Equipped with conventional degrees but making careers in unconventional fields requires a lot of courage, grit, talent and support.
With prestigious professional degrees from reputed institutes, the obvious expectation would be to make a career in the same profession. The Tatwawadi brothers, however, have broken the shackles of such age-old thoughts.
Despite completing engineering from a reputed institute, Vaibhav chose to chase his passion of acting immediately after he bagged the degree from the College of Engineering Pune (COEP). His younger brother Gaurav completed his engineering from the same college and went on to study MBA from MDI, Gurgaon for the same reason – to pursue his passion. He always wanted to be an entrepreneur.
An actor by profession Vaibhav has made a name for himself in many Hindi and regional films in nearly a decade. Gaurav, an entrepreneur worked in many start-ups and corporate companies before establishing his own business. With similar passions, albeit in different sectors of the same field, the duo started their company, Autumn Breeze Filmz that is into film production, creative content for branding and digital marketing. When talent and perseverance are coupled, there is no way for success to evade you.
The Nagpur brothers who are a household name today in the entertainment industry, shared their passion, journey, success and opinions about the entertainment industry and their company with The Insights Success.
Excerpts:
How did you venture into this field?
G – I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. I started exploring the content space as a potential growing business around 3 years back, at that time OTT had just started picking up in India. We believed that increasing content consumption would lead to content war and the content requirement will grow year on year as more and more people get high speed internet access. This we believed would happen for long format, short format and even digital ads. That was the starting point when I decided to enter full time in this field. In addition, Vaibhav has an experience of 10 years in this field being an actor. So, we decided to venture into films and ad films. Though it seems a conventional business model but we have innovated a lot in terms of fund raising and execution for both films and TVC reducing the TAT’s and overheads substantially as compared to a conventional production house.
V: I used to participate in acting competitions since school days. I also was a state level badminton player. I was planning to pursue badminton as career. But it was in 8th standard that I realised it was not sports but it was acting that I wanted to pursue. I did few plays with the theatre groups in Nagpur. Then I went to COEP for my engineering. That turned out to be a turning point. I got groomed as an actor in my college. I won lots of intercollegiate drama competitions and from there things started falling in place. The journey started from Marathi serials to Marathi films to Hindi films and the journey continues.
How has it been without any background in this field?
G: I was the cultural Secretary while pursuing my B Tech from COEP and that was my only small and limited exposure to this sector. Luckily, Vaibhav has an experience for 10 years in both Marathi and Hindi entertainment industry, as an actor though. But he knew people inside out and that was definitely a big help. For the business part, I had been in touch with many producers because of Vaibhav and we would keep on bouncing ideas about the industry and the working style. Through those discussion I realised that it has to be a balance of both creative calls and business calls. And with the present core team we have all the elements needed for a successful production house. We have great artists who have great creative vision. They bring in new concepts on the table. Basically, our core strength is to map a budget for a particular concept. Hence, we believe that there is no concept which is good or bad. It is just that if it is mapped to the right budget then it makes sense both in terms of business and creating whatever it is – it may be a web series, it may be an ad film, short film or anything.
G and V: We basically started with ads for various brands. Our first HIndi feature has been announced day before yesterday and it will be coming out in 2021.
How was the journey coming from Nagpur to the entertainment industry in Mumbai and making a name as well in very less time?
V: Being a Nagpur guy, I did find it difficult to adjust to the pace of Mumbai. And I feel one improves over a period of time with the right kind of exposure. Irrespective of the city, one always faces challenges when he or she opts for a non-conventional career.
G: For both Vaibhav and me, COEP has played a major role. It was Pune that introduced us to cultural professional world. I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur but was not very sure on the sector.Vaibhav always wanted to be an actor so he kept meeting lot of people. He did a lot of theatre and ads in Marathi Hindi Telegu and English.
Whenever he used to shoot, I used to tag along and observe how this industry and business operates. So, it happened step by step for me.
What was your family’s reaction to both brother entering into the entertainment industry despite engineering qualifications?
G: Fortunately, our family has been always very supportive. But it was not that we both decided beforehand and ventured into the entertainment industry together. Initially, it was Vaibhav who always wanted to be an actor. So, my parents were very supportive about it. Their only condition was that we should complete any degree we wanted because education is of prime importance (which even we brothers believe), and then follow whatever you feel is your passion.
