” says Yukiko Unno, international relations and ABU liaison officer, NHK World department.Unno says the team tackled the situation by giving advice on the ground wherever possible taking into account the actual constraints and making recommendations appropriate to the situation at each broadcasting station.The benefit this year has been higher connectivity between participating countries. Unno says the system for exchanging programme files and the progress of internet technology across Asia has greatly facilitated communication with all the different countries.For its efforts, the ABU is entitled to 10-year rights to the shows, which it sub-licenses to television broadcasters in the region. Each broadcaster retains copyright to their own production.Production budgets have not been disclosed, although producers say resources are limited.EBS’ producer Seongboo Yang says he had to be creative about costs for Lost and Found, the story of three classmates accepting each others’ differences when they are stranded on a deserted island.“The cost of borrowing a ship was very expensive, so I could not borrow it for a long time. Because of this, the size of the ship in each scene is different. The ship that appeared in the night is smaller than the first scene,” Yang says.Yang also faced location challenges. “The location – Korean West Sea – has a large tidal range. Because of it, I had to visit there several times and check the sea level. I chose some spots and I thought those were good locations for shooting. However, when I went there to shoot, every spot was submerged under the water,” Yang says.Yang also says the 15-minutes length dictated by the ABU series is challenging. The Korean version of Lost and Found is 20 minutes and “could contain more details”, he says.Over the years, the ABU’s Hamzah has seen improvement in the quality of programmes produced. She says the introduction of mini production workshops in 2008/9 helped to guide producers and share knowledge in fields such as sound and set design. “The capacity building for these producers has enhanced the quality of their work,” she says.Perhaps the project’s most significant long-term contribution is its training ground for young producers.Japan’s NHK assigns producers from its drama division to provide guidance on all production aspects, including story proposal, scriptwriting, filming, editing and post-production.Technical staff also visit production sites as instructors and exchange skills and know-how, such as the operation of high-vision cameras in regions preparing for digital TV production.“Some of the producers were young and inexperienced, and haven’t yet had the chance to work on their own drama. This project has created a positive drive for them to take on the challenge and produce quality content,” she says.EBS’ Yang agrees. Although he has to juggle between producing his regular programmes and his ABU drama, “it is a very good chance to expand international network and experience the whole procedure of making a drama”.ContentAsia Issue Four