cover news reporter Liu Ye
It is not new for popular film and television dramas to drive traffic to filming locations. As short dramas that have been developing rapidly in the past two years, they are now beginning to enter the world of "cultural tourism". In the first half of 2024, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television recommended a total of 28 works in the "Travel with Micro-Shorts" creative plan, with works from Beijing, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Hunan, and Sichuan selected. Among them, "My Return is Windy" tells the story of Sichuan Leshan's intangible cultural heritage delicacies have been viewed up to 190 million times, injecting new vitality into this "delicious" city. After the broadcast of "Flying Youth", Caocun Town received nearly 200,000 tourists during the Spring Festival, and the cultural and tourism short-term The drama has initially achieved results in motivating tourists to check in. On July 27, Cover News interviewed people in the industry to learn how to make "cultural tourism short dramas", what are the characteristics and difficulties.
The "threshold" for cultural tourism short dramas is not low
The content carries more promotional functions
"This short drama was mainly shot in Leshan, Sichuan. We combined the local natural scenery and humanistic customs with science fiction stories." Producer Zhu Xiao Gei has just completed the trial screening of the first season of the cultural and tourism short drama "The Realm of Silence". Unlike the mini-program short dramas that "release a drama in seven days", this military science fiction and suspense-themed short drama took more than two months. , mainly tells the story of a special forces team traveling through a cave and entering a parallel world.
The cultural and tourism short drama "The Realm of Destruction" was filmed in Leshan.
Zhu Xiaogui has produced many vertical screen short dramas before. In early 2024, she changed her track and entered the cultural and tourism short drama industry. In her opinion, the threshold for creating cultural and tourism short dramas is not low, including content thresholds and entry thresholds.
“The content should be more balanced between ‘cultural tourism promotion’ and ‘commercial attributes.’” Simply put, it is the balance between orientation and traffic. Compared with other mini-program short plays, cultural and tourism short plays are more unique in content expression because of their local publicity mission. "There are many red-line themes that cannot be touched, and there is a 'grey line' beyond the red line, such as rubbing The content that is too eye-catching will be very fatal if it is displayed in a cultural tourism short drama. "How to combine the local "cultural tourism" attributes with the "commercial" attributes is a test for the creative team, Zhu Xiaogui said.
Zhu Xiaogui's team has filmed a major online movie with the theme of rural revitalization for the local government as early as 2021, and won two awards in the province. "This year's film also won the Dragon Award, so the cooperation with "The Realm of Destruction" this time is also logical." Zhu Xiaogui said that due to the intervention of government departments, for ordinary creative teams, cultural and tourism short dramas How to prove your own strength and master resources is the most basic entry threshold.
Producer Li Yuan also recently completed the filming of a cultural tourism short drama in Panzhihua, Sichuan. This urban romance film "Full City Sunshine" incorporates Panzhihua's business cards such as "subtropical fruit production base and national forest park" into it. As a film and television person who came into contact with cultural and tourism short dramas for the first time, he is also thinking about the balance between traffic and content. “The country has given (cultural and tourism short dramas) a clear direction. You just need to create according to the requirements. From the perspective of screenwriters and producers, From a perspective, it is a clear proposition composition, but the cultural tourism short drama cannot be turned into a promotional video. On the basis of good content, we want to turn the investment into investment as much as possible through sophisticated production and market-oriented operation. "
Cultural Tourism Short Drama. The drama "Full City Sunshine" is broadcast in vertical screen and is shot in Panzhihua
"Promotional film" and "short drama" need to be clearly identified.
Cultural and tourism short dramas will also need local efforts in the follow-up.
As a new force in film and television, short dramas are closely related to local The first "electric shock" the government encountered was "core cognition".
"As long as you grasp the scale and find the right direction during the promotion process, you can also use the unique routines of short plays appropriately." Li Yuan said. "But many people still think of short plays as promotional videos." Conceptual cognitive bias may lead to short plays that are "short, flat, fast, and down-to-earth" and burdened with a lot of publicity tasks during creation. , and seemed too "tall, big, and superior" and even deviated from the characteristics of the short drama.For this kind of problem, Zhu Xiaogui's team uses local scenery and culture + popular elements + a strong and fast plot rhythm to deal with it.
In addition to the plot rhythm, the length of a single episode is also an obvious identity label of cultural and travel short dramas. "The Realm of Destruction" is a horizontal screen short drama. The first season has a single episode of 3 minutes and a total of 9 episodes. "City of Sunshine" is closer to traditional short dramas in form: it is broadcast on a vertical screen, with a single episode lasting about 1 minute and 30 seconds, with a total of 70 episodes. This is also the first "micro-short drama" attempt by Panzhihua East District Cultural and Broadcasting Tourism Bureau.
Panzhihua East District Cultural Tourism Bureau participated in the production of "City of Sunshine". Although the core requirement was publicity, they showed great recognition for the expressiveness of the short play. "Micro-short dramas are one of the most popular forms of online audio-visual literature and art today. Short time, precise content, and quick access to information are the characteristics of micro-short dramas." After identifying the characteristics of short dramas, Panzhihua East District Cultural and Broadcasting Brigade went from script outline to Scene selection was followed from on-site shooting to post-production, and a "traffic conversion" plan was made to undertake the short drama after it was broadcast: "As the short drama goes online and the plot advances, we first need to 'take advantage of the traffic' and decrypt the shooting We must also carry out market inspections and corporate service training for behind-the-scenes and shooting locations, establish a tourist feedback mechanism, and strive to be a good gold medal 'waiter'." Li Xinyue, deputy director of Panzhihua East District Cultural and Broadcasting Tourism Bureau, told Cover News reporter.
With the implementation of the "Travel with Micro Shorts" plan, more and more cultural and tourism departments have entered the short drama track. Showing the local natural scenery, cultural heritage and style of the times, and showing the new image and charm of cultural tourism are the creative goals of the cultural tourism short drama, but can it have "traffic" in the future? Whether the local area can convert "traffic" into "retention" for tourists to stop depends on the effectiveness of local cultural tourism. (Photo according to interviewee)