Vaibhav was very clear that he wanted to be an actor. I did lot of things. I worked in various sectors like FMCG, finance and capital markets. I explored quite a number of things. But I knew that eventually I need to start something on my own which I love doing. So, I began my entrepreneurship journey during my engineering days. Though all of them failed, I knew that this is what I like to do. As mentioned above sensing the opportunity in the content space we decided to venture out in this space and as always the family has always been very supportive,
You ventured into this field and the pandemic happened shortly after that. How has it affected relatively newcomers to keep their heads above water?
G: We started two years back and the pandemic is around a year old. In the first year we were quite focused on the concepts and getting the right scripts. We believe that script is the soul of the film. So, we were scouting on that front and for managing the cash flow we were doing few ad films. We did work with Sterling Holidays and few startups to start with. Coming to your Covid question, frankly it has been difficult for everyone not only in this industry but also for other industries.
In terms of fund raising, we did a lot of syndication to raise the funds and we have found out a couple of innovative models which I don’t think are presently happening in terms of fund raising part for films. So, the fund-raising model which we have adopted has been unusual way of doing it and which is not normally the market practice per se but that has been an interesting journey during these tough times. I have met a lot of good financers who have been supportive from the day 1 we met them. Plus the trust they have shown in our team has been commendable
People were already into OTT since it came before Covid but box office hits are a different experience for a film maker. Your take?
G and V: Personally speaking, these two are two different distribution channels per se. At the end the product is your film whose soul is the script. So you might be a bit arty when it comes to OTT while you need to be little commercial when it comes to theatrical release but at the end of it the person who is going to see the product is same audience. So, the script and the soul remain intact. In terms of business, it has definitely impacted not only small production houses but big ones too and no one knows how long this will go on. It has been a tough year for all industries including the entertainment one.
Tell us more about your partnership. You complement each other – one being an actor and the other a producer.
G: Basically, Vaibhav being an actor he comes with lot of connects and industry experience. During discussions, he brings a lot on the table in terms of creative calls, right kind of team for the selected script etc. My job is to take care of overall business strategy and vision of the company.
We have introduced artificial intelligence (AI) based marketing tool. So, this tool, NeuroKit, will tell you where exactly a user is bound to see in the creatives, video or 2d before even it is launched. For example, in a hoarding the user will see few spots and not the entire hoarding. Keeping this in mind, we have developed this tool named Neurokit. It helps optimise the design – be it product design, poster release, video, TVC or your film promo. Now, there are eye tracking tools as well in the market to map where a user is looking but it is a costly and time consuming affair. Neurokit will cut down on cost and TAT substantially and can be used by brands, designers, social influencers etc.
As young generation of entrepreneurs in the entertainment industry what is your perception and idea about the industry at the moment, and what future does it hold in general?
G: With so many cultures, languages and different tastes India is a unique market. Every state is like a country in itself because of the different tastes and different likings of content consumption. Right now, what is happening is that people are getting exposed to lot of national and international cinema has started impacting the quality of the content they are consuming. I have seen many people seeing South Asian films and films of other languages.
The exposure to the new content is huge and I believe it will keep on increasing. And seeing the penetration of Jio and OTT platforms in rural areas as well, I believe there is lot of scope in terms of content creation. The content that everyone likes every time is different and they always need something new. There is lot of scope for all kinds of content creators. I am very optimistic about the industry’s growth prospects and strongly believe there is lot of scope still in the content creation space.
What is your success mantra?
V: Â I believe the one thing that is of utmost importance for success is concentration. Attention without tension brings success.
What have you envisioned for the future?
G and V: One film is already lined up. It is a romantic love story. We have not yet finalised the name. We have developed number of scripts. Other than that, we have an ad vertical in which we are trying to reduce the turn-around time which for digital ads right now is around 7-8 days. We are trying to bring it down to 3-4 days. At the moment, we are working on three verticals – ads, films, and web series.
What message would you like to give to today’s generation?
V: The most important thing the youth of today should practice is meditation. I strongly feel that we have got so many resources when it comes to improving the external world but if the internal world is in a mess one cannot remain sane in the current world of cut-throat competition. Other than this I don’t want to suggest anything to the youth as I believe that today’s youth has amazing vision and talent.
