In conversation with:
Ashish SK, Producer of Shaktimaan animated series & CEO, Reliance Animation
Give us an overview of the production of Shaktimaan. How did the entire process happen?
Production of Shaktimaan series in animation has indeed created a unique case study not only for the original IP co-production model in the country but as a model co-production project on a global scale as well. Reliance Animation holds the animation production right of the property and has contributed towards the development of the content in animation, script, character design, stylization, backgrounds, color keys, animatics, the entire pre-production planning & development and complete post production. Since the focus was very clear, to develop a property that will adhere to international standards and yet cater Indian sensibilities, a dream team hand picked from across the country was set up for the pre-production planning and designing at our Pune studio. For the first season of the series we had a co-production with Accel Animation Studio and for the second season our co-producer is Magic N Colors Pvt. Ltd. from Hyderabad.
While the content, a completely new and fresh take of Shaktimaan in its animated avatar was developed in-house by Dhrubo Banerjee along with his content development team, none other than 6 times iEMMY award winning writer Jeffrey Scott penned down the scripts.
Accel’s wholehearted contribution came in the production process of the show with its studio facility in Chennai and Trivandrum. With a severe delivery deadline at hand, the task of maintaining international quality standards with a no-compromise mindset was quite an uphill task. Understanding the criticality of the situation, in an unprecedented move, the production of the show was further divided among 9 other studios across the country: namely – Vensat and Agaram InfoTech in Chennai, Animationzione in Kolkata, Magic & Colors in Hyderabad, Spellbound and Side FX in Pune, Manhan’s Studio V13 in Mumbai, Vyga Animation in Trivandrum and Aakar Digital Media & Solutions in Cochin. Three independent consultants also contributed in the production flow. 13 episodes of 22 mins each (a total of 286 mins of animation) with original sound design and music composition for every episode were produced and delivered in less than 120 days with no compromise on quality. The final leg of the production, the last 40 days saw about 400 artists, animators, compositors and of course the core team at Reliance Animation, the Director of the show Vikram Veturi, Art Director of the show Vinayak Kurne and Editor / Sound Designer Varaprasad J.V. along with the Production Team headed by Anand Pandey working virtually 24 hrs a day focused towards meeting every delivery commitments.
I myself could barely afford only a couple of hours of rest every day because as a producer I believe in being hands on in the process flow. Delivery commitments must be honored with uncompromised quality production.
Significantly, starting from content development to production, animation, compositing, post production – virtually in every department of the process flow, BIG AIMS students contributed in an extremely professional manner not only in Reliance Animation studio but being a part of the studios across the country who contributed in the production of Shaktimaan. The students of BIG AIMS – the Animation Education unit of Reliance Animation, in their very first job did more than a commendable job of delivering the toughest production schedule any original IP in the country has ever witnessed.
A plague that has continuously crippled Indian animation studios creating original IP has been non-adherence to delivery deadlines, which in retrospect has most often made the broadcasters wary about assigning projects to Indian studios. This exceptional production methodology where 10 studios were working on 10 different episodes simultaneously with the entire production process being centrally monitored from Reliance Animation in order to meet the commitments of delivery deadlines with international quality parameters will surely set a new benchmark in planning production pipelines and hopefully a renewed confidence level for the broadcasters on Indian production houses creating original IP.
How many episodes does the series have?
The first season had 13 episodes followed by second season of
another 13.
From 7th May onwards, the first season of Shaktimaan will be
getting re-launched on NICK owing to its tremendous
popularity. Till now the series was getting telecasted on
Sonic channel.
Production work on season 2 – next 13 episodes is already in progress
What were challenges and learning’s in bringing the iconic character of Shaktimaan to the animation medium? The challenge is always tougher when an already iconic property in a certain medium gets converted in another medium. The comparisons are natural. Specially with a property like Shaktimaan which was originally developed by Mr. Mukesh Khanna and Mr. Dinkar Jani in live action that has ruled the kid’s programming content in our country for more than a decade and was positioned by Mr. Akshay Vyas the then Vice President of Viking on Doordarshan. So while picking up an already successful property has its advantage in terms of instant brand recall it also poses greater challenges in justifying the brand in its new avatar. From the very onset, Shaktimaan in animation was positioned with two distinct aspects in mind as its differentiator – “Cyber” and “Yoga”. The world knows India for its cyber geniuses and Yogic gurus. So Shaktimaan in his new avatar was to become a combination of both, a cyber geek Veehan Arya as the alter ego and Shaktimaan who derives his powers from Yogic practices. The earlier set up of Shaktimaan catered to an audience when exposure to super heroes or animation content for that matter was pretty much limited for the Indian audience. But this time, we are catering to an audience who has grown up on quality international animation content since their very childhood with a much-refined sense of narrative style. Hence except for three characters – Shaktimaan, his archrival Kilvish and the evil scientist Dr. Jakol, every character and element of the series is new. Shaktimaan as his alter ego Veehan Arya is a young software student in Indus University under the guidance of eccentric but genius Professor Gyani working on cyber securities. Veehan has his crush on Leena the electrifying journalism student form the same university. Her kid brother Chikoo is a die-hard Shaktimaan fan. Bumpy, Veehan’s roommate, General D’Goze who funds the cyber security research for Professor Gyani, the comic cowardly ACP of Indus City and Tick & Tock the henchmen of the main villain of the series Kilvish adds to the comic flavor of the narrative. And to top it all Shaktimaan with his limitless yogic powers battles ruthless monsters and destructive situations created by Kilvish and Dr. Jakol to bring end to an era of darkness. So Shaktimaan’s positioning is as a “Cyber Yogic Hero” who is also the best friend for all the kids. How did the series evolved from live action to animation? |
