Animation production process
The first step before the first round of homework.
Before the so-called animation, there is often a short (or a little painful) "pre-production operation" (pre-English production Japanese preparation stage). Pre-production operation refers to the preparation for starting production. But what about the front line before production?
The front end of the system is "planning" (Japanese planning stage)
There are two kinds of "planning". The first is that at the annual planning meeting, the boss of an animation company (British boss, executive producer, Japanese president, planner) or a producer with a little loud voice sees an interesting and famous animation or novel, and thinks it should be quite profitable to shoot an animation, so he calls the agent involved in the animation or novel to see if the production right of an animation has been sold. If not, he began to "sometimes long, sometimes short, sometimes painful, sometimes happy." If you see the word "original" at the beginning of the animation, most of them belong to this type.
The other is the director (English director, Japanese director) or animator under the animation company, who thinks it should be interesting to make an animation by daydreaming instead of drawing on time, so he starts to write a planning book himself and then gives it to his boss. Fortunately, if the plan is passed, the boss or producer will look around for the money owner ... Oh, no, the sponsors will respond to the great plan together. If you see the word "original case" at the beginning of the animation, it probably belongs to this type.
After the negotiation is successful or the scheme is adopted.
Let's talk about the next step of the animation company when the original plan is passed.
Animation companies basically don't have the funds to independently produce animation works (whether TV or OVA), so when animation companies want to make original works, the most important thing is to put forward a proposal to sponsors (1) to see if they are interested in investing. If the sponsor is not interested in the new project proposed by the animation company, or thinks that the product (2) has no market value, then this project 100% will never see the light of day again.
Compared with the original case, the animation planning of the original (3) is usually easier to pass the sponsor. Because the original works basically have a fixed customer base (4), the sponsors are psychologically more secure, and they are more willing to invest in adapting the original works into animations and recover their investment by selling related products.
So in what form is this proposal presented to the sponsors?
For American production companies, they will make pilot movies first. The so-called pilot film refers to the essence of short films and is the main weapon for sponsors to persuade investment. However, in Japan, animation companies usually have no funds to make pilot films, and they often submit proposals or scripts to sponsors in paper form. Therefore, the script may be completed before the pre-production job. Because the more sponsors understand the interesting points of the original work, the more they can impress sponsors and get production funds.
Theoretically, the calculation program is simple.
Suppose a film and television company estimates that an animated work (a 30-minute DVD) can sell 1 1,000 sets, and then suppose that a DVD sells for 4,000 yen.
1000 sets of x? 4000 = ? 4,000,000
That 4 million yen is the production cost. All the funds allocated to the production department are included in this 4 million yen. For example, we will introduce animation directors, role stylists, split-mirror animators, main-mirror animators, grassroots animators, music designers, color editors, packaging designers and so on.
In this way, it is very simple to calculate the cost. But in fact, how to estimate how many sets of an animated work can be sold depends on the sales experience of film and television producers, the popularity of animation directors, the charm of role designers and the popularity of seiyuu. These human factors make it difficult to estimate the production cost. For example, every animated film directed by a famous director will become a box office record of Japanese films and win prizes at international film festivals, so the production funds given by sponsors will be much higher than other works. With sufficient production funds, he can increase the number of shots, invite famous seiyuu (or actors) and music production groups, and improve the popularity and publicity effect of the products. If you are a newcomer and have no "achievements", then the funds may be less. Because the film and television company has no comparison benchmark (the performance of newcomers), it will be more cautious to invest in this new project.
From the analysis diagram on the left, we have roughly explained several important steps before doing homework. From this time on, we began to explain the process of pre-production one by one. As you can see, the first and most important step is "scripting". All figure design (*2), mechanical design (*3), art design (*4) and directors should make composition according to the script. Therefore, no matter what kind of planning, the script plays a very important role in the production process.
We mentioned for the second time that the script may have been completed at the project stage. In that case, will the script be revised again after the plan is passed? It depends on the opinions of producers and directors. In the picture on the left, you can see the word producer (*5). Producers are responsible for the success or failure of an animated work. So if the producer has a problem with the script (not attractive enough), the screenwriter (*6) will modify the script. Of course, if the director has an opinion on the script and the producer agrees with the director, then the revision of the script is inevitable. Furthermore, although the director doesn't agree with the preliminary script and the producer doesn't think it is necessary to modify it, the script will not be modified either.
General animation companies don't have exclusive script writers, and most of them invite freelancers (some of these screenwriters are SOHO, and some set up studios with several like-minded screenwriters, such as the famous studio Orphy) to write manuscripts. The reason why we don't hire an exclusive screenwriter is because the script is not a department that needs it all year round. So if necessary, just sign a project contract with the scriptwriter. However, a few traditional animation production companies with a long history still have their own scriptwriting departments.
Script writing is not a simple matter. Different from novels, the actions and feelings of all characters need to be described in detail as bystanders. For example, a character is angry. Because everyone is angry in different ways, we should not only describe how he is angry, but also describe his actions in great detail to illustrate the character and characteristics (for example, Taro is furious = Taro clenched his fist, his eyes became a line, how the sweat dripped from his forehead, how the fire on his head became angry ...). The special way of writing plays makes a novelist sometimes unable to become a good playwright. And good scriptwriters are rare.
The director is the leader of the whole animation production team. There is no certain benchmark for Japanese animation industry to judge the qualification as a director. At present, famous directors have different processes of becoming directors. Some of them switched careers from the film industry, some started as animators, some were screenwriters and directors, and some started from scratch. Generally speaking, most directors in the early stage of animation started from the production management (*2) who participated in animation production for many years, and then they were upgraded to directors or switched to the film industry. However, with the migration of the times, most animation directors are animators at present. The charm of being a director is that you can decide the direction of your work. But because the director decides everything, the work is busy, and the success or failure of the work lies with the director. Therefore, not everyone involved in animation production ultimately aims to be a director. However, for a person who wants to be a director, no matter what job he starts from, it is not difficult as long as he has the heart.