With a new album release and anime debut on the horizon, Japan’s leading virtual artist, KAF has been plenty busy lately. Debuting in 2018, KAF’s digital avatar is anime-inspired but her smooth vocals and emotional lyrics are real. Forging a path for virtual singers, the …Read more »
Anime fans around the World voted on their favorite anime songs and the results are in! Japanese media, Asahi TV surveyed 1,740 people residing outside of Japan to rank their top anisongs. The top 20 were presented by Asahi TV’s General Election team on X. …Read more »
Love anime enough to want to learn how to create it? In the ever-evolving landscape of anime and manga education, Sozoroo emerges illuminating a path for aspiring anime creators worldwide. At its core, Sozoroo stands as an education platform for inspiring creators to have access …Read more »
Another week, another depressing story about the Japanese animation industry! Okay, this info isn’t particularly new, but it’s making the rounds again thanks to being shared on a Japanese TV show. The show compared the average yearly salary animators in China and Japan. On the …Read more »
Shin-Ei Animation, the anime studio behind properties like Doraemon and Crayon Shin-chan, has announced it will open a new branch in Kobe, western Japan. It’ll be the studio’s first branch outside of Tokyo. Why is this significant? Well, the anime industry has traditionally been packed …Read more »
Among all the lousy news about the industry and how bad it is for animators, it’s good to be able to report some nice stuff now and again. The good word today is that Toei Animation is establishing an animator training program which starts in …Read more »
Sadly, we spend a lot of time around here reporting on how lousy the anime industry can be to the people working hard to make the shows and films we all enjoy. Here’s another example, courtesy director Taiki Nishimura, who’s worked on series like Ergo …Read more »
There’s been a lot of effort in the last few years to decentralize the anime (and manga) industries, which’ve been centered around Tokyo since they began. It’s useful to have everything and everyone in one place, but hard for young animators to live in Japan’s …Read more »
Sentai Holdings, the parent company that includes anime distributor Sentai Filmworks as well as streaming service HIDIVE, has been purchased by AMC Networks. That’s the company behind the channel AMC, best known for series like The Walking Dead. The deal includes the holdings that Japan’s …Read more »
Ah, Yoshiyuki Tomino. The lively creator of Mobile Suit Gundam is never shy about sharing his opinion. This time, in an interview with Real Economy, Tomino made this controversial statement: “Japan is no longer an advanced country in terms of animation.” Why? For Tomino, it …Read more »
Here’s an interesting piece of industry news. 8-Bit, the studio behind stuff like Irregular at Magic High School and Encouragement of Climb, just set up a regional office in Niigata City. That’s about three hours from Tokyo on the Shinkansen. 8-Bit is recruiting animators for …Read more »
Wit Studio, the folks behind titles like Great Pretender and Attack on Titan seasons 1-3, are having a bit of a money problem, it seems. For the fiscal period that ended this May, the studio posted a loss of 480 million yen (about $4.2 million). …Read more »
Japan’s anime production market contracted in 2020, bringing in less money than the year before for the first time since 2010. In total, the market brought in some 251 billion yen, or about 2.3 billion dollars. That’s a 1.8% decrease compared to 2019. (Hey, isn’t …Read more »
Media Blasters has taken to social media to share the news that they will no longer use a DVD on Demand system in the new year. Instead, they encouraged people to buy the Blu-ray versions of their favorite anime. “Given the continued drop in DVD …Read more »
Netflix has really been upping its anime game, increasing the number of anime it creates itself. A lengthy article on the matter was published by Wired with the title “There’s Something Super Weird About Netflix Anime.” The article, written by Cecilia D’Anastasio, interviews several people …Read more »
Brianna Fox-Priest
Matt Schley
Danica Davidson
