This is a collection of notes by sakuga fans who attended Anime Style Talk Event on July 1st, which was hosted by Yūichirō Oguro and had guest speaker Toshiyuki Inoue and Takeshi Honda.

Please note that I’m not a professional translator, Japanese and English aren’t my first language, so there are bound to be a lot of mistakes or different interpretations from the original notes. A lot of re-arrangement and additional info have been made too.

I know this is kuso translation, I add a lot of my own interpretation and implication from the notes (the notes were posted on twitter so obviously they don’t cover the whole conversation, it’s just a summary). And probably there are some parts that I haven’t translated yet. It’s really my first poor attempt at translating from JP to EN like this, so I’d like to apologize first if this is really painful to read.

But you can always read the original notes here:

https://pastebin.com/973qkyxp

Source: https://twitter.com/hdjxne3jagh7nsa

and here:

Thank you for reading.

Additional note: There’s another Anime Style Talk Event (and screening event for Maquia, MEMORIES, and Jin Roh) on July 21st, with guest speakers Toshiyuki Inoue, Takeshi Honda, and Hiroyuki Okiura. I’d like to translate it too if I have time, but I can’t promise it will be done soon.

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Let’s talk about Yutaka Nakamura

Inoue: “Nakamura-san is really good, like, just by watching his animation makes me happy. His sakuga MAD are overflowing with such pleasantness.”

Inoue: “His animation in Sword of the Stranger always bring so much joy to me, it is a must-see scene for animators/people who are aiming to be animator.”

Oguro: “When animating, Nakamura-san always read the mood. Surely he likes playing around with the storyboard and instruction the director gave to him, but he still does it at the scope where it is allowed.”

Note: Nakamura animated the climax battle between Nanashi and Luo Lang.

Inoue: “Let’s talk about his character acting animation, even a simple movement is amazing. Technically speaking, I don’t think our skills differ that much, but his inventiveness (at creating action movement) is outstanding. His amazing animation is a result of such outstanding skill and his passionate energy when drawing.”

Honda: “There has been an increasing number of young animators who want to do flashy action like Yutaka Nakamura-san these days. But it’s important to note that super animators like Nakamura-san also started from the bottom stage with simple character acting animation, there are many newbie who just want to skip this stage. You mustn’t neglect this.”

About Inoue’s animation characteristic

Inoue: “I don’t draw things that so out of place (strange). I’m able to draw animation in such a way that I desired.”

Oguro: “Well, that’s a bit cool. Wait…isn’t it too cool? To be able to meet the direction’s demand and even exceeds their expectation. Also you don’t need any correction, do you?”

Inoue: “Well, you can say that to be able to meet the direction’s demand is also my aesthetic sense. Also, during the production of Ghost in the Shell, people at I.G said ‘look, only Inoue-san’s genga that aren’t corrected’. “

Gu Gu Ganmo, one of Inoue’s earliest work and where did his inspiration come from



Oguro: “You really did well on Ganmo, not only your animation was able to meet production’s demand, you also played with the movement and delivered cool action too.”

Inoue: “I wasn’t particularly thinking about direction nor the audience at the time, I just was doing whatever I wanted. It was the era where animators’ characteristic were displayed directly through what they draw. They didn’t draw with such a mind like ‘what if it will be checked by other people (animation supervisors)’. For example in Urusei Yatsura, there were several people who followed in Yoshinori Kanada-san’s footsteps and their animation really stood out.”

Honda: “I decided to enter animation industry after I saw Ganmo. Inoue-san’s animation were just different from other people’s drawings and easy to spot.”

Inoue’s part in episode 7, roller coaster scene.

Oguro: “That scene was really impressive.”

Inoue: “At the time I received a strong influence from Takashi Nakamura-san. The way he draws body’s form and limbs is just so cool, and I hadn’t seen something like that before.”

Inoue: “Speaking of Takashi Nakamura-san, rather than AKIRA I always liked his Gold Lightan and Urashiman better after all. His solo episode on Gold Lightan episode 41 (大魔神の涙) was really good. Although there were many production restrictions (to save money) during his solo episodes, like several cuts weren’t used in photography process.”

Honda: “Actually I’ve never seen that episode before.”

Inoue: “Then prepare yourself for a slap on the wrist.”

Oguro trivia: “Although Sushio-san really likes Takashi Nakamura’s AKIRA, he has never seen Urashiman.”

From Ganmo to friendship with Hiroyuki Kitakubo

Inoue: “After the broadcast of Ganmo’s first episode, I was asked directly by Hiroyuki Kitakubo-san to show me the genga for my scene. Since then we stayed in touch with each other and I got the chance to see many genga from another studio’s (and freelance) animators, such as in Urusei Yatsura. Actually I traded my Ganmo genga with Kitakubo’s collection, it was Yasuomi Umetsu-san’s “Stop!! Hibari-kun!” genga.”

