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  • Everything about animation in Japan today is the result of decades and decades of stylistic

  • evolution.

  • Changes in technology, important cultural events, economic shifts, innovative practitioners,

  • they all contribute to the this flowing timeline.

  • And styles can change drastically in just a few years, triggered by something as small

  • of a single series or movie.

  • There are really fascinating, clear patterns that emerge when you look into a medium in

  • chronological order.

  • Watching how these trends repeat and develop is something i'm really fascinated by.

  • Your favorite character design or animation cut will without a doubt have its roots in

  • shows from 30/40 years ago.

  • It's both important and extremely interesting to see how everything links together in one

  • giant web of influence.

  • Firstly we need to track that web all the way back to it's roots, with the birth of

  • animation in Japan.

  • The first wave of japanese animation came at the start of the 20th century.

  • During the early decades, a number of anime films were produced.

  • It's an interesting period to cover because there wasn't a whole lot of animation being

  • made in Japan, and the stuff that was being made was propaganda material commissioned

  • by the government.

  • Momotaro's Sea Eagles is a good example of this era.

  • Obviously black and white, very slow, simple movements with static painted backgrounds.

  • Lots of the animations in each scene are loops of the same 4-5 frames.

  • Movies like this were jam packed with political propaganda, pushing different idealisms from

  • the Japanese government.

  • Everything was directly correlated with the world war.

  • Hakujaden in 1958 is another good example, the film is almost completely flat in it's

  • dimensions, almost like a puppet show.

  • It really took a long time before there was enough creative control and resources for

  • the medium to start developing.

  • I mean the 30s, 40s and 50s moved at a snail's pace compared to the later decades.

  • The medium really struggled to find a stylistic identity.

  • But that definitely changed as we go into the 60s.

  • The 1960s was very much a stylistic kickstart for anime.

  • It saw the birth of the anime TV series.

  • Multiple, long running series started to appear every year, with that came opportunities for

  • directors and animators to really express their own styles, this started the speedy

  • stylistic evolution of anime.

  • Certain titles started to influence each other and distinct trends started to emerge as more

  • and more shows were made.

  • The early 60s is a period that would essentially shape the whole medium, what happened here

  • is very important.

  • A good starting point to observe this is Tezuka's Astro Boy in 1963, the catalyst for this anime

  • boom.

  • The characteristics of this show become a stylistic base point for almost everything

  • that follows.

  • One of the most important being the show's smart, simple design.

  • Allowing both rich emotional expression while maintaining a realistic style of animation.

  • Obviously Japanese production studios weren't yet operating at the same level as other animation

  • studios like Disney at the time so movement had to be used resourcefully.

  • Astro Boy's character design was very intelligent.

  • Movable joints like elbows and knees had almost no detail, leaving any complexity for static

  • aspects like his belt or his hair, this allowed Astro Boy to look interesting but also made

  • him very easy to animate.

  • Emotions were expressed through his hands and face, which leads onto another important

  • element used in the series, the eyes.

  • Astro Boy's eyes are very recognisable, because it's a style that's still very

  • popular today.

  • They're big and bold, allowing animators to express a lot of information using very

  • simple visuals.

  • Backgrounds were even more limited, they were expressive but lacked detail and never really

  • moved, sometimes block colours or gradients filled up the whole screen.

  • We see these characteristics continued and developed upon into the 60s with shows like

  • Tetsujin and Prince Planet.

  • As the decade progressed, a number of stylistic changes started to take place, mainly influenced

  • by the revolutionary introduction of colour.

  • Kimba The White Lion in 1965 is a great place to look, you can see here the stark improvements

  • from Astro Boy and Tetsujin, the core style is still very simple but the backgrounds for

  • example are far more detailed and sometimes even dynamic.

  • Colour allowed them to be so much more expressive with their backgrounds, using large scale

  • painted landscapes for settings.

  • Character design detail also improved, not only in details of elements like clothing

  • but allowing that detail to move with more fluidity.

  • Action saw a massive quality increase.

  • From the quick, scarcely animated scenes in Astro Boy and Tetsujin, Kimba had a bigger

  • focus on movement and scale.

