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Production I.G

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Production I.G
Company typeAnime studio
IndustryAnime industry
Founded1987-12-15
HeadquartersJapan
Key people
Mitsuhisa Ishikawa
ProductsAnime, Video games, Manga
DivisionsBee Train (1997 - 2006)
Websitehttp://www.production-ig.com/ Template:En icon
http://www.production-ig.co.jp/ Template:Ja icon

Production I.G, Inc. (株式会社プロダクション・アイジー, Kabushiki-gaisha Purodakusyon Ai Jī) (JASDAQ: 3791) is a Japanese anime studio and production enterprise, which was founded on 1987-12-15 by Mitsuhisa Ishikawa.

Production I.G has been involved in the production of several anime television series, OVA and theatrical films, video game animated cut-scenes, video game design and development, as well as music publishing and management. Among its prominent works are Patlabor and the Ghost in the Shell series. Production I.G is known for high-quality animation.

History

Initially founded as "IG Tatsunoko Limited" in 1987, it was a break-off studio of Tatsunoko Productions. Originally consisted of the keyframe studio "鐘夢(pronounced "chaimu" after the English "chime")" and members of the Tatsunoko Production Studio annex.

Among Production I.G's earliest most notable works was the feature length cinematic anime adaptation of the Patlabor story, created by the group HEADGEAR. In 1993, during the final stages of the production of "Patlabor 2" the company ended capital relation to Tatsunoko Production that had 20% of the stocks of I.G and changed its name to the current "Production I.G". The movie "Patlabor 2" is the last product bearing the name "IG Tatsunoko". [citation needed]

In 1998, the company incorporated to become "Production I.G, Inc." Following that, Production I.G merged with "ING", another production company founded by the same Mitsuhisa Ishikawa, in 2000.

It [The I.G in Production I.G] stands for two words Itsumo (always) and Genki (happy), you should ask is that true. In reality it stands for Ishikawa, and my artist collaborator’s name Takayuki Goto, the initials of our last names. But now though I am the sole president, we kept the name. But I am happy to say it means Itsumo Genki.

Taken from the Q&A Session held with Mitsuhisa Ishikawa.[1]

In July 4, 2007, the company announced merger with Mag Garden.[2]

Works

Production I.G have been involved in the production of several anime television series, OVA and theatrical films, such as the Patlabor and the Ghost in the Shell series, Blood: The Last Vampire, Blood+, xxxHolic, the FLCL OVA series, and many others.

They have produced each of the anime adaptations of Masamune Shirow's Ghost in the Shell series, including the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex television series, which was followed on into a second season, Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd GIG, and a TV film, Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. Solid State Society, all three of which were directed by Kenji Kamiyama, and the two theatrical film adaptations, which were directed by Mamoru Oshii.

They have also recently worked with Clamp, producing the xxxHolic anime television series, which aired in 2006, as well as its theatrical film adaptation, xxxHolic - A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Tsubasa Chronicle - The Princess of the Birdcage Land.

2006 saw the release of the new Mamoru Oshii's movie, Tachigui: The Amazing Lives of the Fast Food Grifters, made with a new technique called "superlivemation."

"It's like my home," Oshii declared of I.G in an interview with Andrez Bergen for Japanese newspaper Daily Yomiuri. "It's like Manchester for Manchester United, and Hamburg for HSV (the soccer teams). They know the pitch in whatever condition and situations. However," he added meaningfully, "it doesn't necessarily mean that I can do anything I want to at I.G" [3]

In 2007, the studio will commemorate its 20th year anniversary with Shinreigari/Ghost Hound, which it is co-creating with Ghost in the Shell creator Masamune Shirow. The series will be directed by Ryūtarō Nakamura and written by Chiaki J. Konaka.

Inroads into Hollywood have been made by the company in the form of visual homages from the highly successful sci-fi film directed by the Wachowski brothers, The Matrix, and by creating the animated sequence in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill: Vol. 1. In 2003, Production I.G collaborated with Cartoon Network in producing a 25 minute (five episodes of five minutes each) "micro-series" IGPX Immortal Grand Prix, which has been made into a full series of 26 full thirty minute episodes in 2005.

