THEIR work may not be listed in the TV schedule, but form an integral part of selling content and ensuring the vibrancy and excitement of shows on TV.
And for four years, a small team of Malaysian producers has been carrying the torch on the international stage in a niche but very important creative field.
For the past four years, this group – based in Astro – has been consistently performing at the PromaxBDA Awards, which honours design and marketing work in the advertising and promotions business that is broadcast, published or released in their respective markets.
Late last year, the group bagged six more awards at PromaxBDA Awards 2010 held in SIngapore, including a major gong – Lifetime Achievement Award for AESB Content Management vice-president Rob Middleton.
Astro’s Music Piracy PSA Circle of Piracy and Jangan Lupa Lirik 3 dominated in the Best Comedy Promo category – and they won both gold and silver awards, respectively. Astro’s Diski Dance won the Best Interstitial category while Astro Box Office Movies Thangathirai grabbed the silver award for Best Movie Promo.
“We have been kicking butt for four years, and we will continue to kick ass,” said Middleton in a short interview at Astro’s All-Asia Broadcast Centre recently.
He won the Lifetime Achievement Award for being one of the most well-known names in the Asian creative industry, having spent 20 years doing things such as launching the original MTV Asia, designing and launching the Channel [V] Music Network, as well reinvigorated CNBC, Hallmark and Celestial, among others.
His proudest achievement though, judging by his reaction, could very well be leading different teams to excellence at the PromaxBDA. His teams have won at the awards for 10 of his two decades in the industry.
“Doing promos is indeed quite different than doing normal production,” said AESB On-Air Promo creative director Abid Hussain. “We have to tell stories in 30 seconds or less, and we do 350 to 400 promos a month, which means 10 to 12 promos per person.”
“We’re different than advertising agencies, though,” said Middleton. “While there are great advertising agencies out there, we do not try to dumb down our audience and sell things you don’t need. While we do get a lot of ads, we are not reliant on them, so we have a direct hand in connecting with our viewers.
“We’re going to keep on doing what we do every day, which is to keep people happy.”
They must be really good at it, for audiences, as well as for their people, as the team’s young producers managed to bag the Rocket Winners award since 2007. This includes Jeffrey Yong (2007, now at Disney), Martin Altanie (2008, and also won the Gold Award for the anti-piracy public service announcement mentioned above), Muhammad Brian Bahrain Labansing (2009) and last year’s Cheow Chun Hong (2010).
“We do so many promos every month, and the workload can be daunting,” said Altanie. “It would be good to only focus on one project, but I do love working with different people and getting so many ideas from this great teamwork we have going.”
Well, as things stand, Altanie will continue to work with an excellent, award-winning team headed by some of the best creative talents available in Asia, if not the world.
PromaxBDA awards is basically the Academy Awards of promo, with the added difficulty of it being open to countries across Asia with over 53 countries sending their submissions.
According to its website, PromaxBDA awards categories “include network TV, TV stations, cable networks, cable systems, network radio, radio stations, syndication distributors, interactive media, plus other kudos such as the Brandon Tartikoff Award.”
Such shows and companies that have been rewarded include the Twentieth Century Fox’s Cops, ShowTime (which did Spartacus, among other shows) and FX Networks.
Article source: http://mmail.com.my/content/60799-creativity-pays-big-time
Category: Piracy – Software, Music, Movie