2013-04-25, 10:08 | Link #1682 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Aug 2007
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Okay I would definitely love more Haruhi. In fact I would rather have more Haruhi than Full Metal Panic because I like the former much more (please don't shoot me).
But I suppose if Haruhi never comes to be at least fans outside Japan can still experience the story through the translated novels. Haruhi fans are extremely lucky that way. Just think of all the fans who enjoy an anime series based on a continuing work who don't get the rest of the story because it isn't even being translated.
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2013-04-25, 10:16 | Link #1683 |
Bittersweet Distractor
Join Date: Nov 2007
Age: 32
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^
Only problem is that the author is taking similarly long hiatuses to push out volumes of the light novel which is pathetic considering the difference in output someone like him pushes out compared to say GRMM for Song of Ice and Fire (Who is anything but outstanding in his pace himself) over a period of 3-4 years. But sure, at least being able to read the source is nice, so long as the guy is actually writing anything.
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2013-04-25, 10:21 | Link #1684 | |
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Join Date: Aug 2007
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But not to compare the two because I do expect more from GRRM. Haruhi is mainly fun fluff. But your point doesn't really take away from what I said. There needs to be source material for there to be anime (and of course there is enough for another season or 2). I am just saying if there is never more anime we at least have the source material to enjoy. Whether the author ever finishes the novels is an entirely different matter.
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2013-04-25, 11:43 | Link #1686 | ||
He Without a Title
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: The land of tempura
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Yes yes I know there are fan translations. I have yet to read them since I have them in pdf format and that's a pain to get in the Kindle.
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2013-04-25, 13:33 | Link #1690 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Aug 2007
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But the Haruhi translations are fine and in fact I think they should be caught up with Japan by November. They even have a Kindle release. Anyways I was thinking more I how I feel about something non-Kyoani like the Story of Saiunkoku which will never get another anime season and whose novels will never get translated here. Or something like Baccano. So even though I would love more Haruhi, I still think I am happier as a Haruhi fan than as a fan of Saiunkoku and Baccano.
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2013-04-25, 14:17 | Link #1691 | |
Banned
Join Date: Dec 2012
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I think it really comes down to what one is talking about and what one considers to be "good period" and where such a notion begins and ends. In my case I too find that Kyoto Animation has quite a few weaknesses that balance out some of their strengths same as any major production animation production studio in Japan. I think a bullet point list would keep this simple and concise and keep in mind this is solely my opinion, I don't particularly like to try to speak too much for others, only myself. Strengths: - Exceptionally fluid animation. I think this owes mainly to maintaining a large workforce of animators and what appears to be good oversight. - Ability to establish a report with an audience early on into a project. They are very good at the ground work game of generating hype and garnering attention for any new projects they are working on. This week demonstrates that quite well. - Tendency to keep things internal leads to strong consistency in presentation and production values between projects. - Very good at satisfying the audience that seeks that "moe" feeling in the shows they watch - A clear love of the craft of animation is demonstrated in their nearly all their works. It is clear to me that at least some of their key animators simply enjoy what they do and this leads to occasionally above average or a greater number of Sakuga sequences per project compared to the average animator who is merely working for a paycheck. Weakness: -Tendency to keep things internal leads to a lot of fairly similar feeling products as well as a shortfall of creative ideas. Studios need new creative ideas in order to thrive and grow with the changing tastes of the general audience. Personally I find their most interesting productions on a week to week basis to be those that have involved the freelancer Shoji Gatoh as a writer in some capacity. You need a strong and creatively balanced writer on staff to maintain a strong interest in a production, animation quality can only carry you so far. Kyoto Animation lacks this kind of consistency, but they aren't alone. - People that simply aren't strongly influenced by moe may tend to find themselves bored with the scenario writing in their recent productions. - Overall music production quality can tend to vary wildly from project to project, sometimes producing memorable tunes, other times leading to mere background noise that fails to rise above the average cut. As a strong advocate of memorable background music in anime this is an area I feel they really ought to start paying more attention - Tendency towards slow paced productions with minimal ongoing events and simplistic character interactions may tend to wear out their welcome with audiences rather early into their run. - Comedy is hit or miss. Some people find it laugh out loud hysterical, others such as myself may find chuckles few and far between. Some may notice some of the strengths I've listed overlap with some of what I find to be the studios key weaknesses. This is deliberate, it happens as sometimes a step in one direction requires a trade off in the other. I think Kyoto Animation is a balanced studio with a few key strengths but not a perfect one. This is not a bad thing, but merely a reflection of the reality of the environment within which they work. I also don't think that all their strengths nor all their weaknesses are solely unique to their brand on a production to production basis. |
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2013-04-25, 15:15 | Link #1692 |
He Without a Title
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: The land of tempura
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I mostly agree with you and would just add a very important but underrated strength: the ability to consistently deliver a high-quality product on time.
