Anime Friend

[Radd]

I actually own a copy of both Robotech issues. Picked them up for the novelty of it, when I saw them in a comic shop one day. They're pretty awful. They pretty much make the 90's Robotech comics look like Shakespear.

[Radd]

Also, ja, a lot of comics make the 90's Robotech comics look good in comparison. American comics have been in a pretty sad state for almost as long as I can remember. I mean, Rob Liefeld is a big name in comics. What does that tell you?

[Gubaba]

Also, ja, a lot of comics make the 90's Robotech comics look good in comparison. American comics have been in a pretty sad state for almost as long as I can remember. I mean, Rob Liefeld is a big name in comics. What does that tell you?

That knowledge of basic human anatomy and form is unnecessary in order to be a popular comics artist...?

[Renato]

I know what VF-X image you're talking about, I'm pretty sure it's in PM and will scan it when I get back home tonight. IIRC, Kawamori drew the original lineart and it appears the animators simply traced over it, colored it and added in some animation.

Thanks, would you mind also scanning any accompanying description or caption text that may be near it? Cheers.

The process you're describing is the usual practice for the animation director. Which would mean that the studio had access to Kawamori's layouts and lineart, hence this is more evidence that this shot was most likely not animated in Korea, but was either done in-house at Tatsunoko or AnimeFriend itself. OK, I'm gonna re-watch the episode later and see how many different shots of varying quality there are in this thing.

[TheLoneWolf]

Thanks, would you mind also scanning any accompanying description or caption text that may be near it? Cheers.

Here it is. Parts of the page near the spine are unfortunately missing, PM is a pretty large book and my scanner's bed is relatively small. If you need a higher quality scan to read the smaller kanji shoot me a PM with your email address and I'll send the uncompressed tif.

[Renato]

Thanks for the scan, TheLoneWolf. There is some amazing detail in those layouts that seem to be lost a bit when on the actual screen (Hopefully the Bandai Visual remaster can make it look great..?).

I just realised a few hours ago, though, that Private Time is actually NOT the Focker reminiscing episode, rather, it's the one with Misa waiting for Hikaru to go on a picnic. Agh. Dunno why I got it confused with Rainy Night. Yeah, anyone that Private Time one DEFINITELY was mostly ugly, ugly cel work, but still it seems that quite a few additions by Mikimoto himself did make it in there. Notably, several of the face close-ups of Misa, Hikaru and Minmay.

At some point I will get round to watching the episode again and will give timecodes for the Mikimoto shots... Other than that, consider the rest ofd the episode "Koreanimation".

By the way, another tidbit: check out pages 92 and 93 of the TIAS 7 book (the one I mentioned in the post above). There is a double page spread of the Ichiro Itano sequence from episode 18 (where Roy dies and Max kicks ass) which features Itano's layouts for the keyframes, Mitsuru Yoshida's colour application guidelines, and running along at the bottom is the actual cel art, which is actually credited to Anime Friend.

[Hiriyu]

... 22: Love Concert (Oh GOD, I still get nightmares about Minmay's eyes in this one)...

:lol:

So I'm not the only one... I once had this terrible nightmare that my girlfriend had THOSE EYES. Truly frightening.

[TheLoneWolf]

Yeah, anyone that Private Time one DEFINITELY was mostly ugly, ugly cel work, but still it seems that quite a few additions by Mikimoto himself did make it in there. Notably, several of the face close-ups of Misa, Hikaru and Minmay.

Agreed, most of Private Time looks horrible. Even as a kid, I noticed the stark contrast between the closing sequence with Hikaru & Misa and the rest of the episode.

By the way, another tidbit: check out pages 92 and 93 of the TIAS 7 book (the one I mentioned in the post above). There is a double page spread of the Ichiro Itano sequence from episode 18 (where Roy dies and Max kicks ass) which features Itano's layouts for the keyframes, Mitsuru Yoshida's colour application guidelines, and running along at the bottom is the actual cel art, which is actually credited to Anime Friend.

I'll take a look at that when I get back home, thanks for providing the Yoshida's name. Could you provide Anime Friend's name in Japanese text so that I can know what to look for?

Also, I was watching some Japanese clips of Macross on YouTube and I found one of Max's first battle with Milia from episode 18. What caught my eye was that the title for this clip listed Hideaki Anno; was he one of the animators for this battle? I had heard that he worked on SDF, but I never knew which parts he specifically worked on.

[Gubaba]

"Anime Friend" is アニメフレンド

[TheLoneWolf]

"Anime Friend" is アニメフレンド

Thanks!

[Gubaba]

You're welcome!

By the way, I looked 'em up on Japanese Wikipedia, and it turns out they did six of the Time Bokan series! Very cool.

They also started in 1977 and went out of business in 1990. They did about three series after Mospeada; I don't recognize any of them, but let's face it...Tatsunoko's heyday was well over by then.

[Renato]

Yep, and Time Bokan is great classic stuff.

Anyway, I think Hideaki Anno did a lot of work mainly on episode 27 "Ai wa Nagareru", most famously he drew that shot of all the navy blue Phalanxes opening their missile hatches. A lot of his shots were full of detail mecha stuff.

Never heard of him doing anything related to the knife episode because I thought that was all (mal)handled by Star Pro.

[TheLoneWolf]

They also started in 1977 and went out of business in 1990. They did about three series after Mospeada;

R.I.P. Anime Friend.

Never heard of him doing anything related to the knife episode because I thought that was all (mal)handled by Star Pro.

I was referring to Max & Milia's mecha battle from episode 18, not their knife fight from Virgin Road. If Anno animated Virgin Road, Macross would've been the last series he ever would have worked on.

