THE BRIDGE

tag animation

Gyao and GREE establish investment fund to develop anime film business

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See the original story in Japanese. Gyao, a broadband video distribution company and a subsidiary of Yahoo Japan (TYO:4689), and Japanese social gaming giant GREE (TYO:3632) announced today that they have established a company to invest in animation content development. The team-up was first announced back in February with a tentative company name. Making the most of IT and information systems, the new company will be called AnimatiC (which they say is a combo of animation and systematic) and its goal will be to develop fresh new animation films and content that audiences have never seen before. AnimatiC’s portfolio films will be distributed via video distribution platforms including Gyao, and it is expected that business will extend beyond developing social gaming apps or collectible card game products derivative from anime. Accordingly, for film producers, if you receive investment from the fund, you can easily get a distribution channel for your film, and have an easy access to related businesses. On a bit of a side note, Japanese smash-hit mobile gaming app Puzzle & Dragons has recently partnered with animated film series Evangelion to offered a limited time promotion where users can win character items from the series. Similarly, a film…

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See the original story in Japanese.

Gyao, a broadband video distribution company and a subsidiary of Yahoo Japan (TYO:4689), and Japanese social gaming giant GREE (TYO:3632) announced today that they have established a company to invest in animation content development. The team-up was first announced back in February with a tentative company name.

Making the most of IT and information systems, the new company will be called AnimatiC (which they say is a combo of animation and systematic) and its goal will be to develop fresh new animation films and content that audiences have never seen before.

AnimatiC’s portfolio films will be distributed via video distribution platforms including Gyao, and it is expected that business will extend beyond developing social gaming apps or collectible card game products derivative from anime. Accordingly, for film producers, if you receive investment from the fund, you can easily get a distribution channel for your film, and have an easy access to related businesses.

On a bit of a side note, Japanese smash-hit mobile gaming app Puzzle & Dragons has recently partnered with animated film series Evangelion to offered a limited time promotion where users can win character items from the series. Similarly, a film distributor planning to release the anime Time of Eve with English subtitles on Blu-ray raised more than 7 million dollars in about four weeks on crowdsourcing platform Kickstarter. These results indicate there is much potential in anime content distribution over the internet.

I believe it is possible to empower many anime creators using IT and information systems. As seen in the recently launch of anime-focused crowdfunding site Anipopo, this space is the focus of very high expectations from the market.

Animation effects startup Cybernoids raises $557K for global expansion

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Cybernoids, a Tokyo-based startup developing two-dimensional animation technology, announced on Monday it has raised 52.4 million yen (approximately $557,000) from Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, Seibu Shinkin Capital, and visual-effects developer Qtec. The funds are to be used to intensifying the company’s business expansion overseas. The startup has developed a new image rendering technology called Live 2D, which makes it easier to add motions or expression changes to characters animated in 2D. The company’s CEO Tetsuya Nakajo explains the global market potential of their flagship technology: The overseas animation industry has no similar technology because they’ve been developing only 3-dimensional animation titles. Cybernoids was founded in July of 2006, and the Live 2D technology was chosen as one of the year’s finalists for Mitou, a bi-annual software engineering promotion program run by a governmental IT promotional agency of Japan. The company’s Flash-based technology helps smartphone game developers easily create animated character motion, and it has been deployed to more than 40 game titles including Konami’s virtual dating game for females, Tokimeki Restaurant. The company is exhibiting the latest version of its Live 2D technology at the Game Developers Conference 2013, which is currently underway in San Francisco. Check out the following video from…

cybernoids_logoCybernoids, a Tokyo-based startup developing two-dimensional animation technology, announced on Monday it has raised 52.4 million yen (approximately $557,000) from Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, Seibu Shinkin Capital, and visual-effects developer Qtec. The funds are to be used to intensifying the company’s business expansion overseas.

The startup has developed a new image rendering technology called Live 2D, which makes it easier to add motions or expression changes to characters animated in 2D. The company’s CEO Tetsuya Nakajo explains the global market potential of their flagship technology:

The overseas animation industry has no similar technology because they’ve been developing only 3-dimensional animation titles.

live2d_screenshot

Cybernoids was founded in July of 2006, and the Live 2D technology was chosen as one of the year’s finalists for Mitou, a bi-annual software engineering promotion program run by a governmental IT promotional agency of Japan. The company’s Flash-based technology helps smartphone game developers easily create animated character motion, and it has been deployed to more than 40 game titles including Konami’s virtual dating game for females, Tokimeki Restaurant.

The company is exhibiting the latest version of its Live 2D technology at the Game Developers Conference 2013, which is currently underway in San Francisco. Check out the following video from the folks at Diginfo News for more information on how the technology works.

Old-school art meets modern day funding in Japan

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This is part of our Crowdfunding in Japan series (RSS). Services like KickStarter have become a global phenomenon with the power to let creative individuals take their ideas to new heights. It’s happening here in Japan too, most notably on Campfire, the country’s answer to Kickstarter. From Sukimaki Animation, While the Crow Weeps is a short animation using multiplane cameras, implementing a technique often used in the past to create 3D effects in traditional cell animation. In While the Crow Weeps this method was used to capture each individually hand-drawn frame. The subject of the art series is a group of crows, and in addition to the unique camera technique, it also uses Japanese paper (washi), black India Ink and mineral pigments as painting materials. By choosing these unusual, older methods, the project aims to expand the expressiveness of the artwork. Using this multiplane camera technique in production is very rare in the age of personal computers. The technique gives the artwork a distinct atmosphere and warmth that cannot be expressed with digital processing. The Campfire campaign aimed to raise JPY 300,000 (about $3,300) to fund production costs. That goal was reached successfully on December 13, 2012, and the project…

crows-tears

This is part of our Crowdfunding in Japan series (RSS). Services like KickStarter have become a global phenomenon with the power to let creative individuals take their ideas to new heights. It’s happening here in Japan too, most notably on Campfire, the country’s answer to Kickstarter.


From Sukimaki Animation, While the Crow Weeps is a short animation using multiplane cameras, implementing a technique often used in the past to create 3D effects in traditional cell animation. In While the Crow Weeps this method was used to capture each individually hand-drawn frame.

The subject of the art series is a group of crows, and in addition to the unique camera technique, it also uses Japanese paper (washi), black India Ink and mineral pigments as painting materials. By choosing these unusual, older methods, the project aims to expand the expressiveness of the artwork.

Using this multiplane camera technique in production is very rare in the age of personal computers. The technique gives the artwork a distinct atmosphere and warmth that cannot be expressed with digital processing.

The Campfire campaign aimed to raise JPY 300,000 (about $3,300) to fund production costs. That goal was reached successfully on December 13, 2012, and the project has since stopped seeking additional patrons. The artwork is scheduled to be completed by this spring.

For an idea of how this artwork looks, you can see the video clip below.