A Study of One Piece Animation

JulieYBM

Yokoyama's supervising/corrections have really improved.

I think the Uchiyama episodes started to stand out more - in a bad way - because the art evolved and was getting more detailed, except his episodes, that remained pretty much the same all the way through GT.
Still, the animation for his episodes did get better too. Piccolo vs 17 and his Buu arc efforts come to mind.

Yeah, that was part of it. Uchiyama was the one supervisor to really maintain the early arcs' style, but what really killed the look of his episodes was the fact that he went from four named key animators on his episodes to just two. Before the Artificial Human arc he rarely if ever did key animation himself…then he had to when

was the only key animator that didn't jump ship. When an episode is only key animated by two people, one of them being the supervisor and an awful key animator…

.

Joe

@Yuugi's:

Yokoyama's supervising/corrections have really improved.

Yeah, that was part of it. Uchiyama was the one supervisor to really maintain the early arcs' style, but what really killed the look of his episodes was the fact that he went from four named key animators on his episodes to just two. Before the Artificial Human arc he rarely if ever did key animation himself…then he had to when
was the only key animator that didn't jump ship. When an episode is only key animated by two people, one of them being the supervisor and an awful key animator…
.

Yeah the stuff like what you linked to looks like it was animated during the animation slump of the 70s. Stuff like this makes me hit the Forward button a lot on my DVD. Yokoyama isn't as bad because he isn't used nearly as much and One Piece characters aren't nearly as detailed as Dragon Ball characters so you usually can't tell the huge difference in art between episodes when you watch it in a marathon.

Crossword

Ironically, Yokoyama's problem tends to be the opposite. He's great at the complex, detailed characters, while the simpler, more anime-esque ones tend to suffer.

JulieYBM

My God, episode #531 had actual animation! Not to mention that storyboarding!!

XMURADX

@Yuugi's:

My God, episode #531 had actual animation! Not to mention that storyboarding!!

I agree, there was a good list of key animators. There was some really nice movements for some scenes, specially the part with Caribou and the beginning of the strawhats talking in the air.

Storyboarding was different than usual, but still I can't blame the director for the lack of content, they need to cover 1.5 for these boring parts.

Joe

@Crossword:

Ironically, Yokoyama's problem tends to be the opposite. He's great at the complex, detailed characters, while the simpler, more anime-esque ones tend to suffer.

Never noticed that myself. I'll pay closer attention next time i watch one of his episodes.

Whitebeard. 1

This post is deleted!

Shezar

@Whitebeard.:

Hahahaha here too?
Spam to the max i see.I wonder how long this guy will last.

Archah

Tate Naoki & Hisada Kazuya working again as KA in #532.

Crossword

While it's clear which part Tate animated, I want to say Hisada animated from 18:50 to when Neptune starts to attack around 20:43 or so.

XMURADX

I was just checking the Animation Directors, and it got me excited to know that Inoue, Ishizuka, Kawamura and Nakatani are next on the list. And the next chapters are 616-619.

I think Ishizuka will either do #536[Chap 517] or #537[Chap 518], and Inoue might probably cover a talking chapter #535[616]. But since they threw Yokoyama Kenji a little bit early like they do every 2-3 episodes for him, I think they were trying to fix the rota, so Inoue and Ishizuka get to do the important chapters.

So I hope for this…

535 - [616] Anyone normal like Ide.
536 - [617] Eisaku Inoue
537 - [618] Katsumi Ishizuka
538 - [619] Atsuko Kawamura

And Nakatani to work on the flashback as usual.

Unless Tate comes back. :p

XMURADX

ワンピース

535「ホーディ襲来　復讐計画の始まり」 ("Hody's Rage, The origin of the revenge plan")
中山智博　所勝美　所勝美　井上栄作

536「竜宮城の決戦！ゾロVSホーディ」 ("Decisive battle in Ryugu palace! Zoro VS Hody")
田中仁　上田芳裕　上田芳裕　川村敦子

537「しらほしを守れ！デッケンの追撃」 ("Protect Shirahoshi! Dekken Chase")
菅良幸　中島豊　中島豊　久田和也

538「一味敗北！？　ホーディ竜宮城制圧」 ("Member defeat! ?, Hody controls Ryugu palace")
上坂浩彦　伊藤尚往　伊藤尚往　石塚勝海

==============

535: Eisaku Inoue
536: Atsuko Kawamura
537: Kazuya Hisada
538: Katsumi Ishizuka

Awesome month regarding animation!

535, 537, and 538 have good episode directors. Yoshihiro Ueda's directing is not good when it comes to Action so 536 might be slow paced.

I did a rough translation of the titles, but not sure.

