The idea of lighting can be brought into the animation space digitally.
Interviewer
In the days of celluloid animation, the basis of the atmosphere was art. On the other hand, with digital technology, you can change the color and darkness in any way you want.
Anno
With video, you can add some rough lighting during mastering. But with digital photography, I especially like how fine gradations can be fine-tuned with masks and layers. I can create delicate lines, like how the light gets darker and darker the further up in the sky it goes. That's something I really appreciated. I think in the end, only with the use of digital technology has it become possible to do proper detailed lighting in animation. In the days of celluloid, the lighting was very rough, and it was only possible to use lighting that had been decided at the stage of layout. That's how the light in the background is determined, and that's how the light in the cels is determined.
Interviewer
What happens if you decide on the light source and specify it in the layout when you direct?
Anno
Once the light source is determined, it can no longer be changed. If I wanted to add something, I would have to shoot the material in duplicate, adjust the lighting in the video studio as I mentioned earlier, or have it redrawn. If you want to change the direction of the shadows, you have to modify the original image, so you can't change it by repainting the cells.
Interviewer
When shooting film in the era of animation production using cels, lighting was adjusted using real paraffin. So it is not surprising that it would be very rough, isn't it?
Anno
There aren't that many types of paraffin. And there is no such thing as a gradation material. That's why the lighting is very rough. Now that we've gone digital, we can finally do detailed lighting. Spotlights can be specified at the time of shooting, so I can instruct the photographer to brighten only this area. It's a great improvement, isn't it?
Interviewer
When looking at the shadow color of a cell, the highlights. Think of the light as coming from over here." It's given, isn't it? So you can process it as if the light is really shining on it.
Anno
The only main light source for the cell was a large light hanging above the stage. We turned off the lights on the other side and only lit the cell from this side at this angle. That was all we really could do. For example, we could use a board reflector to shine the light from this side, or put a small light underneath to shine only on the telegraph poles. We couldn't do such detailed work. If we really wanted to do that, we would have to draw a cell from the beginning to make it look like it was lit. Even if I wanted to do that, the number of colors in a cell is fixed. So, it is impossible to lighten or darken the color more than the color of the paint. And once the colors were painted, they could not be changed.
With digital technology, however, it is possible to fine-tune the color and brightness on the spot, even for already painted cells. Even if a cell is actually painted brightly, if I want to turn off the light so that there is no light shining on it, I can darken it with a single click. I really appreciate that. Conversely, you can add a fine gradient to just the character by simply requesting that this area be slightly darkened. In addition to the main light source, you can also use board reflectors and small lights. Plus, you can now use colored paraffin paper or flock paper to block out light. It is now possible to design lighting as a space in spite of the flatness of the animation. I think this is a great feature of digital. I think that is one of the things Tsurumaki really likes about it.
Interviewer.
You mentioned before that "Tsurumaki does not play it safe and takes a proactive attitude in his art making".
Anno
I feel that the technique of layering helps us to imagine a flat surface as a three-dimensional space. This is not only me, but people have a strong desire to make animation with the feel of live-action. In my case, it is more like special effects than live-action. So, I tend to look for the image of lighting on the animation screen.
PROFILE
総監督: あんの・ひであき
Born in 1960. Born in Yamaguchi Prefecture. In 1981, while a student at Osaka University of Arts, he attracted attention with the opening animation for "DAICON III," a science fiction convention held in Osaka.
Later, while working on a number of films with the amateur film group "DAICON FILM," he moved to Tokyo and participated in the TV animation "Super Dimension Fortress Macross" (1982) as an original picture artist.
In the opening animation of "DAICON IV" in 1983, he presented even more outstanding depiction of mecha and effects.
In 1984, he was in charge of the Giant God Warrior in the climax of "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" directed by Hayao Miyazaki. Since then, he has worked on effects and mecha drawings for numerous films, including Hiroyuki Yamaga's first Gainax film, "The Wings of Honnêamise
(1987), for which he is credited as special effects artist.
In 1988, he made his debut as an animation director with the OVA "Gunbuster".He received high acclaim for his direction that united otaku, special effects, and epic sci-fi drama.
He then directed his first TV series, "Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water," broadcast on NHK in 1990 (partly directed by Shinji Higuchi), which depicted an epic science fiction world set in the 19th century, the age of invention.
In 1995, he directed the TV series "Neon Genesis Evangelion," which became a huge sensation along with "Rebuild of Evangelion" in 1997.
In 1998, he directed his first live-action film, "Love & Pop".
In 1999, he directed the animated TV series "Kare Kano" (partly directed by Hiroki Sato) and the making-of video "GAMERA1999" for "Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris".
In 2000, he directed "Shiki-Jitsu," the first film for Studio Casino (Studio Ghibli's live-action label).
Directed the live-action short film "流星課長" and the animated short film "空想の機械達の中の破壊の発明" (Studio Ghibli) in 2002, directed the live-action film "Cutie Honey" in 2004, and was the general director of the OVA "Re: Cutie Honey".
In May 2006, he founded and became the president of khara, inc. In addition to the first Studio khara film "Rebuild of Evangelion", he also directed the Japanese version of the Danish puppet film "Strings" (released in April 2007).