Texture of Kabaneri

Texture of Kabaneri: Redefining the coloring techniques as demonstrated in "Kabaneri of Iron Fortress"

Coloring in Anime has come long way since Ink & Paint Department a.k.a. Finishing (仕上げ/Shiage) painted each cellophane sheet (cel for short) with a special paint and then those cels are photographed with a special camera stand. With adoption of digital coloring and compositing techniques, color scheme used in anime has gotten more brighter and gained richer texture. To many fans, one of the most notable example of such technique is rosy cheeks and florid skin of female anime characters which have been shown in past ten years. This time, "Kabaneri of Iron Fortress" pushed the envelope to next level which moving images look more like paintings.

Again, I found another fascinating interview from the same Animage magazine which features the coloring technique and a new job title.

Animage June 2016 issue

Feature: Drawing of the Soul

Painting of the Soul

Chief Make-Up Animator: Sachiko Matsumoto (松本幸子)

Introduction
It's no doubt that heavily detailed visual is one the factors that keeps the "Kabaneri of Iron Fortress" exciting. Among those, it's the thickly textured cuts comprised of critical scenes, such as character close-up, that draw eyes to the show. They are the cuts made by artists with unique job title of "Make-Up Animator" of the show. These artists made an epoch as if these characters are painted like an illustration all while moving. They play important role in symbolizing the show's visual quality and bringing life to its drama.



---What kind of work does "Makeup Animator" do?

Matsumoto: Job title of "Makeup Animator" came up only recently. Director (Tetsuro) Araki and Design Setting Overseer (Junpei) Kasaoka came up with that title. From the start, it was about finding new expressions from digital 2D animation while utilizing it in production. We've set goal of expressing texture and feel of Haruhiko Mikimoto's illustration on actual screen .


---Therefore, isn't the work close to "compositing"?

Matsumoto: That's right. Except, in case of animation compositing, it has been augmented into a still image; however this time, we've been putting into a moving character images which is different from how things are done: how will it look when texture is added to moving characters.
We conducted multiple tests as we made it. Processing method changes depending on character; beautiful and cute for girls; keep the harsh line quality intact while adding texture to metallic parts, leather belt, glasses and etc for Ikoma. For example, in ink & paint stage, an "eye" is painted in separate solid colors, but we added highlights and depth to iris and pupil. Even eyebrows only had little touch up at first, but now we made it look fuzzy with blurring and added the process into the workflow. Then there is the hair. To express glossy and translucent feel of hair depicted in Mikimoto's illustration, we touched up the hair strands one by one with Brush tool. Also there is the goal of maintaining nuance of the line quality drawn by Chief Animation Director (Yasuyuki) Ebara, so we adjusted the line thickness and opacity while extracting pencil line strokes from inbetween drawings. So the work is about adding such process one (cel) frame at a time which also flows with character's movement. It's difficult because it's not just simply cleaning up the image, it's about not clashing with flow of the movement.


---In other words, you don't process it automatically like CG, but "paint" it one frame at a time.

Something like that (laughs). So at any rate, we can work with from few cuts to dozens of cuts for each episode. For example, we handled a total of 11 cuts for episode #1. As for staffs including myself, a person for inbetween, person who handles compositing and textures, and others, a total of 5 people have been working on the process.


---What are the fun aspect and difficult aspect while you're working?

I think it would be great if we can express that character is "alive" in that world. Again, there is that Director Araki's "wanting to make girls look cute" request so we pay special attention to them. Due to fact that cuts which we're handling are acting as face of the story, there is a heavy burden of doing the absolute best; but still it's really rewarding. They're really luxurious cuts, so we would be happy if everyone could enjoy with "oh wow" feeling.

Last scene in the episode #1: An impressive cut where Mumei removes her ribbon.
Top one is before the processing, Bottom one is after the processing which shows a hint of sexiness added to hair and skin texture. Also a feeling of richness in her expression as well.  In case of this cut, the same processing was done on 30 frames one frame at a time.




Likewise, Ayame from Episode #1. Lower right is before the processing. Upper left is after the processing. Rosy cheek is derived from blurred flat red color. When comparing before and after processing on eyebrows, they actually look like women's makeup. Limited only to female characters, slight red hue is added on eyelids to express florid complexion