24 June 2015
Hyderabad

Publicity Design is the first point of attraction for any movie. It is one way of ushering the audience to the theaters. The young duo of Tollywood - Anil and Bhanu are creating a trend by bringing uniqueness to their publicity designs. Idlebrain throws Focus Light on this most sort designer duo for this week.

Bhanu -
I was born in Vijayawada. But I did my schooling and college in Hyderabad. After I finished graduation, I joined Edit multimedia and pursued a two year diploma course. I, then worked for a year there. That’s where I met Anil.  

Anil -
I was born in Nalgonda district. But I did my schooling in Warangal. Though I joined medicine in Hyderabad, my heart was not in science. I thought I could be closer to movies, so I moved to Hyderabad and took up the medical seat. But as fate had it, I left the college and joined in multimedia. That's where I met Bhanu. 

Bhanu -
My story is different. Unlike Anil, I didn't make it to Engineering entrance in one go. So, I was preparing myself for long term EAMCET. In the meantime, I thought I would take up some courses in computer. I joined Aptech computers and completed a Higher Diploma in Software Engineering. Later One day, I happened to be in Secunderabad and chanced upon Edit Multimedia center. I went inside out of curiosity and was intimidated by their course curriculum. I took up on multimedia and thus never stopped my journey.

Anil-
I left Nature Cure and Yogic science course for multimedia. I wanted to be a director and was totally bug by film industry. I did approach many directors to be their assistant. But was always asked to come back or revisit. I Could never make it into the industry, as I never had a god father or a contact point. So, the only way to get into the industry was to pursue multimedia and get noticed. Thus, I joined multimedia in a fluke and just as Bhanu, never turned back.

Bhanu-
I wanted to be an actor. I was interested in acting. But guess what; even I had no entry point into the industry. So when I met Anil, we both thought, since we don’t have anyone in the industry, why not start designing film posters and get noticed. That’s how ABCD emerged.

ABCD- Anil Bhanu Core Design

Bhanu-
The talent that we had was to use Photoshop. So, we thought let’s start doing posters and stuff. Everything was getting digitized at that time. So, all designers were shifting to Photoshop designing from manual designing. So, Anil and I had this practical approach. If we go to the directors to be their Assistant Directors, they would ask us to come back. But if we make posters, then they will be interested in talking to us. So, it was more of a practical approach for us to meet the directors and build some contacts.

Anil-
We named our company as Anil Bhanu as name is everything that we want. We wanted to be known. So, we named our company after our names. Before we started the company, we used to visit all production houses, meet the directors, and show some samples to them. Many people saw the work and also gave us some work. We used to make lot of samples. But for almost 2 years, we never had any concrete work.

Bhanu-
Nothing was final. For 3 years, we were surviving on our parents. Luckily we had computers. So, we kept them in our room and used to work on some projects. One day, we got an opportunity to work with Aditya Music Company. At that time, Aditya was a leading music company. They gave us some CD covers and when we did that project. They were mighty impressed and started giving us work regularly. It was our main source of income. Though we were given samples, we never had concrete work to rely on. All we had was our pocket money. We also made some book covers for publications and schools, Logos for startup companies and some Photoshop works wherever required. Those were our struggling days!

Anil-
It was tough for us. These days it is all digitized. But when we started, we used to take pictures as hard copies. Then select the pictures and make them into big size bromide prints. Then get the drum scanned. Finally, work on these images and take printouts to show them to the directors. Each printout would cost us Rs 140. We would make 10-20 such prints. Sometimes, they used to like them. Sometimes they would never appreciate them. And we were always asked to come back- which means, almost end of the game. Then we chanced upon Krishna, who used to be a publicity designer under the name Krishna Digitals. We became good friends with Krishna and one day he asked us to meet Krishna Vamsi who wanted a production house logo.