I don't think I've ever seen a KyoAni show having a clearly unfinished episode like virtually every other studio does in virtually every season. Even the times they "fixed" something in the home video releases it was always minor inconsistencies or slight animation mistakes mostly invisible to the average viewer. That's not something to underestimate in this medium.
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2013-04-25, 15:44 | Link #1693 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Tennessee
Age: 36
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2013-04-25, 16:10 | Link #1695 |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2012
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Their storyboard and layout work are of a really high quality, way above the average anime, and the average anime is more complex than your average cartoon. They're capable of really complex scenes because their animators are really good at it, actually their animators are getting even better with each show.
Some of those clever shots were there already in FMP: The Second Raid but the execution and the quality in the animation wasn't, they needed some time to improve their skills. That's the reason why I'm so disappointed with a lot of other studios like I.G productions which had amazing naturalistic animators in the 90's, very few of those remain working there and the new guys aren't as good at it. Kyoani is a very professional studio, they try their best to improve with each show. For example, Tamako Market has a more naturalistic approach to their animation, more subtle than their last efforts and you can see their evolution in that style. Nichijou was a show where their animators had some freedom to go more crazy than usual and you can tell that they were having a good time animating that show. Nichijou is amazing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL2lvFgeQsY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywDYS5Iy2EI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndmcRDWSj20 |
2013-04-25, 16:15 | Link #1696 | |
Bittersweet Distractor
Join Date: Nov 2007
Age: 32
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But anyways, yes this isn't a Baccano or Moribito situation with the translations. That's a case of economics stopping it though. With Haruhi there is no such limitation, hence the amount of frustration this creates.
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2013-04-25, 19:58 | Link #1697 | |
Senior Member
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: In the middle of nowhere
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Spoiler for Disappearance ending:
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2013-04-25, 20:57 | Link #1698 |
Senior Member
Author
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Yes, that's what I mean.
For anime-only viewers, this bit makes it crystal clear that there's more story left to come. That the entire incident has not truly been resolved yet, as you correctly point out. In my opinion, this constitutes a horrible hanging plot thread if the Haruhi anime ends with Disappearance. With all of that in mind, I disagree with you on your broader argument. I definitely think this means that Disapperance is a bad point for the Haruhi anime to end off on. It does not give an organic sense of narrative closure given how its main conflict is resolved. Sure, we can surmise the two things you pointed out, but that doesn't change the fact that clearly there is much more story left to be told. There's no way an anime-only viewer can sort of "pretend" that this is all the story there is (whereas an anime-only viewer of K-On can do just that with the ending of K-On's 2nd season and/or the K-On movie).
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2013-04-26, 00:23 | Link #1699 | ||||
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Join Date: Sep 2011
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If your concern lies solely with that plot point, I'd argue that a story in the proper sense can't be made out of it. We already see everything we need in the movie to connect the dots and make the narrative consistent (besides all the paradoxes inherent to time-travelling stories). The audience doesn't require any more narrative to resolve that particular plot point by themselves. I thought your concerns were more about character arcs and lack of understanding of the "bigger" mysteries of the Haruhi universe, which I also think are not necessary for the Haruhi anime to have a consistent narrative (not to say the later novels shouldn't exist or that they're irrelevant; my only point is that they don't need to be adapted for the Haruhi anime to make sense as it is). Quote:
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However, that doesn't make them a bad studio at all. It just means they could be better. I also think that in practice, the ideology behind Kyoani's structure works much better, and probably any person in the industry would strive for such an ideal if they were capable of creating their own animation studio. For example, ufotable is trying to go the same route with making their projects strongly in-house. I can have fantasies about Hosoda directing a feature film backed by Kyoani's A team (I'm talking about animators, digital processing and photography departments mainly) plus some others (Takaaki Yamashita, Sadamoto, Inoue, and if I want to go full wet-dream, get Iso on board too). But in the reality of the Japanese animation industry, it's clear that Kyoani's approach is infinitely more effective and desirable for producers, directors and animators alike. The impossibility of most Tokyo-based studios to foster such environment is another issue that could probably merit its own thread. One last thing: for the record, I think Tamako Market is a very good show, despite some weak episodes like 5 and 7 (and maybe the finale). In my books, it's a hundred times better than every KEY adaptation and much tighter than Haruhi. So I'd put into question the premise that they've been shown to fail at doing original projects, which has been taken as a given for some of the arguments presented in the thread. EDIT: Oh, didn't see this post! Quote:
Tamako was also heavily constricted by schedule issues (well, only relative to Kyoani's standard), having two assistant animation directors and even 23 (!) animators for single episodes. Last edited by Warm Mist; 2013-04-26 at 00:33. |
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