Gedo Senki (Tales from Earthsea)

12th January 2006

Number 16 - The Sympathy of my Staff

At this point the key animation is steadily being completed, I noticed something as the characters took shape. The characters, especially the hero Arren and the heroine Theru have gotten rather "lifelike"[1].

This is because, the understanding and sympathy of the animation staff for the main characters has deepened even further, I think.

The boy Arren, who is looking for the meaning of life without finding it, with darkness growing in his heart, and the girl Theru, who knows the joy of just being alive and tries to show that to the boy.

Whether consciously or unconsciously I don't know, but the staff's understanding of the two has turned into an empathy that goes beyond logic, and I think that this is reflected in the pictures.

For example, a character suddenly turning their eyes away, or standing dumbfounded, these slight expressions and actions have come to look strangely 'live'.

And this has appeared in their drawing of the characters as a whole. For example the drawing of Sparrowhawk[2], who accompanies Arren, has become 'Sparrowhawk as seen by Arren', Somewhere he has come to overlap with Arren, and so the way he is drawn has come to reflect that I think.

Last time, I wrote[3] about my joy when the addition of a voice made a character expand beyond what I had thought when I drew it. This is the same for the animation.

Just having the story work out arbitrarily is of course no good. Equally, if the director, myself, is the only one who understands or sympathizes with the characters, the movie will have no strength.

It is the work of staff each pouring their own feelings into the work, that puts life into the characters. I feel that strongly today.

Translator's Notes

[1]: The word 'nama' (生) also means 'raw', 'fresh', 'natural' etc.

[2]: Japanese 'Haitaka'

[3]: He uses the character for 'draw/paint' here but I think this is a typo.