Tips for Successful Indipendent Anime Film

Nowadays, using social networking services, “professionals”, “ordinary people”, and “students” can send out their works. In such an environment, there are people who are making “independent production (indle Anime)” or animation productions with a many people who are having difficulty in making their “Projects” go well.

In the animation industry, there are a few people around me who are doing independent production while working, and after being in the industry for a long time, I have come to realize that there are those who “get it right and complete the project” and those who “fail (spontaneously disappear).

This time, I would like to introduce the results of analysis that I have obtained from such experience, which is probably “this will work” and “this will fail”.

Create a routine

Many people who are successful in independent production are good at “self-management” and “time management”. I have the impression that they have set aside a certain amount of time for what they want to create.

Furthermore, those who have made it a habit to spend a certain amount of time every day for independent production are very strong. This is because they always make steady progress, even if it is at a slow pace.

“The influence and strength of habit” is something that has been said in many books, and I believe that whether or not you can do this first will greatly determine your success.

Animation production is a huge amount of work and takes time. In order to complete the work, it is necessary to “maintain the motivation to continue the production”. This “Motivation” tends to flucture, so if the motivation is temporary, it is difficult to make progress if you say, “I don’t feel like doing it today, so I’ll do it tomorrow…” and if it disappears, it “spontaneously disappears” and often “ends in failure”.

Therefore, I think it is best to “make it a routine”, or “make it a habit”. Just like you feel uncomfortable if you don’t brush your teeth at night, if you can bring it to a level where you feel uncomfortable if you don’t work on it early in the morning or after coming home, in short, if you can bring it to a “natual” level, it will be completed someday.

You can find out how to make it a habit from books, Youtube, etc., but I think these three are the most important.

In summary, Ichiro’s famous quote is easy to understand.

Accumulating small things is the only way to go to extraordinary places.

See the reality (quality and speed)

If it’s not finished, it’s meaningless.

Everyone dreams at the beginning.
“I’m going to make a high quality work of art like this that will surprise everyone!”

See “reality”.

Many people who are successful in independent production tend to create within a fairly realistic range. In short, they have a clear objective of “what they want to create and what is important to them”, and they are able to discard everything else once and for all. Then, they thin about “how to create a picture that does not look unnatural at the very least”.

For example, let’s consider the following.

Do you want to create a story (long sotry)?
Do you want to create a picture (image) that you want to express?

You want to create a story.

If you want to create a long story, you need to lower the quality. Or, you should narrow down the points you need to focus on. The story is what you want to show, and pictures and movements are OK as long as they convey that story at least well as possible.

You want to create a picture.

If you want to create a picture that expresses or is of high quality, then the length should be short. Nowadays, people are watching short movies on Twitter, Tiktok, Youtube, and so on. Music videos (2 to 5 minutes), commercials (15 or 30 seconds), or even a single shot can be seen by viewers. Since it is time-consuming to improve quality and explore expression, I recommend that you make your films “short”.

Understand the pace, speed and quality of what you can create.

The probability of success increases when you are able to grasp “your pace and speed” after creating a “routine”. If you cannot do this, you will tend to “spontaneously disappear” from “loss of motivation” before you know it because you “do not have enough time and cannot see completion” in relation to the “image of completion and sense of pace you have in mind”.

It is natural, but it is impossible to create something of the same level in the extra time available, since commercial animation is created by skilled professionals in many different sections, using their time as a job and, if necessary, cutting down on their own efforts. It is important not to seek perfection too much from the beginning.

First plan a schedule / set a goal.

If you are aware of “creating a routine” and “quality and speed” together, you will see that a certain degree of “planning” is important. In other words, if “time secured ≥ time required for work” can be established by considering the following order, I think you can increase the probability of success.

How to determine the number of man-hours to be worked

Let’s break down what you actually need to make and calculate the “man-hours”, which is the time it takes to do the work. To be more specific, after developing a plan for what you want to create, you need to make a table of “quantity allocations + schedule”, which is the work of a “project manager” in the case of Anime.

Let’s take an example and simulate it.

I won’t go into “how to write the details” here, but I think it would be easy to imagine “how to plan” by referring to the management table article I have written in the past.

