The High☆Speed! interviews continue with two conversations with artists commanding the animation department: character designer Futoshi Nishiya and prop designer Seiichi Akitake talk about how they project the character’s personality into the design work, be it general traits or daily life minutiae, while also sharing anecdotes regarding the production process.
High☆Speed!, a somewhat overlooked movie in Kyoto Animation’s repertoire, is approaching its third anniversary. To celebrate that we’ll be hosting a series of interviews translated by Pen over the next few days, starting with this roundable where the core staff talked about their general feelings towards the movie as a whole and some key scenes in particular. Yasuhiro Takemoto: Director x Maiko Nishioka: Scriptwriter x Futoshi Nishiya: Character designer and chief animation director
Fans and critics alike love to associate qualities and flaws to anime studios, but to which extent does that hold any water? Have companies managed to build an in-house style of their own, and do they want to do that in the first place? We’d like to address misconceptions in this regard while explaining the potential of studio culture in the anime industry, as illustrated by the very curious tale of one of the biggest anime series of recent times:…