*Note: during the production of Urusei Yatsura, Kitakubo also did some KA for “Stop!! Hibari-kun!” episode 9 and 15, which had Umetsu as animation supervisor and key animator in those episodes.

About Cream Lemon Part 4

Inoue: “After Ganmo, we became really close and when Kitakubo-san invited me to his Pop Chaser episode.”

Note: Inoue drew the H scene in the first half. [NSFW Warning]



Inoue: “It’s necessary to make the individuals movement different when they are making out, and there’s bed sheet too. I kinda want to compliment myself for figuring that out.”

Cream Lemon Part 4: POP♥CHASER was released on March 13, 1985. It was Hiroyuki Kitakubo’s first directorial debut, just when he was still 21 years old. He was credited under pen name Dai Sakura, with him providing the scenario, storyboard, direction, animation supervision, and character design (along with Yuuji Moriyama). Kitakubo’s personal connection was truly integral role for this OVA, they were brought from various places, and not to mention that all of them were using pen names. You can say they were the memers of their generation. https://www18.atwiki.jp/sakuga/pages/219.html

Inoue: “You can say it was thanks to Kitakubo-san that I was able to broaden my world and meet many people. If I hadn’t met Kitakubo-san probably I would’ve been stuck with Studio Junio for a few more years.”

Note: Inoue later went outside of the studio to work on AKIRA when he was around 26 or 27.*

MEMORIES

Note: As a brief introduction, MEMORIES (also Otomo Katsuhiro’s Memories) is a 1995 Japanese animated science fiction anthology film with Katsuhiro Otomo as executive producer, and based on three of his manga short stories. The film is composed of three shorts: Magnetic Rose (彼女の想いで Kanojo no Omoide), directed by Studio 4°C co-founder Kōji Morimoto and written by Satoshi Kon; Stink Bomb (最臭兵器 Saishū-heiki), directed by Tensai Okamura and written by Otomo, and Cannon Fodder (大砲の街 Taihō no Machi), written and directed by Otomo himself.*

Inoue served as character designer and animation supervisor for Magnetic Rose and key animator for Cannon Fodder, which were produced by Studio 4°C.

Inoue: “I gave a lot of animation correction to the point I was re-drawing about half of the film from the scratch. Only Hiroyuki Okiura-san and Kouichi Arai-san that didn’t need any correction apart from character’s face.”

Small talk

Inoue:

– “I kinda want to participate in flashy anime.”

– “I don’t have much interest in story, the only novel I ever finished to read is Ring.”

– “Manga is only a collection of pictures with words attached on it. If I read it and don’t find it interesting I’ll just flip the pages and gaze at the pictures.”

– “I don’t have it in me, but Kenji Kamiyama can tell you the weak point of a story and why it is a poor piece of work.”

– “While I don’t have much interest about story in anime that I worked on, I don’t have such a thought that story is unimportant. Sometimes I thought, “before you drew good storyboard, how about to fix the story first?”.”

Inoue’s Anime recommendation

– Bambi.

Inoue’s comment: even though the animation techniques hadn’t been established at the time, from the perspective of animation technique, the form of animals brought big influences. There were no technical gap/weak points in it.

– Fantasia

Honda interrupted: “But Fantasia is boring.”

Inoue: “Just watch it for its technical skill!”

– 101 Dalmatians

“Around this era, Disney’s style has been established.”

– The Secret of Nimh

“Personally I think The Secret of Nimh’s average animation quality is the best in the world. In a work with no sakuga kantoku system, the animation’s level and movement remained constant. Don Bluth’s cool timing and character acting (the great attention to detail how character moved) were so amazing that I tried to imitate his style.”

– The Little Prince and the Eight-Headed Dragon / Wanpaku Ōji no Orochi Taiji [TOEI, 1963, Yugo Serikawa]

– The Great Adventure of Horus, Prince of the Sun / Taiyō no Ōji Horusu no Daibōken [TOEI, 1968, Isao Takahata]

– Animal Treasure Island / Dōbutsu Takarajima [1971, Hiroshi Ikeda]

– 3000 Leagues in Search of Mother / Haha o Tazunete Sanzenri [1976, Isao Takahata]

Main point: Produced by small number team, Miyazaki-san’s layouts, Yoichi Kotabe-san’s animation supervision. Not only that, the scenario and direction is still one of the best, the depiction of characters’ personalities were so real.

– Heidi

– Hedgehog in the Fog

– Emara

– The Old Lady and the Pigeons

Inoue: “Also, I watched Enter the Dragon (Bruce Lee’s film) around 30 times at the theater.”