Specific simulation 1 : “4-minute music video”

Suppose you want to make a 4-minute music video featuring two 3D characters. The number of shots will vary greatly depending on the tempo and direction of show, but let’s say the number of shots is 90. This is a very rough calculation, but assuming that one 3D asset (from model to set-up) is created in one month, it will take two months to complete. And if you assume that “cut work (animation – rendering – compositing)” is made at a pace of “one shot in two days”, it would take 180 days. Then, including “pre-production” and “post-production”, it would take about 9 to 10 months to complete the project.

Specific simulation 2 : “10-minute short film”

Let’s also consider story ones. It is generally said that one episode of a TV Anime is about 21minute long, which is “about 300 shots”, so if it is “10 minutes” long, there are “150 shots” in the calculation. In other words, even if you make “one cut a day” of the finished product as a film and make it every day without missing a day, it would take “150 days”. If it takes “two days” to make one shot, it would take “300 days”, and if it take “three days” to make one cut, it would take “450 days”.

Then, if you can spare 3 hours a day and want to complete the project in one year, you can think of a plan to complete one cut in 2 days (6 hours). Then, to keep the quality within that range, it is necessary to consider what kind of picture should be created.

This is the amount of shot work alone. If you add “pre-production” such as scriptwriting, storyboarding, and design, and “post-production” such as sound and editing, it is easy to imagine that the time will increase without a hitch. With 3DCG, you also have to estimate the time it takes to create assets and cost to render them.

Keep a buffer.

Don’t forget, it is also important to estimate the “buffer”.

I have seen many different types of productions, including those of my student days and there is a very high probability that something will go wrong in the middle of a project. If you are too precise, it is easy to become impatient when something exceptional happens or when thing don’t go well.

For example, “I can work a lot on Saturdays and Sundays, so I can make a lot here!” If you think that you will have plenty of time to work on weekends, you will end up turning blue later on. The “buffer” will give you “mental space”.

Planning and scheduling is very important

As you have seen above, if “time secured ≥ time required for work” is not established, it is almost certain that the project will not be “successful”. “Planning” and “Scheduling” help visualize this.

It is also said that “people have a habit of trying to spend until the deadline is full” or that “deadlines determine people’s behavior”, so “scheduling” is very important.

When you can see the schedule, you know “how much time you have to make each shot”, and you can design the direction of your picture making accordingly. In the case of 3DCG, the number of models is also important, and it is also important to consider how the models can be used in different ways.

“You’re doing an independent produciton! When do you plan to complete it?” and if you cannot answer, you should assume that you will not be able to complete it. The worst thing you can do it to say, “I’m just kind of going ahead with it”.

Team production is not reccommended.

I’ve never seen an example of an independent production group around me that has succeeded in saying, “We’ll make it as team”. The theory is usually that “everyone is too busy with work and the work does not progress, so it spontaneously disappears” or “the group does not get along well or is not satisfied with what is made, so breaks up in the middle of the work”.

Well, as I say, it was the same for me. In my second year of work, three of my coworkers and I decided to work together on an independent production, but we couldn’t agree on what we wanted to make in the pre-produciton stage, so we broke up. (It was partly because we were not able to do the things I have mentioned above.) Well, later on, things happend, and the other two became the director…

I have not seen this, but a team like this might be OK. There is an “individual” who overwhelmingly wants to create something, and that person is the “director”. There are those around him who are willing to “help”. Ultimately, even if all the “helpers” are gone, it is important to have the mindset of “making it alone”.

Think about it for a moment. Do you think everyone on your team can do the “routinization” you wrote about above? No matter what you do, you have a “daily life”, so unless you have strong “motivation” or “work”, their priority will drop. When I go home, there are so many temptations.
If the director is charismatic and attracts people around him/her to the point where they say, “I can devote my time to this guy!” It would be a different story. However, I think such a person has already made something by himself or is capable of gathering people to make something commercially.

Summary

There are many people around me who became directors because of independent production. In the 3DCG field, it is possible for one person or a small group of people to create a coherent work, so I think there are man such people in particular. It is easy for the producer to see that “this person can create this kind of work.

Also, it is inevitable that people who are able to complete independent productions properly often have the above characteristics, so I think that many people are quick and produce good quality work in a short period of time. Even if your work doesn’t get buzz on Twitter or get a lot of views on Youtube, the “results of your work” will lead you to the next stage of your career.