  • This allowed them to add a lot more emotion and weight into their action scenes.

  • These slight improvements continued throughout the 60s, highlighted even more so in 1967's

  • Speed Racer.

  • By this time we're seeing animation that we're more used to seeing today.

  • 1969's Dororo is very noteworthy.

  • Where the other series of the 60s were very much for a younger audience, Dororo targeted

  • a more mature audience with more dark, violent imagery.

  • Lot's of death and fighting that was absent from a lot of it's predecessors.

  • Dororo also took a heavy influence from cinema, classic samurai films from the 50s and 60s

  • being a clear influence.

  • This is possibly one of the most important aspects, using cinematic techniques to push

  • the medium in it's own stylistic direction.

  • Lighting, composition and more complex animation all played a part in molding anime of the

  • late 60s.

  • And this regularity in TV anime caused an increase in development, more progress was

  • made in this decade than was made during the first 30/40 years of the medium.

  • Production teams began to grow and larger creative risks were taken.

  • Experimental productions are usually the catalyst for innovation.

  • In 1971, Osamu Dezaki proved this with Ashita no Joe, possibly one of the most progressive

  • works in the medium so far.

  • It took the TV anime format that had been established and injected it with a cinematic

  • flare.

  • This could be a response to how prosperous and experimental the movie industry had become

  • in the 60s.

  • One of the most obvious changes is the huge leap in character detail and animation.

  • Compared to even 5 years ago, Dezaki's characters are far more detailed and utilize movement

  • more effectively.

  • This is mirrored in Lupin III the same year, at the time, these were some of the most detailed

  • characters the medium had seen, with some of the most expressive animation.

  • You'll notice also that these shows were aimed at a much older audience.

  • Were the likes of Astro Boy and Kimba were aimed as a younger teenage audience, Joe and

  • Lupin had a much older demographic.

  • What starts to develop in a really interesting way in the 70s in the animation of human elements,

  • we start to see it a lot in Joe and Lupin with their more realistic character designs

  • and detailed facial expressions but it's in the more subtle shows that this really

  • starts.

  • If you look at Heidi, Girl of the Alps from 1974, there's a huge focus on the animation

  • of things like facial expressions and body movement.

  • Unlike almost everything that i've mentioned so far, Heidi didn't have action to portray

  • strong emotions, so animation had to be focused in the small details.

  • There are a number of shows that echo this development like Nobody's Boy Remi and later,

  • Akagi No Anne, the amount of detail put into a single facial expression in this show was

  • spectacular, unlike really anything the medium had seen.

  • Animation was no longer a scarcely used tool for key scenes, it was now being utilised

  • in the intricacies of a show.

  • Background art is also something that grows very heavily in these shows, these backgrounds

  • were created with such skill but also a level of consistency, they blend with the animation

  • of the show and start to form incredibly immersive worlds.

  • Another important development that strived in different areas was the boom of Mech anime

  • in the 70s, or Giant Robot anime.

  • This is a really important development because it dominates the industry for about 20 years.

  • Some of the early titles such as Casshan or Grendizer in 1974 show the beginnings of this

  • trend.

  • Obviously they all develop from a lot of the sci-fi shows in the 60s but it's here where

  • they start to really create a specific identity.

  • Mechanical animation was something really unique to Anime, shows like Yamato and Tekkman

  • are prime examples of how japanese animators were making this their speciality.

  • It would become something that Japan would be known for worldwide.

  • Loads of complex, detailed mechanical animations started to appear.

  • So much so that the production of Space Battleship Yamato included a dedicated team for Mechanical

  • design: Studio Nue.

  • Leading us into one of the single most important titles for the medium, Mobile Suit Gundam

  • in 1979.

  • A show that would become the stylistic benchmark for the next decade of anime.

  • The legendary Kunio Okawara was behind the mechanical design for this series, possible

  • making the single most important set of designs the medium had seen so far.

  • It wasn't just the complexity of the mech designs that are important here, it's the

  • level to which they're animated, it's simple outstanding, and crazy to think that

  • just 15 years before Astro Boy was just beginning to incorporate what is now relatively basic

  • animation.

