Contains one Gonzo-related poor business practices tidbit: Trinity Blood was rejected multiple times as a ‘mission impossible’ type of project, per director Tomohiro Hirata.
Via Anime Insider: Various Gonzo Shows (June 2005)
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Tag Archives: Borderline Plagarism for the Freedom of Information
Via Anime Insider: ADV’s Gantz Release (April 2005)
A short article detailing ADV’s Gantz anime release plans for 13 DVDs with 2 episodes each (they later shortened it to 10 disks).
Via Anime Insider: Takayuki Inagaki (April 2005)
Series Director Takayuki Inagaki briefly talks about the 70s-style homage motivations behind Desert Punk.
Via Anime Insider: Cowboy Bebop (April 2005)
Bones president Masahiko Minami and character designer Toshihiro Kawamoto look back on Cowboy Bebop on the occasion of the “Remix” DVD release. Nothing really new here, given the amount of other interviews these two have done, but it’s my policy to archive multiple-page full text interviews regardless.
Via Anime Insider: Katsuhiro Otomo (April 2005)
Katsuhiro Otomo talks about developing Steamboy, his most difficult-to-make work that spent 10 years in production.
Via Anime Insider: License Costs and DVD Sales (April 2005)
An article explaining the high-relative-to-other-US-boxes cost of anime DVDs. A couple of really interesting figures in here (via Forbes and Geneon VP Nobu Yamamoto):
-ADV paid between $1 million and $2.6 million for each anime TV series, and $0.5 million to $5 million for each anime movie. (Forbes) I believe that’s production, including licensing, but it’s not entirely clear.
-Licensing for a popular anime title could reach $50,000/episode. (Yamamoto) That’s a far cry above the max of ~$33,000/episode paid for Pumpkin Scissors and Air Gear (the most expensive shows on this 2006-2007 ADV list). Licensor collaboration may have proven effective.
-For the same popular anime as above dubbing ran $12k/ep, authoring/materials/quality control ran $10k/DVD release, marketing ran $15k/box set release. Manufacturing and royalties cost an additional $15/box set.
-Wholesale retailers typically got 50% discounts on more popular series.
-The cost of licences grew almost a factor of 10 faster than the size of the market since 2000. (Yamamoto) Presumably some of this was just Japanese companies getting their fair cut of things as prices adjusted to more properly value the market, and some was overvaluing just how strong the market was.
Via Anime Insider: US Industry Collaboration (February 2005)
This article describes an attempt of which I was not aware of by Funimation, ADV, and Geneon to cooperate and drive the price of licenses down. It likely worked (more on that in just a moment), despite the fact that one of the three closed down and another declared bankruptcy.
Via Anime Insider: Santa Inoue (February 2005)
Tokyo Tribes author Santa Inoue talks about his mission to portray authentic Tokyo street culture in his manga.
Via Anime Insider: Real Bout High School Live Action Plans (February 2005)
A short article outling plans for a Real Bout High School live action movie, which, like many other things from the mid-00s, didn’t pan out.
Via Anime Insider: Kenji Kamiyama’s GitS Episode Commentary (February 2005)
Kenji Kamiyama offers some brief comments on each episode of the first season of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex.
Animetics 