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maintain that aspect in a subtle yet universally accepted manner. Starting from the naming convention it was followed thoroughly throughout the process flow. Hence we find Shaktimaan’s cyber geek alter ego named as Veehan (meaning – the first morning light) Arya (the descendants of the Aryans). Even the naming of the key location for the series “Indus City” followed similar balanced approach. Just to finalise these two names must have taken atleast six months of research and debate. Every element of the series – Veehan’s back story, the seven wise gurus who resemble our “Saptarshi Mandal”, the yogic powers of Shaktimaan – the core source being awakening the power centers in our own body – the kundalinis and the seven chakras, everything had to be researched and then aligned as part of a narrative that will be modern, apt for today’s time and yet having the essence of the Indian philosophies that have transcended over the centuries. The narrative dabbles with high-octane action, hilarious comedy and gripping emotions catapulting Shaktimaan as the greatest Cyber Yogic Hero the world has ever seen. Every threat, every demon, every crisis that Shaktimaan faces is larger than life creating a huge canvas for an animation IP for television originating from India. Just the way kids have gotten hooked to the series already, even the greatest fans of original live action Shaktimaan has also expressed their wholehearted support towards the new avatar. The same is true with even Mr. Mukesh Khanna and Mr. Dinkar Jani. They too have found Shaktimaan in animation absolutely stunning and engrossing. Now our aim is to carry on with the series season after season to entertain the audience with their favorite super hero Shaktimaan. Why did you select flash animation? Flash animation brings down the cost significantly, which is essential when you are creating a property for broadcasting. Secondly it has a unique storyboard/comic book kind of a feel and with the teams in India evolving to deliver world class flash animation using the strengths of the tools like photoshop, flash and after effects to its best, one can display and create an unparallel illusion which can match any form of storytelling. Specially when you have a director of the show who can do the greatest justice to these three tools, it becomes the most natural choice. What kind of preproduction went into the series? |
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The set up was kept neutral with the similar perspective in mind and the backgrounds – a thoroughly researched futuristic Asian city with an international touch as the key location of the series – Indus City. The colors were chosen in a manner so that the look and feel by itself can stand out as a differentiator for the series even on a global scale. The animatics were drawn with such thoroughness that they were nothing short of international standards. The voice dubbing was done in New York with English as the primary language to be dubbed later into Indian regional languages. Background music with sinc / non sinc sound effects was done on animatics itself with final edit and the package was thereafter forwarded for production with nothing left for imagination. It was this utmost precision in preproduction that helped the animation production of the series getting done in less than 4 months with 10 different studios across the country working on it simultaneously, which was nothing short of a miracle really. But then, if the pre-production planning is perfect, even miracles can become successful reality, as proven by Shaktimaan series. What kind of music has been given to the series? The music is contemporary, trendy, pacy with a canvas nothing short of a feature film. The music of Shaktimaan is one of its greatest USP’s which has lend the series a magnum canvas even though it’s made for television. The recordings are done at Chennai, a commendable job considering that the original score for the last 10 episodes were done in exact 10 days including all final sinc and non sinc sound effects. Yet when you listen, they are original scores and the scale is nothing short of a feature film. What kind of response and feedback have you received for the series so far? Well we won the “Best Animated Episode” at FICCI BAF for the series this year. It is undoubtedly the finest 2D animated series on Indian broadcasting. As for the viewer’s, the response is phenomenal. Not just the kids, but even grown ups are getting hooked with the story, narrative and the characters. |
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Thrilling storylines, gripping scripts, excellent animation, amazing color schemes, superlative music – everything put together as a package has given the audience a wholesome experience of viewing satisfaction with quality written all over. The most satisfying experience for us is to have so many people calling up, mailing us and congratulating for creating such a quality content for Indian broadcasting with Indian sensibilities and yet with an international edge. We are extremely confident of the success of the series both in India and abroad. What are the future plans for this property? Going forward we are already producing the second season of next 13 episodes of Shaktimaan. We see this property will now be marketed internationally. At the same time hopefully in the next 5 years we will have over 150 – 200 episodes done. What was the overall production budget of the series? I wish I knew it. An Indian Superhero is PRICELESS. |
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Mukesh Khanna Speaks: I have been talking with Ashish since last 10 years at least from the time he first approached me with a proposition to turn Shaktimaan into animation. Over the years I have seen him producing outstanding content like “Little Krishna” and his upcoming feature film Krishna Aur Kans”. The way he and his team at Reliance Animation have taken Indian Animation to true global heights, I was very sure that no one else would be able to do justice to my creation better than them. And they have proved me right. Shaktimaan in animation is nothing short of magic. When you watch it, the first reaction that comes is “ wow, is this really done in India?”, the quality is so awesome. We have discussed endlessly on the property and its transformation for the modern audience and what has finally come out of it looks absolutely international and yet retaining the core Indian sensibilities. It has retained all the right elements of Shaktimaan and yet has given it a facelift for the modern day kids. I think this series has given Shaktimaan a status of immortality since that is the beauty of animation. And now with the series coming on NICK, kids of our country will get a much better opportunity to watch their favorite hero in action. Since animation lends a platform where sky is the limit for creative ideas, the scale that has been given to Shaktimaan is enormous, something we always wanted to try in live action but for natural reasons you have certain boundaries. But I am so glad to see that the canvas of Shaktimaan in animation is like a feature film for every episode with so much of action and comedy. Do watch it, it’s amazing. I am so proud as an Indian that we could create such a quality content from India with our own Indian superhero in animation and show the world what we are capable of doing. |
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