  • And this development in mechanical animation continues into the 80s where it becomes one

  • of the most important areas of the medium.

  • There's a huge wave of mech anime that come during the early 80s, and instantly you can

  • see how fast the medium is developing stylistically.

  • I want to start with Macross in 1982.

  • What's important to see here is the development of specific areas.

  • Dynamic, animated backgrounds for instance, this is something that really starts to develop

  • in the 80s.

  • Before, TV anime would have simple images or layered images, very rarely would the backgrounds

  • or environments move.

  • In Macross the line between foreground and background start to blur, and this becomes

  • one of the most important technical developments.

  • Also, how characters and objects are drawn change, Macross has that sketchy style animation

  • that you seen in Mobile Suit Gundam, this time, far more detailed and dynamic.

  • This is a big change from the bolder, more solid line work of previous TV anime, and

  • it opens up opportunities for more unique movement.

  • This causes really important details like hair movement and clothing detail, aspects

  • that were sorely missed until this point.

  • Macross really set the standard for TV mech anime, and you can see how that reflects into

  • other shows like Armoured Trooper Votoms, one of my personal favourites and Mospeada.

  • But it would be Gundam that once again pushed this area of the medium.

  • A few years later in 1985, Zeta Gundam was released, you can see instantly the improvements

  • in shading and line detail.

  • Also, the mechanical design has improved so much.

  • A year later in 1986 you can see this happening again in Gundam ZZ.

  • I think one of the most notable developments is the consistency of everything.

  • There's no longer a big quality gap between backgrounds and characters or one scene and

  • another, everything is as detailed as it needs to be and it all fits together really nicely.

  • As I was saying earlier, experimentation is usually the catalyst for development.

  • You can see how the experimental shows of the 80s mirror the developments of the decade.

  • Starting with Urusei Yatsura in 1981.

  • This is, i think, one of the very first shows that really start to resemble modern anime.

  • This, and a handful of other shows really became the standard for non-mech anime in

  • the 80s, and then kind of all anime after this decade.

  • The show's colourful aesthetic and exaggerated visual presence becomes a staple of japanese

  • animation.

  • Aspects like the character's hair and the bright backgrounds are all extremely important

  • developments.

  • Another big change in the 80s was the introduction of the OVA (productions that went straight

  • to video), allowing creators to bring to life projects that didn't quite fit the TV or Movie

  • template.

  • This started with Dallos in 1983, and you can see instantly how it differs from almost

  • everything else, it has it's own unique, maybe darker atmosphere and imagery.

  • And again with Angel's Egg in 1984, a really unique, visual style that really pushed the

  • kind of art-house aesthetic into the medium.

  • You can see influences from very specific areas like eastern european cinema here that

  • definitely hadn't had the chance to appear before.

  • These OVAs are definitely steps into the foundation of future styles.

  • This is around the time Studio Gainax were founded, one of the first modern anime studios.

  • They kind of revolutionised how a studio worked and pushed the boundaries of what a smaller

  • team could achieve, subsequently pushing their own style and influence, which you'll see

  • this in later years.

  • These OVAs also played a big part in the development of the cyberpunk look later in the decade,

  • before Akira came along, titles like Megazone 23 and Bubblegum Crisis kickstarted that whole

  • cyberpunk sub genre, elements that anime is renowned for like large futuristic cities

  • and neon imagery.

  • But before that we have a wave of movies that would really define a whole generation of

  • films to come, this is of course the birth of Studio Ghibli, a coming together of some

  • of the industry's most important individuals.

  • Their first project, actually coming before the studio officially founded was Nausicaa

  • of the wind in 1984 and then their first official film as a studio in 1986, Laputa, Castle in

  • the Sky.

  • These productions were huge steps in many areas, firstly Animation.

  • Aspects like character animation and crowd animation were outstanding.

  • The detail and movement were completely unique to the studio at the time.

  • They managed to create a sense of realism with their ultra-smooth movement, consistently

  • layered throughout their films.

  • Matched only by their spectacular background art, I mean Nausicaa had 17 credited background

  • artists, production teams with this scale and talent were really rare at this point

  • in the industry, these films were such a leap.