Another trivia

There was a project called Sea Side Company, an anime pilot that was produced by TOEI. It was directed by Junichi Sato but the serialization plan cancelled and the pilot has never been released on physical copy either. The pilot film mostly animated by Inoue, with a bit of key animation by Satoru Utsunomiya and Yuuji Moriyama.

Animators that Inoue keeps an eye out for:

– Megumi Kouno

Inoue watched Darling in the Franxx episode 3 (SB/Direction: Toshifumi Akai, Animation Supervision: Kouno), and he also saw Megumi Kouno’s MAD retweeted by Bahi JD.

– Shingo Yamashita

Inoue referred Yama as genius

– Bahi JD

– Spencer Wan

– Ken’ichi Fujisawa

Inoue: “There was amazing guy in One Punch Man and Mob Psycho, and I was wondering who’s him/her, but in the end I didn’t know the name.”

My own works that I’m most proud of

– Chironup no Kitsune

Inoue: “I did around 80 cuts, the storm scene. I was able to replicate Yōichi Kotabe-san’s effect, wasn’t I?”

– Ghost in the Shell Movie (1995).

Especially the cut where Major was floating up after diving.

– Ookami Kodomo to Ame no Yuki (Wolf Children).

Inoue: “The scene where the kids were playing in the snow. I was having fun doing that flashy cuts.”

– Tobe! Kujira no Peek

Inoue: “I was volunteering for the beginning scene, I’m proud of my sea wave’s effect animation. It was right after I saw Mitsuo Iso-san’s full limited animation in Gosenzosama Banbanzai! so I was kind of influenced by his animation.

[About Mitsuo Iso-san’s full limited animation]

Inoue: “Iso-san’s full limited technique requires him to draw every drawing in a shot in order to maintain control over the movement, it’s quite complicated and I couldn’t do it.”

[…] Next, in Eva Iso did the beginning of 1 and the end of 19, as well as writing script for the first time, which he has since only done once. His work in 19 is particularly striking and what makes it unique easier to grasp compared with some of his other work. The beastly way the robot moves is closely observed and very convincing in the timing and in the particular actions taken, for example the timing of the way he raises his head and looks around blinking. The close-up shot of the robot biting off a piece of flesh is a classic example of the concept of “full limited” animation that Iso developed, whereby he draws every drawing in a shot in order to maintain control over the movement. Every single drawing contributes to the movement, which jerks dramatically every which way over the screen the way such a shot would undoubtedly look zoomed in with a camera lens from far away. – AniPages

– Record of Lodoss War OVA Episode 1

Dragon scene and action.

Inoue: “During Roujin Z production, Satoshi Kon-san once asked me who did the part where Woodchuck was running and praised it. I was really happy he liked it.”

Inoue’s Work Schedule

13 P.M~: Begins to work.

17 P.M~: Break, have a dinner and 1 hour walk.

23 P.M~: Begins to work again.

Inoue: “I always ensure that I have enough sleep so I only worked around 10 hours a day. Pulling an all nighter is really demanding, and I rarely do this, but sometimes it’s fun. During the production of ‘Evangelion: 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo‘, I was not in the mood to do every single cut every day, so I piled up the work for some time and pulled all nighter with festive mood.”

Current project

Inoue: “I’m currently working at Production I.G for an adaptation of novels that won the Japan Booksellers’ Award. “

Honda: “I’m currently working with Hayao Miyazaki-san’s on his latest film.”

About Takeshi Honda



Honda: “When I was doing Nishigokubo with Mahiro Maeda-san, I thought I would just go with animated flipbook style like what I drew in the beginning part. But with that monstrous line up animators, the quality really went up their animation moved seamlessly, I just can’t beat it.”

Note: In the end Honda drew even more amazing scene.

Full short:

Inoue: “Honda-san’s animation is probably the ideal style for Japanese Animation. Really stood out but not so jarring.”

Honda: “Well I know the feeling to want to go wild and draw really flashy scene, but thinking from the perspective of animation supervisor, I just can’t let out my animation to be so out of place.”

Inoue: “I wonder why Ohira-san is never thinking about how the animation supervisor’s felt.”

Talking about character design

Honda: “When I was working with Iso-san in Dennou Coil, the images from character visual I designed and what requested by Iso-san’s storyboard were very different. We thought it would be the best to make the characters look cute, but what Iso-san requested were different. He said to me ‘isn’t protruding chin looks better?’, like hell it is!”

The initial setting and concept design for Dennou Coil, which were drawn by Takeshi Honda

Inoue: “It’s not like I want to draw bishoujo characters, but when I asked to draw them I kinda understand the feeling that want to draw them beautifully.”