The number of online video users has increased by 61% in five years. Online dramas have been upgraded from "fragmented" pastime to rigid demand.

viewers are willing to pay for online content, which elevates online dramas from the initial "fragmented" pastime to the rigid demand for entertainment, which also makes online dramas have to take seriously the growing aesthetic demands of the audience.

in the first 10 months of this year, 555 online dramas were recorded and broadcast by various websites in the State Administration of Press, publication, Radio, Film and Television. The data released at the Fifth Internet Audiovisual Congress attracted the attention of the industry. Over the past five years, the number of online video users in China has increased from 349 million to 565 million, an increase of 61 per cent. But at the same time, many practitioners also confess the current market confusion-the quality and traffic of online audio-visual content have not been "advanced", and the quality of many shows is worrying, but they are "getting hotter and hotter" in the market.

A few days ago, the 2017 China Network Audio-Visual Development Research report released by the China Network Audio-Visual Program Service Association shows that the proportion of domestic online video users continues to grow, with more than 40% of paying users. The number of paying members who spend more than 40 yuan a month has also increased from 20.2% last year to 26.0%. Viewers are willing to pay for online content, which elevates online dramas from the initial "fragmented" pastime to rigid entertainment needs, which also makes online dramas have to take seriously the growing aesthetic demands of the audience.

< strong > the concept of consumption has upgraded, requiring that the aesthetic appreciation of online dramas no longer just satisfy the recreation of fragmented time < / strong >

at the Internet audio-visual conference, industry insiders pointed out that after an extensive increase in number, the stage of "boutique" has come. Only by losing the shortcut thinking of "flow-only" and realizing the dual upgrading of quality and value, can we support a huge market scale.

producer Huang Xing of Penguin Film and Television Tianxuan Studios shares his industry confusion that quality and traffic are separated in the field of online drama production in China. "attracting traffic is a sword hanging over major platforms and film and television production companies, but in the process, we are bound to take some detours." Huang Xing cited his own production of "Kyushu Sky City" as an example. At the beginning of the project, the show was a "man's play", but it was changed into a "female emotional drama" because big data analyzed that most of the female users were on the viewing platform. As a result, the audience performance was quite good, but primary-age encountered a lot of curses because of the plot.

"Kyushu Sky City" is by no means alone. "Super IP+ topic star + defamiliarized character setting" was once regarded as a creative shortcut to curry favor with the post-00s and post-90s. But for now, shortcuts are not working. Adapted from the popular online article, "General in the first part" said it cost 300 million yuan, played the leading role by Ma Sichun, and brought out the costumes designed by Oscar winner and Tian Huimei. But the network score is only 5.4. "the saturation of the picture is too high, the plastic texture of the props", "slow down the camera when you don't agree with each other", "the role sets grandstanding". Most of the comments are controversial. Similarly, "the sound of thunder is big and the rain is small" are "the strange things of the wild where ghosts blow lanterns" and "the yellow skin graves of ghosts blowing lanterns". Both works are adapted from phenomenal online novels, and the main actors are also well-known, but they still can't stop the decline in word-of-mouth. The former score is 2.7 and the latter is 5.3.

< strong > quality, which is no longer overshadowed by "shortcuts", has become the key word for the promotion of online drama < / strong >

, which contrasts with the failure of "flow seed" is the success of several suspense theme online dramas this year. A few days ago, streaming giant Netflix announced that it would buy the overseas distribution rights of "the Dark Night". This is the first time that Netflix has bought the rights to an online drama in China, which means the work will be broadcast abroad on a large scale. "Audio-visual production is a professional field, with solid suspense settings and wonderful characterization." In the view of well-known director Xie Fei, the success of these works lies precisely in the return of the Noumenon of film and television content creation-- the length and the shortness; it is possible to have stars or not; to emphasize the quality of types and follow the characteristics of audio-visual art.

in the new plans announced by major websites at the end of the year, the names of a number of well-known directors, such as Guan Hu, Zhang Li, Han Sanping, Feng Xiaogang, and Zhou Xingchi, appeared in the camp of online drama content production, which highlights the determination to "enrich" the content. "the entry of a large amount of capital makes online dramas very popular, but the online dramas that really make young people applaud are very limited, far from reaching the degree of saturation." Director Peter Chan has expressed his interest and concern about the online drama industry.

from the point of view of people in the industry, online dramas still have a lot of room to rise, and need to change from extensive quantity growth to quality improvement in shaping high-quality products. While pursuing new ideas, new aesthetics and new postures, we also need the protection of production quality and ideological value.

Edit: mary