In mid October 2010, the Culture Japan crew went along to the headquarters of Production IG to see what goes on behind the scenes of making hit anime titles such as Ghost in the Shell, East of Eden and recently Sengoku Basara. Today we get to take a look and try some of the processes that are involved in making anime.
I remember when I could hardly speak Japanese back in the UK. Ghost in the Shell was released on video and I remembering it being such an inspiring movie. Was great to be able to visit the company responsible for the movie.
Back then we were still using a standard video camera to do our filming. Now we use the Lumix GH2 and you can see some of the results in the Shibuya Tour post.
Here we have Toru Okubo who is does the character design for Sengoku Basara. He's camera shy so we don't get to see his face.
Various colors are used to make it easy to fill in the colors later on. In the anime world, many assistants are paid per sheet that they fill in. The amount paid for each sheet is not exactly going to buy you a Nissan GTR but in the words of the Production IG boss - he says stick with this position for 3 years and you will be on the path to being a superstar.
He also said that many foreigners who start out with this job tend not to last long. Stick with it and it will be worth it in the long run - does not matter whether you are Japanese or not.
How many of you want to work in the anime industry? If so then you should start off with an online profile of your artwork (Pixiv, Deviant, Flickr etc) and then tell us if you think you can trace the above image within 20 mins - that's the speed expected for a piece like this. But do remember that you should not be expecting to be able to buy that Nissan GTR on your salary in the first 3 years.
Then its my turn. The software allows me to select areas, inverse and fill in colors for the current frame. The sheet that was filled in with colored hard lines have now made it easy for areas to be filled in on the computer.
All the completed frames are then strung together and merged with backgrounds and light flares. The final product is then ready for a process called Afreco "After Recording" where anime voice actors/actress read their scripts while making sure that the voice is in sync with the mouth movements. Sound effects and sound are usually added right at the end.
Time to rummage around the rest of the offices. Discover some Sengoku Basara Bushiroad Weiss Schwarz cards.
Production IG also run their own restaurant called Musashino Campus filled to the brim with a load of noms. Address and map as follows.
東京都武蔵野市中町2-1-9 IGビルディング1階
Then its time to interview the big boss of Production IG - Mitsuhisa Ishikawa. I wonder what our first project will be ^^;
This episode of Culture Japan is broadcast tonight (2010/12/11) in Japan on Tokyo MX TV from 22:30 - 23:00. This current season of Culture Japan will start its first episode run across the whole of Asia on Animax Asia from December 17th 2010 from 20:00 - 21:00. Asia gets 2 half hour shows back to back.
Will update you soon as to when the rest of the world gets it. Going to leave you with some screencaps from tonight's episode.