Complete Filmography:

Films

TV

OVAs

Games

Innovations

Production I.G is one of the forerunners of digital animation techniques. While not exclusive in their usage of computer technology, they are given praise for their advances in digital compositing, digital effects, digital image/story boarding, and digital colorgrading. Because of this, some prefer to refer to Production I.G as an 'animation lab' rather than a studio.

The film "Ghost in the Shell" marked the first ever overlay of computer generated visuals onto a hand drawn background. Surprisingly, many of the digital looking effects in the film were laboriously hand produced.

Production I.G's advances in digital cinematography techniques have been credited in no small part to Effects Director Hisashi Ezura (江面 久), Director Hiroyuki Kitakubo (北久保 弘之), Animator Norifumi Kiyozumi (清積 紀文) and Toshihiro Kawamoto (川元 利浩) who joined Production I.G in the spring of 1996. Their first application of digital techniques was presented in the animated cut sequences for the Sony PlayStation game, "Ghost in the Shell".

The first feature length animated film to use this digital manipulation by Production I.G was "Blood: The Last Vampire" released in 2000. This found the comprehensive usage of digital technology in a largely seamless manner. From this production onward, digital effects were used in almost every one of their projects including "Sakura Wars: The Movie", "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex", "MiniPato", and "Innocence".

Digital Compositing

Traditional compositing had physical limitations on the number of layers being placed into the final film. Care was also needed in making the individual layers be compatible with each other, so that one would not conflict with another.

With the advance of digital compositing, the discrete layers could be edited in groups, and lighting effects could be applied to the entire frame, or to each layer selectively. This greatly helped the production of Hayao Miyazaki's "Princess Mononoke" by creating a depth of field previously unseen in an animated feature. In "Blood: The Last Vampire", this also contributed into having a deep, and hitherto unseen active background supporting the foreground characters.

More recently, further development and experimentation has allowed for the seamless addition of computer generated images, objects and characters into a traditional hand-drawn scene. For example, the Tachikoma Think-Tanks of "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex" are 3-D computer models composited into the scene. This has allowed for repeated mechanical objects to be unified in appearance.

Digital Storyboard

The storyboard is not an aspect of production that finds its way into the finished product. The production process of an anime traditionally breaks the larger whole into smaller sections handled by specific key-frame animators. This allowed for specific artists to show their individual talents, but also created some discontinuity in style.

Production I.G has created a position called the "Screen Architect" who builds the atmosphere and feel of a scene. This is accomplished by creating a storyboard which has the same effects as the finished product applied to it. Prior to digital image manipulation, the application of effects such as lighting, blurs and shadows was done manually and consumed much time.

This allowed the production crews to visualize and unify the visual feel of a film. Combined with digital compositing, this further strengthened the power of post production editing and allowed for fine-tuning of the final product's visual presentation.

Digital Colorgrading

Colorgrading is a fine-tuning post-production process which controls the colors presented in a scene. Animation differs from live-action filming in its ability to choose the colors that the cels are being painted in. This allows for a much more controlled visual environment. This advantage is however lost in the lack of control after the color is painted on the cel.

Digital colorgrading allows for multiple layers to be edited at once, and was used in "Blood: The Last Vampire" to build a very specific unified color palette. Within the limited color palette, specific colors were enhanced to draw the attention of the viewer in a way difficult to paint in the cel.

The subtle nature of the manipulation is the power of colorgrading, as it contributes to the scene without being noticed. It continues to be used in Production I.G's films without being overtly noticed.

Digital Special Effects

Production I.G is known for creating analog effects digitally. For traditional hand-drawn animation, often analog effects easily created on film are difficult to reproduce.

The less obvious digital contributions into an analog scene include lens effects such as the fish-eye lens, motion blur to more vividly portray movement, instability in the focus of the camera, unstable light exposure, lighting effects such as shadows, and gun muzzle flashes.

References

  1. ^ "A night with Mitsuhisa Ishikawa". Retrieved 2007-10-22.
  2. ^ "Production I.G Announces Mag Garden Merger" (in Japanese). Retrieved 2007-10-22.
  3. ^ The Age of Innocence, Andrez Bergen. Daily Yomiuri, March 2004.



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