Along with an understanding of the broader context of the subject, the most vital ingredient to good anime coverage is a reliable source. So when US journalists actually interview people on the production side in Japan, it’s generally worth noting unless the interview consists entirely of fluff. This is the latest of what will hopefully be a couple more posts archiving articles from Newtype USA’s [inside] series of articles written by Amos Wong. This article on studio 4C includes President Eiko Tanaka talking about global markets and the technical aspect of continuous takes, Koji Morimoto talking about his work on the Animatrix and the producer who got him involved in the project, and Shinichiro Watanabe talking his issues with tight schedules.
Note: Pictures are scans of the article made on my crappy scanner, which cover the article text but not the entire page. They’re also in greyscale, because I’m interested in archiving interview text and color scans make the process more of a headache than it needs to be. Apologies for that. Scans after the jump, along with comments on the contents of the article.
Comments:
-The article states that 4C employs 45 members, significantly less than the 80 or so employed by gonzo, but they also say that they are fairly small as anime studios go.
-The commentary on the continuous takes in Memories’ Cannon Fodder segment is interesting because it comes from Tanaka, the president/producer. Michael Arias, mentioned in the same article, went from CG director on Tekkon Kinkreet to producer on the Animatrix. There’s probably a large degree of people skills/basic technical know how that’s transitive and would help people in both positions.
-I don’t quite get the ‘harem’ comment on the first page, but if I had to guess, it might have something to do with the fact that Tanaka is a woman and the majority of animators presumably were not. Could be wrong.
Animetics 
Anime studio staff count are a matter of public record, and often times companies will list them right on their company website:
Kyoani
Employees: 129 (2010 April to present)
http://www.kyotoanimation.co.jp/company/outline/
Here’s a list compiled a while back by animapple:
304 Toei
246 TMS Entertainment
184 Production IG
171 Sunrise
159 Kyoto Animation
150 Studio Pierrot
150 Studio Deen
140 Studio Ghibli
130 Mad House
120 J.C.Staff
110 ufotable
100 XEBEC
100 AIC
78 GAINAX
77 Satellite
70 P.A.Works
70 Bee Train
70 Synergy SP
41 Artland
38 A-1 Pictures
36 NOMAD
20 Brain’s Base
15 feel.
10 Ordet
http://animapple.blogspot.com/2010/12/company-number-of-staffs-that-each.html
That’s neat, especially how small A-1 Pictures was at the time. It would be nice if that list was sourced (links are to an animesuki user profile and a dead article) – I’d like to check how the info changed, especially for A-1, which only has their top-level staff listed on their page: http://a1p.jp/staff/
Nevermind, wikipedia lists their current employee count at 129 people: http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/A-1_Pictures
Found a more up-to-date list:
