Chapter 161: Animation’s Preparatory Leap

Of course, by the level at which the Creed Animations crew is semi-ready enough, the projects did get their start.

Even though it had only been a week or so since Seasoned Hayao was shaping them up, the preliminary legwork towards a leap had to be done already.

The sooner the beginning of everything, the better it would be for Mr. Miyazaki to do his fault-finding and correctional improvements as well.

The idleness and training mood of the 'production' compartment finally settled into calm, restlessness, and busy addendums.

Everyone's figurative thinking caps were symbolically worn as they prepared themselves on a collective brainstorm.

It was too bad that their explorative and originality won't be used much as they are going for an adaptive method of doing things.

As such, their long tables were filled with all the necessary materials they need. The signature pen and papers were there but with the respective comic book material for them to base on.

Since Creed Comics were their project titles, single-issue comic books and even Volume Books of those respective comic titles were laid out.

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Like any animation studio, the Creed animation team eventually delved themselves into the multiple phases of animation.

The very pioneering phase for them to go through researching, conceptualizing, and scripting.

Animating with comic book adaptation was what made them breezed through some of those stages as they just needed to affix some interpretative and medium-shifting factors into it.

Perhaps Creed Comics and Creed Animations are among the inter-medium fields that can do so with relative ease. Alexander's Japanese-inspired penchant for coherence finally solidified its advantages even further.

Seasoned Hayao, who was helpfully overseeing and guiding the preliminary phases can't help but feel at home with such a chapter-esque progression of comic books.

Making an animation series from Creed Comics' stories was a toned-down exercise for a veteran like him. After all, it wasn't the type where he had to compress his entire Nausicaa manga into a single feature-length film.

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All in all, everything was at a good pace with the script-making process but the complexity had to rise eventually.

While a group of production people was scripting from speech bubbles and narrations, a group of people had to start the storyboarding phase in simultaneity.

Storyboards were filled with squares. Inside those squares are characters and designated positions. Below the squares is the supposed dialogue.

Like a comic, each square is read from left to right. Most of these drawing squares are made up of bond paper that was cut into quarters.

The empty wood board wall now had a lot of pinned papers that represent scenes of the entire animation progression.

Supplementary images of the background and some of the materials were also illustrated in different angles and scenarios.

The storyboarding phase is what can be considered the pre-production stage of film production, only that it is in animation.

Mr. Miyazaki was at this point to nitpick once again as he oversaw the entire process. The director hasn't been finalized quite yet but it would come to no doubt to everyone that the Japanese specialist would get that title.

He was shuttled through the split projects of the animation teams and pointed out where, when, and how things should be.

Each project has a different style, theme, topic, and story but he somehow managed due to all the practice he has been having.

Of course, Alexander and Creed Comics' shifted advisorial team was there to help out as well. The comic book employees that delegated to animation finally had their time to shine.

They were considerably influential in making the print form, after all, so they were quite a big help in finalizing the animated version and managing some of the processes.

The storyboarding phase also has a part in the styling phase. Themes and methods of animating varied from one animation project to the next.

Since Alexander's versatility was already established, the varied but solidified styles of each titled project are already guaranteed. All that had to be done is translate them well from still comic images to fluidic motion.

Those motion considerations are still quite ahead though as it is still the storyboarding, episode dividing, tone choosing, and styling deliberation processes.

The next phases would only serve to complicate the complexities of everything further. The true still drawing process, timing voiceovers and recordings... even the upcoming editing, layering, working on every movement clip, blending every image, and all the works serve to tax the team on many levels.

They would all be tackled in due time, so it was best to stick with the true preliminary planning stages for now.

The more perfected the storyboards and scripts are, the more conducive and easy it would be when it is finally time to deal with the next animation phases.

Each phase needs to be optimized to its best for the final product to be the most optimized and the best it can be.

The 'production' compartment was buzzing with work while the rest of the compartments were on a training standby.

They didn't know when they'll be as busy as the 'production' people but they were still quite looking forward to it.

A lot of them wanted to rush along with the busy teams but everyone also knew that they had to be patient. Although the venture had a great leap with what was happening, animation was a sequential marathon and not a sprint.

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As the grind for the Creed Animations' projects ensued, the main players did have time to convene themselves.

Alexander had only participated seldom times due to his school responsibilities but Seasoned Hayao truly took these rare opportunities to exchange animation knowledge and discuss animation topics.

Of course, Alexander would oblige as he had benefited from these simple exchanges with a legend like Hayao Miyazaki as well.

It had to be said that when the animation legend finally knew who wrote the comic books that are being adapted, he did get his own share of surprising shock just like the previous clueless-to-enlightened joes before him.

Miyazaki's process was quite a delayed one though as reading and translating American texts do take some time for him. It also had to be said the poor Mr. Translator had to go through the shock process as well.

They thought that the boy was already abnormal during their first meeting but they were never told that there was still much more abnormalness to be found out!

Alexander really had no effective method of dealing with people who are dealing with how to deal with him. The 'dealing' process takes some time of getting used to for everybody but at least he had established a great rappeur to those that have finally acclimatized with his mind-boggling capabilities.

They had to look at him with weird looks for a while but they would eventually get used to it and take their respect for his inputs to a much higher level.

Like all the Alexander-shocked peers before him, Seasoned Hayao became much more enthusiastic about working with him and the advantageous effects clearly showed throughout all the man's contributions to the animation project.

From a temporary helper, the man became a managing director who had no qualms with delaying his film projects for a while. It may just be a short while but Seasoned Hayao was the very MVP that is integral in making everything happen.

In any case, the animation venture got more and more clearer as all the pieces fell into place.

Alexander, Miyazaki, and the animation crew were doing what they can to make sure that all their efforts will be rewarded in the end.