Photo: Courtesy
Every day, a group of children goes to play at a daycare center. At the end of the day, when all the children go home, the toys come to life at night. There is a detailed discussion about how much the children have worn them out during the day. A team of five toys, known as "Teenie Scouts: Big Five," repairs the toys that were damaged during play.
The toys a dinosaur, a fire-fighting truck, a police car, a rabbit bunny, and a school bus spend the whole night searching for other lost toys. They embark on breathtaking missions to rescue them. All their adventures must be completed before the children return to the daycare center in the morning. Each episode of this two-season, 52-part famous Korean series involves such exciting stories, teaching the importance of friendship and teamwork. It has been a hit on the Korean television channel KBS since its broadcast.
The rights to the Bengali dubbed version of this famous series, "Teenie Scouts: Big Five," have been bought by Bangladesh's most popular satellite channel, Impress Telefilm Limited's Channel i. The series is now being regularly broadcast every Friday and Saturday evening on Channel i in Bangladesh, and immediately afterward, the episodes are available to Bengali-speaking audiences worldwide on the OTT platform i-Screen.
It is known that Abu Shahed Emon, a renowned director and producer from Bangladesh who has directed movies like "Jalaler Golpo" (Jalal's Story), "Arai Mon Swapno" (Golden A Plus), "The Container," and series like "Mercules," and produced films such as "Iti, Tomari Dhaka" (Sincerely Yours, Dhaka), "Payer Tolay Mati Nai" (No Ground Beneath the Feet), and "Patalghar" (A House with No Names), has personally overseen the dedicated dubbing artists in the production of the Bengali dubbed version of "Teenie Scouts: Big Five." Director and producer Abu Shahed Emon shared, "Since studying film in South Korea, I have been closely acquainted with Korean cinema and culture, which led to my acquaintance with Central Animation Company Limited or CAC.
Many of our friends work at this Korean animation studio. I had the opportunity to visit the studio and see the production firsthand during the making of this animation series. I was interested in the project from the beginning. The animations are made using the stop-motion technique at this studio. In this process, creators directly take pictures of various character dolls, capturing still images of different poses.
A second of film is made up of 24 frames. Accordingly, one picture per movement of a character amounts to a total of 24 pictures per second. So, you can understand that about 1,500 pictures are taken for a minute of footage.
The process is similar to filming a regular movie, except that the sets are much smaller and instead of human actors, various kinds of dolls are used, which are animated by taking one picture at a time. The production is completed with the help of a large number of people and is very time-consuming. Even in the age of computer graphics, this type of manually created animation is considered a classic in terms of construction style. The studio's stop-motion technique is well-known in the animation world. Its immense arrangement, the diversity of storyline, music, cinematography, and action make the creation of this cartoon from its production technique to its content profoundly impactful.
The content's relevance, its role in the cognitive development of 5-6-year-old children, and its narrative style have brought it much discussion when broadcast on KBS. Later, it was dubbed into several languages, including English and Korean, and broadcast. As we are somewhat behind in creating content for children in our country, the idea of purchasing the rights to two animation series for dubbing into Bengali came from there. After buying the rights in Bengali, matching the performance of the series made in Korean, writing an understandable Bengali screenplay, creating dialogues, dubbing by many artists, syncing and editing, and other tasks were done, finally leading to the first season being broadcast on Channel i.
The issue is very joyful for me. As the project director and creative producer of this work, this task has been a special event for me. We usually tell stories in a certain way in movies or series. From that standpoint, working on the dubbing part of this series, I saw that performing meaningful work in Bengali with content in different languages is a very laborious task. However, since the task involves children, it is extremely satisfying. If little children see a work produced under my supervision in Bengali and find even a little joy in their young minds, then it is a great achievement for me.
Additionally, if we can produce work about our own culture in Bangladesh like this simply-made animation, then the demand for dubbed content globally in today's creative economy era can also earn foreign currency for Bangladeshi animation content. Central Animation Company Limited is a self-contained production company working on animation where all steps from determining the content of the story, creating the screenplay, planning, production, and editing to presentation are completed in the same place. It uses various methods such as stop-motion, 2D animation, 3D printing, and AI to enter the memory world of not only Korean children but children in many countries around the world.
There is another animation series waiting to be broadcast after 'Big Five.' The work on that series, named 'Galaxy Kids,' which introduces children to cosmic planets, stars, and the solar system through stories, has also been completed. As a producer of drama, movies, and web series, I have thoroughly enjoyed working as the project director and creative producer of the Bengali dubbed version of this animation project. For those who want to work in animation, this work style can be inspiring. Although this work, made in the Korean language for 5-6-year-old children, aims to imprint culture in the minds of children through Korean culture, it amazes me.
Because children of this age spend a lot of time in front of the TV set all over the world. Thus, content like this animation contributes significantly to the spread of Korean culture and plays a huge role in Korea's creative economy. With the right sponsorship, it is possible to produce it in Bangladesh as well.
Messenger/JRTarek
