The official website of the Anime Tamago program (formerly Anime Mirai) revealed the story synopses, key visuals, staffs, and a teaser video for its 2016 anime shorts on Wednesday. As in previous years, the anime shorts will train young animators on-the-job, though the exact amount of funding the project will receive from the Agency of Cultural Affairs has not yet been revealed.

The anime shorts and the studios producing them include:





Title: "Colorful Ninja Iromaki"Studio: Signal MD (IG Port's new anime studio subsidiary Director: Kentarō Kobayashi (comedian/actor/writer of the Rahmens comedy duo)Producer: Yoshiki SakuraiThird-grader Himeno moves to a huge mansion in the country. But she soon finds out it's a ninja house! The ninjas Akamaki—who tends to the fires, Aomaki—who sees to the water, and Kiiromaki—who sees to the carpentry, mistake Himeno for a princess, and begin solving problems for her with their own unique skills. But that is not the full extent of their powers! When Aomaki and Kiiromaki combine, they from Midorimaki. Similarly, when Akamaki and Aomaki combine, they form Murasakimaki; and when Akamaki and Kiiromaki combine, they form Tōmaki. Life with these colorful ninjas has only begun, when they discover a large tornado heading for the mansion. What will happen to the Himeno family? Can the colorful ninja protect Himeno?





Title: "UTOPA"Studio: Studio 4°CDirector, Original Character Design: Takahiro TanakaProducer: Tomoko OgiwaraHundreds of years after the 20th century, nature and the ecosystem have been devastated due to use of nuclear and biological weaponry. Most of Earth has been contaminated and is collapsing into ruin, and a great majority of plants and animals are now extinct. The world heads to the “Big Six,” the sixth mass extinction event. Humanity built cities in the sky, migrating the endangered species of animals and plants there. Over many years, the animals evolved in these isolated cities. With artificial genetic crossbreeding, they acquire language, bipedality, and build a life and civilization for themselves free from want. No one thinks of the world below any longer. One day, a single plant seed wanders into one of the sky cities and some children discover it. Unable to resist the temptation to look into the world outside, they decide to undertake an adventure to the outside world, not knowing that once they set foot on the ground, they will never be able to return.





Title: "Kacchikenee"Studio: Tezuka ProductionsDirector: Fumihiro YoshimuraProducer: Yoshihiro ShimizuAiko lives in a shrine that has a sliding door that mysteriously is only half painted, and thought during her childhood that she wanted to paint it. But the 17-year old Aiko now has no dreams about the future. Suddenly, a strange man appears before her. Aiko's grandfather and the shrine's chief priest offers the man to stay in the shrine, but Aiko isn't having any of it. But she realizes the kindness of the brusque young man, and slowly comes to like him. But what is his true identity?





Title: "Kaze no Matasaburō"Studio: BuemonDirector: Yuki YamadaProducer: Kiyohiko TakayamaA girl moves from the city and goes to school in the country due to some circumstances at her father's job. Her new schoolmates keep her at a distance. There is a boy she'd like to get to know better, but she worries about how he might treat her, and doesn't try to get closer. She begins to hate life in the country, and longs to return to the city, but she ends up meeting a real god of wind. The work depicts the fears, kindness, and love of children in a short, fleeting fairy tale.

The official website also began streaming a promotional video for the project.

Each studio will produce their respective anime shorts until March 2016. The shorts will premiere at an unspecified time in 2016.

The Japanese government's Agency of Cultural Affairs launched its "Young Animator Training Project" in 2010 with the aim of fostering the growth of domestic animation studios, and tackling the concern that more of the Japanese animation process is being outsourced overseas. The project has spawned such works as Little Witch Academia and Death Billiards (which inspired the Death Parade television anime). This year's Anime Mirai shorts screened at the Tokyo Anime Award Festival on March 22.

Source: Kai-You