  • This kickstarted a huge wave of anime films from the mid to late 80s, these kind of massive

  • production teams became more common and subsequently some really amazing work was done.

  • One of the more unique additions is Wing of Honneamise in 1987.

  • The film had, again, incredible background art and character animation accompanied by

  • very mature themes.

  • This was happening alongside the growth of Cyberpunk anime and it becomes a really influential

  • title, unfortunately it was kind of dwarfed by Akira the next again year.

  • Akira is possibly the single most influential anime filmever.

  • It was at the time, and still is, one of the most technically impressive pieces of Japanese

  • animation.

  • It was obsessive in it's attention to detail, every scene containing an unbelievable level

  • of dynamic animation.

  • It's very much a turning point for sci-fi anime aswell.

  • Where a lot of the genre's previous additions had been brighter and aimed at a younger demographic,

  • Akira marker a change in a more mature focused sci-fi audience.

  • And that more mature audience is something that continues into the 90s, along with a

  • number of other developments.

  • The 90s becomes a really interesting time period, you have all the amazing development

  • of the 80s with a bit more freedom in the form of OVAs and niche markets.

  • The early 90s in particular was an interesting time for this.

  • Titles like Macross Plus offered a very quirky take on the cyberpunk genre and on the Macross

  • franchise.

  • This title is very much a preview of what's to come.

  • I love the interesting blend of old and new in Macross Plus, the character designs are

  • more in the style of the mid 80s but the general aesthetic is very 90s.

  • Stuff like this happens a lot in OVA titles.

  • There was a lot of improvements in technology which I think completely changed the direction

  • films and series were taking.

  • Ghost in the Shell in 1995 is a great place to look into.

  • Instantly you can see that Ghost in the Shell is taking less from the mech era of the 80s

  • and more from those later films, calculated body proportions, very neat line-work, smooth

  • animation, realism was the focus of the film.

  • The photorealistic backgrounds and more traditional clothing choices, this is all part of the

  • growth towards a more realistic style.

  • That realistic style of animation and design is definitely a development that continues

  • throughout the decade.

  • You can see it in shows like Evangelion and Gundam Wing the same year.

  • I think this more realistic design is a reflection of an older target audience.

  • Evangelion is a great example of where TV anime is at this point, there's some really,

  • really talented animators working in the industry and it shows.

  • But this isn't the only kind of style that is developing.

  • Lots of shows are branching out into different styles.

  • Escaflowne in 1996 is one of my personal favourites from the decade, it has a unique fantasy aesthetic,

  • I think deriving more from video games than anything else, but it's fantastic.

  • It mixes fantasy and sci-fi in the same way Miyazaki does with a lot of his studio Ghibli.

  • And the quality of animation for a tv production is just mind-blowing.

  • And again another fantasy series, Berserk, it didn't quite get the same level of production

  • value as Escaflowne but the designs are just awesome.

  • I like how experimental and bold choices with lighting and colour are getting.

  • And that kind of sketchy line work that we seen back in the 80s is coming back.

  • And towards the end of the 90s we have a collection of just really solid shows, this is a really

  • special period I think, especially for audiences in the West.

  • Titles like Cowboy Bebop and trigun were a really nice blend of everything that happened

  • over the last 20 years in the industry.

  • These were a mix of so many different styles and genres, becoming a kind of the turning

  • point at the very end of the 90s and the start of the 2000s were everything changes stylistically.

  • Around the same time we start seeing a lot more experimental shows popping up too, this

  • is possibly the most influential development going into the 2000s.

  • I want to start with Utena in 1997.

  • For me, I think Utena's use of colour and exaggerated imagery are both links to the

  • past with similarities to the works of Dezaki for example and also previews of styles to

  • come.

  • And also, Serial Experiments Lain.

  • We really hadn't had many TV productions that were this visually experimental until

  • now.

  • You can see Lain takes the standard aesthetic and tweaks it to make it the deeply psychological

  • experience it is.

  • The simpler character designs and subtle background art become a real trend in later years too.

  • Similarly with Boogiepop phantom in the year 2000.

  • These signify a very important change in how the industry was working or more specifically

  • how TV anime were working.

