Innovation and cinematic language intertwine in El Channel, a Colombian digital platform set to launch later this year that aims to preserve the country’s culture by casting it in an entertaining light.

Currently a prototype, the project took root when audiovisual production companies, 2/4 Producciones and 2inventive, produced a web series together.

2/4 Producciones, dedicated to features and short films, focused on digital narratives, while 2inventive, specializing in TV series and commercial videos, provided a vision for the format.

“Conversations began to grow,” says Marco Velez, director of 2/4 Producciones. “We thought about going the extra mile and creating a channel.”

They later brought in digital marketing agency Xtrategy as a third partner.

“This way we have a global understanding of the product, not only regarding the audiovisual, production and image-related aspects, but the strategic and digital elements as well,” says Xtrategy Director of Innovation Carlos Andrés Torres.

The group started by rethinking what the Colombian audience needs.

“Digital video has exploded and its consumption is steadily growing and constant,” says Torres. “However, cultural content is somehow getting lost in the mass of funny videos, fun facts and sensationalism that exists online. Therefore, because we know how important it is to save culture, we decided to innovate that type of content.”

2inventive Co-Founder Diego Alejandro García sees El Channel as “a space where we want to present our culture to the world, and to all generations, in a much more entertaining way with a lighter and more intimate format that’s not stiff or boring, as cultural content is usually treated in Colombia.”

Torres suggests the country is losing its sense of culture.

“The English-speaking culture, and globalization in general, brings foreign ways of thinking and acting into the country every day. Young people look down on everything related to Colombian culture, so we want to start presenting the ‘cool side’’ of those Colombian things.”

The very name, El Channel, formed by the combination of the Spanish term ‘el’ and the English word ‘channel,’ recognizes this assimilation of foreign influence by blending the two languages.

Finding the Right Audience

The project is currently in an experimentation stage, with the impact of the content being tested on YouTube in two target demographics: young people ages 15-24, and 25-35—two segments the partners identified as having a hard time finding interesting audiovisual content on social media or on independent platforms. They also discovered a stark difference between the two sectors.

“The younger group is looking for funnier content whereas the other seeks content that ‘speaks to them,’” says Velez.

Plans include the launch of a website where content will be organized based on those findings, and shared across other platforms. Fiction web series also are under development, the first of which is La Fiesta (The Party), set to debut in September as individual sketches so that each episode is independent from the others.

Compelling Cultural Narratives

According to Torres, El Channel wants to recast old traditions and cultural practices with a young, street-based approach that shirks the previously careful, somewhat boring displays of Colombian cultural content.

For example, the video below highlights 12 unique ways to open a bottle of beer, based on the Colombian custom of rumba, or partying.

Overall, the channel strikes the tone of a light film, with dynamic camera shots, animated elements, the addition of subtitles so videos won’t require audio, and an easy-to-access platform.

“In Colombia, cultural content has not been adapted to new formats beyond television, and it fails to capture our attention,” says Velez. “Most of the cultural content is delivered without a point of view, so we want to achieve a more cinematic language that presents the most information we can in a single shot.”

He also believes this will help grab users’ attention and encourage the team to tinker with short videos that get to the point in a compelling way.

“We want El Channel to have an audiovisual quality stamp; to be entertaining and easy to produce, but done in style,” says García, who envisions the platform incorporating more 2D, 3D and illustration down the line.

Content ranges from videos like “12 clever ways to open a beer” to “If you haven’t played this, you are not a true Colombian” which is focused on tejo, a national sport that involves throwing a metal disc onto a board covered with clay. Another video, “This is how you win a woman’s heart with compliments,” seeks to restore traditional and respectful ways of wooing women.

Mixing Old with New

As far as aesthetics go, El Channel aims to be a contemporary, high-quality platform complemented by graphics that align with the retro-modern visual identity reflected in the logo.

“The idea is that the brand’s entire look and feel is based on that,” says Torres. “We want to keep up with our target audience’s intimate and modern consumption trend.”

The logo is inspired by the color bars used as a test pattern in the early days of television, mixed with a font based on a modern, sleek signature.

“We combined the old with the new,” says Torres.

As El Channel gets to know its audience, it will begin launching digital marketing campaigns in early 2018.

El Channel’s Culture

As the project continues to grow, the partners continue to think about their expectations for El Channel.

Velez—who, while living in Europe, was inspired by the diffusion of culture among the different countries—says he dreams of expanding El Channel throughout Latin America.

“I think the world is becoming smaller and Latin America should get on board,” he says.

García believes the risks of everyone living in a digital space are that people may forget their origins.

“Much of what we are today is part of our past,” he says. “We want Colombia to breathe culture, and culture is everything that happens in the country, not only its music, film or visual arts. It is everything that identifies and shapes the local identity. We want to show all this capital we have and that Colombians seize it, love it, appreciate it.”

Version español: La nueva plataforma El Channel busca resaltar la cultura colombiana

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