How anime is made

How is anime created? Everything starts with an idea. It happens that a brainstorming session is arranged, where only one is chosen from a whole bunch, but the best one. Sometimes it's all about leadership. But anyway, this is the very first and most boring stage. After choosing an idea, the composition of the team that will implement it is decided, and sponsors are sought.

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1. Anime is actually quite an expensive thing - the cost of showing 52 episodes late at night on TV channels 5-7 is approaching 50 million yen (about 21 million rubles), and showing Fullmetal Alchemist anime at 6 pm cost 10 times more.

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3. In this picture, you can see all the stages of the anime creation process from and to.

4. The next couple of steps are optional if the anime will be drawn based on the manga comic. In general, there are a lot of such anime, and this is quite justified. By whether the manga was successful or not, you can find out in advance whether the anime will be successful, and just save some pennies. However, it happens the other way around - the manga is drawn from the anime. For example, this was the case with FLCL.

5. The second stage is to come up with a general concept - who, how, what and why. Characters, the main storyline are being invented, some first sketches are being made. As soon as all this is ready, the scriptwriters and artists begin their work. A detailed script is written, characters and backgrounds are drawn, and then a rough storyboard is made.

6. Everything is usually drawn in the old fashioned way, with a pencil on paper. Characters are drawn in different angles and moods, in different clothes and with different objects.

7. Digitization of these sketches can be done in two ways. Or pencil sketches are covered with ink or hard pencil for more contrast, and then scanned:

8. Or they are first scanned, and then contrast is added on the tablet. It turns out in general the same thing. After the characters are ready, sketches of the entire storyline are drawn. This is also done with a pencil on paper, with comments, at intervals of a second.

9. Separately from all this, the background is drawn. At the same time, it often happens that it is drawn not from scratch, but from some photographs. Therefore, do not be surprised if you see familiar places while walking around Japan.

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11. However, the background can be drawn later, in the process, especially if it is distant and you do not need to draw shadows from the animation in detail on it.

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13. Finally we move on to the next part, finally related to the computer. This is where the biggest and most difficult work begins - animation, coloring and layout. First, the artists draw several frames of character animation, between finished sketches of storyline frames. For television anime, usually 12 frames per second are drawn, but sometimes it is 24 or 8. This is done in the same way as before - the contours are displayed on paper and converted to digital form. This is a very painstaking work - imagine how much you need to draw for a 25-minute series!

14. Then other people (although maybe the same ones) smooth this animation so that everything looks natural and without jerks. And finally, third parties color this animation. In addition to all this, there are also effects artists. They add all sorts of sparks, stars and more. As a result, after adding the background, an almost finished anime segment is obtained.

15. The whole process is monitored by an art director (animation director), who checks the frames, makes edits, and sometimes redraws something entirely with his own hands. Therefore, this position is usually assigned to one of the artists - animators, with extensive experience. It is worth noting that recently the life of animators has greatly facilitated three-dimensional graphics. For example, it is actively and very fruitfully used in his works by Makoto Shinkai. But still, most of the anime is still drawn by hand.

16. Then comes the turn of the sound. Actors-seiyuu pronounce their lines and sing songs. From the outside, this can look very funny. Most of the voices of anime boys are actually female - in men, the voice is lower and does not look like a child, and for some reason no one takes children for voice acting.

Voices are processed, additional sounds are superimposed - the rustling of leaves, walking, etc. Finally, background music is added, and the production of the anime enters the final stage - the show.

How do they get money from anime? Advertising and sale of paraphernalia. An ad block is inserted in the middle of a series on television. Sometimes the names of sponsoring companies or their products are drawn right in the anime (for example, all characters use phones of the same company). The anime is being released on DVD. Numerous posters, figurines and more are produced. Well, we're just watching it.