[Ginrai]

In the interview on the end of the AnimEigo set, Ishiguro Noboru specifically says that Anno was Ichiro Itano's assistant on Macross.

[Renato]

I was referring to Max & Milia's mecha battle from episode 18, not their knife fight from Virgin Road. If Anno animated Virgin Road, Macross would've been the last series he ever would have worked on.

Ah, OK, I misunderstood. Heh, that would've been a funny turn-out of events:

ANNO: "Er, I'd like to make a TV anime about angels coming down to destroy humanity, and giant robots made to fight them..."

TV EXEC: "Wow, sounds great! Now, Mr. Anno, let me just check your resume here..."

ANNO: *gulps*

TV EXEC: "1982.... Macross? Wow, that's impressive... What did you do on it?"

ANNO: "Erm... the, uh..." *whispers*

TV EXEC: "GET THE HELL OUTTA MY OFFICE!!"

[wolfx]

I wanted to post this in the newbie thread but i guess i'll post here instead for better context.

Is this wikipedia entry accurate?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macross

Macross (マクロス, Makurosu?, lit. "Macross") is a long-running series of science fiction anime, created by Shoji Kawamori of Studio Nue in 1982.

Now I always regarded ANN as fact as I did some research years ago about it and found out that Kawamori probably can't be credited as the original creator of Macross. He was just the mecha designer then. It wasn't until Macross DYRL? and future series when he started directing Macross and become closely associated to Macross.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encycloped...nime.php?id=355

So how true is the above statement. Is he the creator of Macross? Was he the person who planned the scenarios, written the story, etc? Hope you guys can confirm this for me once and for all.

[Gubaba]

No, SDFM is not Kawamori's baby...the story was collaborative. Certainly, as director, Noburo ishiguro should get the lion's share of the credit.

Still, my instinct tells me that Ishiguro, the respected veteran, was really present more to keep the young turks in line and make sure they actually got the episodes done, than to do any real directing. I have no proof for that, however....and listening to Ishiguro's "guest appearance" on the Miss D.J. album, I'm not so sure anymore...

[Renato]

It was originally Kawamori and Miyatake's idea, remember that it was originally conceived as "Battle City Megaroad/Megaload". Noboru Ishiguro was not involved at such an early stage, he went on board the project several drafts later.

Kawamori and Miyatake had several other projects they wanted to do and the one which eventually became Macross (it was planned as a parody of Yamato and Gundam etc) was actually just a "dummy", in case the other ones didn't get any support. Needless to say, that's exactly what happened. They originally were going for a much more serious, hard-edged sci-fi story, but they ended up doing "another" robot show, which would please the broadcasters.

They didn't scrap the whole of the work from the other project, though (entitled "Genocidus"), the main mecha from that eventually became what we now know as the GERWALK.

EDIT -- Gubaba, you're right that Ishiguro was there to give reassurance to the producers since almost everyone of the staff was inexperienced. I read in Newtype recenty that Yasuhito Kikuchi, Mac F director and former animator on SDF, said his position (along with Kawamori) on the new show is similar to the original show in that they're basically looking over a bunch of up-and-coming young animators. So I guess they're like passing the torch.

Edited April 28, 2008 by Renato

[Gubaba]

EDIT -- Gubaba, you're right that Ishiguro was there to give reassurance to the producers since almost everyone of the staff was inexperienced. I read in Newtype recenty that Yasuhito Kikuchi, Mac F director and former animator on SDF, said his position (along with Kawamori) on the new show is similar to the original show in that they're basically looking over a bunch of up-and-coming young animators. So I guess they're like passing the torch.

I had a hunch that turned out to be right???

SWEET! I'm gonna go to VEGAS!

[Radd]

I recall back when translations of the Tokyo Circuit Court rulings were big news that a lot of light was shed on Kawamori's role in the production of SDF:M. It was certainly a lot more than just "mecha designer", though if I recall a lot of what he did was credited under a different name.

[wolfx]

Any hard cold facts about Kawamori doing stuff under a pseudonym? Cause from ANN site there seems to be a whole team of scenario writers which made me think Kawamori had little to do with the idea and direction of the anime.

I'm aware of Megaroad and the whole Breast Fighter business but not sure how it all gel-ed with Kawamori = the creator of Macross. Weren't they just designs for an anime which simply evolved into Macross? Very much like how the VF-25 concept changed to what it is today?

[Radd]

I tried to find the thread, however...I don't know that it exists anymore. In the current HG/BW Legal thread there's a link to the previous thread which from what I saw would have contained the court ruling info, but the link is broken.

[TheLoneWolf]

I recall back when translations of the Tokyo Circuit Court rulings were big news that a lot of light was shed on Kawamori's role in the production of SDF:M. It was certainly a lot more than just "mecha designer"

On the opposite page of that scan I posted are scenes from episode 27 (Love Goes Away) that Kawamori directed. I believe someone posted that Kawamori also wrote the script for episode 36 (Fly High). From everything I've read, Macross was essentially created on the fly, with episodes being completed mere hours before broadcast. Being so low on man-power and given the chaotic schedule that they had to work under, it wouldn't surprise me if Kawamori did a little bit of everything in the series. But how much exactly he did, I don't know.

though if I recall a lot of what he did was credited under a different name.

I have an issue of Animerica that says Kawamori used the pseudonym "Masanori Kawamori." I may have the spelling wrong, I don't have access to my stuff since I'm hundreds of miles away in Kansas City on a business trip.

[Ginrai]

Eiji Kurokawa = Shoji Kawamori.