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Ashutosh,
the IBN 7 Managing Editor told indiantelevision.com "The
difference is hard to explain without actually showing what we
mean, but let's say the difference would be a man from the small
town and a man from Mumbai or Manhattan."
Ashutosh
says that the group has been feeling that Hindi news channels
take on a rustic, rural face, which puts off many young people
who have become aspirational.
He
says that with the flush of money due to recent economic boom
in the country colouring the outlook of the viewers, there is
need to give the face of the channel a completely international
look.
Alongside,
technology would be key to the viewing experience as many virtual
studios will be added for news programming.
"We
shall just have one master studio with proper sets, the rest will
be all be virtual and we can create any kind of set that the particular
news requires," Ashutosh said.
As
an example he agreed that it would now be possible to report,
say, on a plane hijack creating the virtual set of the plane and
the cockpit and showing how the hijack had taken place, instead
of just giving audio takes on these details.
Ashutosh
said that large chunks of prime time will have the support of
these virtual studios, and that too would add to the international
viewing experience.
But
the key issue is of the look, he stressed, explaining that the
news content will be the same but with a changed face. He says
that the entire colour scheme, among other visual effects willl
be changed to give the international feel.
"Let's
say a man has shifted from Raipur to Rochester, and so does his
look. The cloth is the same the man is the same but the look is
international."
It
was a bit difficult to envisage, though, as the various bands
that are seen on the screen of IBN 7 today will still be there.
At
present there are four bands, one at top and three below, and
those would stay.
Asked
why BBC or CNN does not have these bands, and that primarily these
are the cause for Indian Hindi news channels' on-screen look being
badly cluttered, he said that this is because those foreign channels
do not have to face the intense competition one sees in India.
"Those
bands are constant feed of information useful to the viewers,
so that even if the audio is out, one can feed on information,
whether regarding the story on news, or other ticker news and
so forth," he explained.
His
defence is that the tremendous competition to grab eyeballs is
what has led Indian channels to go for these techniques, and said:
"These will stay, but still, you will realise that what you
are seeing today on our channel is completely different from what
is coming up."
Ashutosh
admitted that the virtual studios have come at a huge price, but
this reinventing of the channel was necessary.
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