Vijayalaxmi Hegde
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Subtitling and Dubbing for Indian OTTs: Everyone Can Win
Back when I started writing for the language services industry in 2010, it took some effort to explain to people that there was actually such an industry. Not so any more. Over-the-top platforms have single-handedly made translation and localization a thing in India.
With 40 plus OTT platforms and counting, India should rank as one of the most competitive markets in this genre globally. What does this mean for the translation and localization sector? How can OTT players use language services to meet their viewers’ expectations? We take a look in this post.
The Indian OTT Landscape
The players
The Indian OTT market has a healthy presence of indigenous as well as international players. Among the desi players, regional rajas such as hoichoi (Bengali), Planet Marathi, aha (Telugu), and their ilk rule the markets they operate in. Not to be left behind, global players such as Amazon Prime and Netflix, come in loaded with original content mostly in Hindi. Then there are the hybrids such as Disney+ Hotstar, who were among the first to realize that the way OTT could draw people in is by being an extension of their TV.
In the last year or so, many regional OTT companies have come up. They are highly focused on their language-specific markets. According to a FICCI-PwC report, the share of regional language consumption on OTT platforms will cross 50% of total time spent by 2025, easing past Hindi at 45%. It further stated that content costs will continue to increase as the overall quality benchmark rises to address the needs of a more aware audience, particularly across regional markets.
The viewers
Currently, there are about 350 million OTT viewers in India. Increasingly, they are male, within the age of 18-35, and come from rural areas. About 80 million are paying subscribers. Though we don’t have a break-up of rural versus urban, we can safely assume that most of the paying subscribers come from urban areas. The viewers are maturing very quickly and there is some level of discontent brewing. They find that they are spending much more on entertainment via OTT than they used to via cable TV. They also feel it difficult to navigate across platforms – meaning they are feeling boxed in.
And everything else in between
The devices and the connectivity required to push this OTT revolution are already here. Still, some points to consider: the mobile phone remains the primary source of internet connectivity in many households. And, a mobile phone as well as the streaming service is shared by family or friends. This is one reason why free/feemium streaming services such as YouTube or Voot are hard to challenge as they are light on the pocket.
Language services get a boost, thanks to OTT
Indian-language viewers of OTT content outnumber English-language viewers. And, let’s not forget that even the English-language viewers mostly do speak or understand one Indian language. No surprise then that a substantial volume of content is being localized from English to Indian languages. But Indian language to English and from thereon to other languages has found a niche of its own, thanks to the diaspora and an appetite and curiosity shaping up for mainstream Indian cinema.
Along with this, Indian language to Indian language is emerging, too. I remember my aunt gushing over a Bengali teleserial dubbed into Kannada. Her interest in the content was all the more because of the fact that it was originally Bengali content. She was curious about how it would compare against her own culture. Dubbing made this possible.
Subtitling and dubbing have both taken off like never before in the Indian localization sector. Some audiences might prefer subtitles, while some others might go for dubbing. In the more premium markets, subtitles might be acceptable. But my aunt’s ilk, I suspect, would be much more comfortable just listening to the dialogue in their native language rather than having to read on-screen.
The choice between subtitling and dubbing may actually vary between types of content rather than language to language. Content producers have to put in some research here to understand what will suit their audience.
Challenges galore, despite the opportunities
Language service providers (LSPs) are scrambling for trained resources when it comes to subtitling and dubbing and there just aren’t enough. Firstly, formal training institutes are few and far between and new recruits have to be trained on the job. This means that subtitlers and dubbing artists cannot hit the road running. Secondly, even the availability of enough native language speakers and linguists is not a given.
On the tech side, LSPs have some serious investing to do in terms of server space and computing power, which is required for heavy audio/video files. However, even if an LSP does not want to spend heavily on tech infrastructure, it can still find its place under the sun by taking on smaller, contractual work from the bigger LSPs. There’s surely something for everyone in the Indian localization sector right now.
OTT players, translate to multiple RoI on content
On the OTT side of things, the scramble is for content. With time, viewer maturity will increase and not just any content will do. Then comes the question: how much original content can be produced within a reasonable framework of time, budget, and other constraints?
The answer, OTT friends, lies with the language services industry. Sooner or later, you will hit the limit on original content production. Perhaps you already have. But with subtitling and dubbing, the story is only beginning. Take the examples of crossover content, be it Indian (such as Jai Bhim) or from overseas (such as Squid Game or Money Heist). Or even the mainstream Bengali>Kannada content my aunt was watching. The producers of this content multiplied their return on investment manifold simply by translating and localizing it.
Shailesh Kapoor, founder & CEO of Ormax Media, told Business Insider, “The language barrier has been broken considerably by the OTT medium. With dubbing and subtitles available in many languages for all major shows and films now, platforms cannot stick to single-language, homogenous offerings any more. We can expect more language-led experimentation, both in content acquisition and presentation.”
The cost of subtitling or dubbing is a fraction of the cost of producing fresh content. But it’s not just an attractive option from the cost angle, but might be a more convenient option in these pandemic times. Plus, one is never short of content this way. It can even provide some buffer time while new content can be produced.
Also, captions or subtitles are not just for someone who doesn’t understand the language: they increase viewership and engagement. You only have to look at YouTube or Facebook to understand the power of captions. Captions help make the video more accessible. They also let the viewers watch the content anywhere – during their commute, while in the gym, etc – where they might have to turn the audio off.
The Indian media localization scene is very interesting right now: everyone can win here. Provided, OTT players wake up fully to the potential of translation and localization and LSPs are able to cope with the surging demand.
