Spotlight: Animatic Adaptations

What to look out for when adapting films for testing in foreign countries and languages

As the person in charge of TV commercial production in your agency, you probably had to adapt the language of your client's TVC for an audience in another country once before. Maybe the specs and concepts regarding transcreation have been provided by the client. Or maybe you had to use the international network of your company to customize these language versions for the specific needs, traditions, customs and quirks of the target audience.

Some samples of script excerpts...

The hero's girlfriend, wearing a strapless top, approaches him to gently caress his freshly shaved, bare chest.

Sounds sexy, right? Though for a version to be shown in the United Arab Emirates, you'd have to change the scene -
shoulders need to be covered and instead of the woman touching the hero, an admiring look will have to suffice.

All the jewelry our heroine is wearing seems a bit much. This could be misinterpreted as an ironic exaggeration. Please change this!

This might be a good idea if the film is meant to air in West Europe. But for a Russian audience, the scene doesn´t need correcting.
They love sparkling, glittering merchandise over there - stuff just can´t be too glitzy in Russia.

Products vary in the details 

Not only can the narrative of the TVC differ from the guideline original, but in a lot of cases the product itself does.
While a body lotion in Germany might be simply squeezed out of a bottle, in France it might have a different form, label and another way to apply the product. In this case it is neccessary to replace the artwork. To be more specific: adapt the Photoshop layers of packshots, hands etc.

In certain cases you might even find yourself creating entirely different application scenes.

What are the most typical adaptation languages?

Since every product has its own distinct target audience, which may be quite different in other countries though, it only makes sense to adapt a campaign where there is a relevant market.

Funky Frame´s typical adaptation workflow includes a guideline version in English, which, after approval, can be adapted for typical West European countries like Germany, France, Italy, Spain or Poland. Beyond the European borders we also often adapt for Russia, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, South Africa, India or Brazil.
A successful localization does not only need a voice talent that is capable of speaking the desired language, but rather a native speaker. A reliable partner studio that should come up with state of the art,  stable technology is another important requirement.