  • All the variables that previously mattered in TV anime production went out the window,

  • and this change in production ended up making one of the most experimental and visually

  • interesting shows of the last decade.

  • the uses of lighting in these series were amazing and the the muted colour palettes,

  • it was all it was all so unique, we really hadn't seen anything like it.

  • This period of experimentation is incredibly important going into the 2000s.

  • A lot of the shows that are made over the next 10 15 years come from this period of

  • experimentation.

  • Whole studios are based around the idea of creating experimental and unique looking shows.

  • It's something that has a real market and stylistically it just explodes the amount

  • of evolution.

  • Going into the next decade I think a lot of things drastically change.

  • for instance, the use of digital animation is more common that is ever been, and that

  • changes a lot of things in terms of how many people need to work on a project, how a project

  • can get funded, the resources needed to make a project, it's all very different.

  • One show that I think encapsulates this is FLCL.

  • A kind of transitionary anime into the new decade.

  • The show has this really bright exaggerated aesthetic while maintaining a really high

  • level of polish.

  • The animation and shot compositions are amazing, but aspects of the visual style like the background

  • art are definitely a step away from that idea of realism and revert back to a more playful

  • style, and it has a level of surrealism to its visuals and it's story telling, this is

  • all very much a theme of the time.

  • REC

  • Gurren Lagann is a later example of this, and an interesting one because it has this

  • playful aesthetic but such a high level of polish, you can see the wild bu amazing line-work

  • in almost every detail of the animation, and this is kind of due to the developments in

  • digital animation.

  • Digital animation really Becomes of the most important and most influential aspect of the

  • industry.

  • Shows kind of revolve their world's around this idea, and it leads to a wave of very

  • very exploratory but also high quality anime.

  • But of course, that more realistic style that was saw in the 90s doesn't disappear, in fact

  • it keeps developing and produces some of the decade's most visually impressive works.

  • Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex was a great alternative adaptation to the previous

  • decade's film, Ergo Proxy in 2006 was a fantastic development of that dark, muted

  • style from Serial Experiments Lain's era.

  • And the experimental phases of the 80s and the 90s don't just stop there.

  • Going into the 2000s there are just as much if not more experimentation than ever.

  • Studio shaft is one of my favourite examples of this.

  • They are behind some of the most visually impressive titles of the decade, shows like

  • Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei and Monogatari.

  • They have all of the characteristics of those previous phases with an added layer of quality

  • and finesse.

  • I think some of the shows that Shaft make over the years are outstanding in their animation

  • quality, their smoothness and adjust general production value without them losing the experimental

  • flare.

  • Also you have a collection of practitioners during this period, creating some extremely

  • experimental shows, masaaki yuasa, kenji Nakamura, and Rei Matsumoto are a few great examples.

  • These practitioners all use animation and resources in a way that has never been done

  • before.

  • masaaki yuasa for example creates these huge worlds with extravagant animation using just

  • very small teams and simpler tools.

  • And this progression leads us up to the current set of styles really.

  • The landscape at the moment is one dominated with digital animation, causing almost every

  • show to have a very unique style.

  • You can take any 5 anime films from each year and chances are they'll all have their own

  • visual identity, but they'll all be firmly rooted somewhere in the past.

  • Even the most exciting new design will have it's influence in the works of Dezaki or

  • Tezuka.

  • And that is fascinating.

  • We're in a new, internet driven era and the landscape of animation is changing so

  • much, I think the fact like creators like Masaaki Yuasa are given opportunities is testament

  • to how creative the medium has become, and I can only really hope for that to continue….

  • And I hope you have enjoyed this video, and the last few videos i've made about visual

  • developments in anime.

  • I've spent months researching and making these videos so if you enjoyed them please

  • do check out some of my other videos and click subscribe.

  • I have similar videos looking into specific areas of development that you can check out

  • on the screen, but thanks for now.

Everything about animation in Japan today is the result of decades and decades of stylistic

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B1 中級 美國腔

動漫的風格演變 (The Stylistic Evolution of Anime)

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    二百五 發佈於 2021 年 01 月 14 日
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