Anil-
We talked to Krishna Vamsi’s manager, Babu, and gave him our numbers. We waited for his call for two months and gave up. After sometime Babu called us and asked us to bring the works and samples. We immediately took our best works and showed them to Krishna Vamsi. He then told us that Sridevi wanted a logo for her yet to be launched production house - Sridevi Prodcutions. He asked us to make a logo and show him. We worked day and night and made some 10-20 logos and some animation concepts too. They were sent to Sridevi and within a fortnight we heard from them saying they liked one logo. Krishna Vamsi also wanted us to make a poster for his next movie. Unfortunately that movie was stalled in the midway. We were back to square one. Luckily after sometime, Krishna Vamsi took up Khadgam project. But he was hesitant as the movie housed all big stars and we were pretty new comers. We assured him that we could do it. So, we took the work very seriously, and worked on the posters. When we gave him some samples , he was very happy with our work and gave us the project khagdam. That’s how we got a break in the industry. We put our heart and soul in it as it was our baby project. 

Bhanu
Krishna Vamsi's assistants also gave us some projects after Khagdam. One very interesting incident happened here. Actor Krishnudu is our good friend. He is also a photographer. We used to hangout a lot. One day, he asked us to make business cards for him. Krishnudu is very close to Ram Gopal Varma. When he met RGV and gave him his card, RGV was impressed by the design on the card and asked us to meet him. We met up with RGV and he gave us the project of Madhyanam hatya. Thus we started doing his projects too. Though RGV insisted on moving us to Mumbai, we never moved and stuck to our roots. We made posters for Sarkar, Darna jaroori hai, Rakta charitra, Not a Love story, The Attacks of 26/11 and many more. After Madhyana hatya, we pretty much did all movies of RGV.

Anil-
After Khadgam, we used to do just a movie or two a year. It was very tough financially. But slowly our work started picking up. It did take a lot of time. Initially, we used to go to the shootings by reading about them in the newspapers. We would go to their locations and meet the directors. It took us lot of time and much struggle to get good work. Bommmarillu Bhaskar is a good friend of us. Bhaskar asked us to meet Dil Raju for Bommarillu posters. At that time, Dil Raju had a designer. So, he asked us to make a poster and told us that he would give us the work only if he is impressed. Each time, it was like proving ourselves. So, we made palettes and showed him. He liked them and since then we have been doing Dil Raju's movies. It has always been about networking and proving for us.

Bhanu-
When we create designs, we take utmost care of them. We try to maintain similar palette for all poster for one movie. We make sure the color tone and scheme match in each poster. It is very important to maintain that uniqueness. We work according to the taste of the directors. Once we get clients they never go away. Because, we make sure, we give them the best work. Krishna vamsi, Dil Raju, Gunasekhar, Ram Gopal Varma, Surender Reddy and many others have been with us since we started working for them.

Anil-
There is lot of competition in this field. Tollywood Publicity artists have a union too. It’s called Cine Publicity Artists Association, where we need to take up membership. There are more than 150 registered members in the union and almost 80 members are very active. Imagine having those many people in a small industry. It is quite competitive. But once we prove and give our best designs, the clients won’t move out.

Bhanu
So far we made approximately 150 film posters. It was quite a lot of struggle initially. But, we tried our best to get a foothold. Now, people in the industry know us. We both are so tuned in that we hardly have a conflict. We have assistants who help us in our office. While I take care of the administration, Anil takes care of the creative work. We both share our works. Anil is shy. I am the talker. So, I go out and negotiate the deals. If we make a poster, we both should like it. We are our own critics. We try our best to communicate to the audience through the posters. 

Our families-

Bhanu- My wife. Manjari, used to work as pre-primary teacher, but now she is a housewife. Ours is a love marriage and as you can see, she has been with me through my struggles. We have a 7 year old daughter, Teertha.

Anil- My wife Aruna is from Mumbai. She is an MBA graduate and does online trading from home. We have an 8 year old son, Viraat.

Anil- Bhanu could be contacted at -
[email protected]

By
Swathi Sriram

Other articles in 'Focus Light:
• Vijaya Bhaskar
• Vinay Varma
• Dr. Josyabhatla Sarma
• Sasikiran Narayana