Animation Studio Staff Count
521 Toei Animation (as of 2014-03-31)
300 Ghibli
224 Sunrise
166 TMS Entertainment (as of 2012-06)
137 OLM (as of 2013-03)
130 JC Staff (including contractors)
129 Kyoto Animation (as of 2010-04)
125 A-1 (as of 2013-01)
124 Asashi Production (as of 2013-04)
120 Production IG
120 Studio DEEN (including contractors)
110 Satellite (as of 2013-04)
110 UFotable
100 Studio Hibari
100 XEBEC (including contractors)
100 Tezuka Productions
92 Studio L (as of 2013-05, including contractors)
83 Gainax
80 Answer Studio
70 Madhouse (including contractors)
77 Dogakobo (as of 2011-09)
70 Shin-Ei Animation (as of 2011-07)
70 DLE (as of 2012-09)
59 Telecom Animation Film
55 Diomedia (as of 2013-04)
53 Studio Comet
52 Tatsunoko (as of 2013-03-31)
50 Imagine (as of 2012)
50 Eiken
50 Orange
45 Brain Based (as of 2010-06)
41 ACTUS (including contractors)
42 Gonzo
40 Studio ADD (as of 2011-05)
40 Studio Live
40 MSC (as of 2011-09)
37 G&G Direction
36 Nomad
30 Sunshine Corporation (as of 2011-08)
26 Studio Fantasia
25 A.C.G.T.
24 Production REED (as of 2012-10)
23 Triple A (including contractors)
23 Digital Network Animation
23 Asread (including contractors)
21 Artland
20 ZEXCS
18 Dream Force (as of 2011-01)
17 Kamikaze Douga
12 EGG (as of 2012-01, exlcuding contractors)
10 Ordet (as of 2013-01)
http://nextsociety.blog102.fc2.com/blog-entry-2209.html
The list sources wikipedia, company site, and most importantly, industry health surveys by Teikoku Databank research firm:
2009:
Click to access p100803.pdf
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com.au/news/2010-08-19/research-firm/anime-studios-revenues-down-for-2nd-year (English Summary)
2011:
Click to access p121205.pdf
http://www.teikoku.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Press-Release-Dec.-27.pdf (English summary)
Since then we have seen a wave of bankruptcies and consolidations for anime studio, so I’m curious to see what a newer report will look like. Hopefully TDB will delivier.
Yeah, this is neat. Zexcs animated like 3 things this past year and a half that I remember and they’ve got a desiccated skeleton crew, though their animation is not very good. Still impressive that you can make that much with a staff that small.
Maybe it has something to do with smaller budgets. I’ve seen a number of things lately that make me doubt some of the conventional 10-30 million yen budget figures (at least in terms of being universal).
1 million yen for AIC in this article: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2007-10-15/japanese-animators-directors-establish-first-union
5.5 million yen for Zexcs via Sister Princess via its ann page: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=1114
Here’s a list of TV anime production budget I translated a while back.
1962 – 2.1 million yen – Astro Boy
1963 – 1.2 million yen – Gigantor
1965 – 2.3 million yen – Super Jetter
1982 – 5.5 million yen – Macross
1987 – 10 million yen – Legend of Galactic Heroes
1994 – 16.6 million yen – Dirty Pair Flash
1994 – 30.9 million yen – Mega Man
1995 – 6.25 million yen – Evangelion
1996 – 30 million yen – Escaflowne
1998 – 20 million yen – Cowboy Bebop
2000 – 10 million yen – One Piece
2000 – 9 million yen – Zoids
2001 – 5.5 million yen – Sister Princess
2002 – 13 million yen – Gunslinger Girl
2002 – 25 million yen – Gundam SEED
2002 – 30 million yen – Ghost in the Shell
2003 – 18 million yen – Kaleido Star
2003 – 30 million yen – Astro Boy
2004 – 33 million yen – Gundam SEED Destiny
2004 – 32 million yen – SAMURAI 7
2007 – 10 million yen – Bamboo Blade
Source: http://alfalfa.livedoor.biz/archives/50621035.html
The list cut off the good part, but we can probably fill in the gap together with a little effort.
>Producer Nobuhiro Nakayama (Toaru Majutsu no Index, Hatsukoi Limited, Modern Magic Made Simple) noted during a lecture on Sunday at Tokyo University that a two-cours (six-month or 26-episode) anime series costs 300 million yen (about US$3.85 million) to create.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2011-11-29/toaru-majutsu-no-index-producer/26-episode-anime-costs-300-million-yen
2007 – Afro Samurai
5 episodes
Production cost: ¥119,580,000 ( $1,000,000)
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=5275
https://www.google.com/search?q=Production+cost&oq=Production+cost&aqs=chrome..69i57&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8#q=Production+cost+site%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.animenewsnetwork.com%2Fencyclopedia%2Fanime.php
That list seems to show some evolution from earlier time periods. I guess that would have been partially inflation, but 1 yen in 1970 is only worth about 3 in 2014, so those 60s shows are still about half the cost.
http://fxtop.com/en/inflation-calculator.php
More interesting, I think, is the fact that the series with higher episode budgets in the 2000s on that list seem to tend to be 2-cour ones. It’s possible people are more willing to invest big budgets on shows that they already had high hopes for (or just that the longer shows were more likely to succeed and have fans willing to inquire about them, idk). It’s also a small sample; the variance could be huge even with 10 million being a trustworthy benchmark cost.
I also still can’t get over how Zexcs has made multiple shows in a year when they have less than twice the staff of a studio of dedicated in-betweeners (EGG). Maybe they just subcontract more than usual. One junk stat I dredged up is that Blast of Tempest’s ann page only lists two-non Bones companies on primary key animation, but Cuticle Detective Inaba’s lists five. Definitely something to look at and compare in the future.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=14611
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=14331