JulieYBM

It's great seeing Hisada supervising again. Hopefully he'll be able to get some sort of battle scene to key animate (or at least something that'll look good).

XMURADX

Judging from the leaked preview of 539

It seems like it's Nakatani. Man, that's 5 great looking episodes in a row. When was the last time this ever happened? Never. I hope the same rota stay for the main stuff later on.

The last few good episodes in a row that looked good were 510, 511, 512, and 513.

Kibin

Can somebody tell me which animators were involved in 536 and 537. Have Urata done the Usopp part (15:30 to 15:47) in 536?

XMURADX

@Kibin:

Can somebody tell me which animators were involved in 536 and 537. Have Urata done the Usopp part (15:30 to 15:47) in 536?

537 Had Nakatsuru working again on the show, which surprised a lot of sakuota, even though the scene wasn't his usual level (Luffy' action), still it looked great.

536 had 2 animators that I suspect they were responsible for a couple of great scenes, one of them was the Underwater Zoro Vs. Hody.

XMURADX

3/11「特番の為放送休止」 (No Episode)

539話「蘇る因縁！ナミと魚人海賊団！」
中山智博　小牧文　小牧文　川村敦子
AD:Atsuko Kawamura
Director: Aya KOMAKI

540話「奴隷解放の英雄　冒険家タイガー」
田中仁　佐藤宏幸　佐藤宏幸＆上田芳裕　久田和也
AD:Kazuya HISADA
Director:Yoshihiro UEDA & Hiroyuki Sato?

541話「黄猿登場！タイガーを狙う罠！」
中山智博　上田芳裕　上田芳裕　石塚勝海
AD: Katsumi ISHIZUKA
Director: Yoshihiro UEDA

542話「チーム結成！チョッパーを救え」
村山功　中島豊　中島豊　横山健次
AD: Kenji Yokoyama
Director: Yutaka NAKASHIMA

I don't know, could be fake. Having Hisada, Kawamura and Ishizuka just after they worked last month is very very rare. Take it with a grain of salt.

Looks like 1 chapter pacing judging from the titles.

Bad news, Tate is Animation Director for Toriko #51.

Crossword

That wouldn't be a bad list at all, if true, but it's still suspicious. While it's not unheard of for teams to have a very short turnaround time, the same three in a row again? I was expecting Shingaki and/or Shimanuki to be in the line-up, honestly.

As for Tate being on Toriko, well, good for Toriko, and I too hope it isn't a permanent thing. Him doing animation directing work again's good though. Aside from those two One Piece scenes he key animated a little while ago the only other work I know he's done recently are little bits in Guilty Crown.

XMURADX

Shingaki said a while ago that he is working on 543, and he mentioned Koala.

Dahaka. 0

If the titles are true, then pacing is gonna speed up
looks like 539 will cover 620
and 541 will cover 623 (trap and "yellow monkey") but he appears in chapter 622 too, so it could be standard 1chap-1ep
And 542 is filler? google translate says something about chopper… ?

Volpe

Just out of curiosity, where do you guys get these lists from?

XMURADX

@!Volpe:

Just out of curiosity, where do you guys get these lists from?

Newtype
http://anime.webnt.jp/programs/view/79

Info gets leaked out early on 2ch. But sometimes it's fake.

Volpe

Thanks.
And about the 542, it's a crossover with Toriko…again.

Crossword

Really? Well, I guess that explains why Chopper's in the title.

Can't say I'm really pumped. Toriko never grabbed me to begin with, and the first special ended up sucking pretty hard in its second half.

kaizokuo12

About Tate AD a Toriko episode, could that be the crossover?

MasterKingJC

@!Volpe:

Thanks.
And about the 542, it's a crossover with Toriko…again.

For real? Sweet!
I liked the first crossover, but I wonder if this one will have the crew in their post time-skip designs..

XMURADX

@kaizokuo12:

About Tate AD a Toriko episode, could that be the crossover?

8th of April
Toriko = 51
One Piece = 542

Oh shit, nice catch. So Tate is not really working on Toriko. Just like when I thought Nakatani did the first Toriko ep, it was Nakatani and Takeo Ide that were responsible for the 1 hour special.

＞「トリコ×ワンピースコラボスペシャル 2」はフジテレビほかで
＞4/8（日）午前9:00～放送！（地域により放送時間・曜日が異なります）

One Piece X Toriko special on the 8th of April. I'm now reliefed.

Maron

@MasterKingJC:

For real? Sweet!
I liked the first crossover, but I wonder if this one will have the crew in their post time-skip designs..

Why wouldn't it?

JulieYBM

Holy crap, another crossover? Hell yes. I hope these become a regular thing with Toei!

EDIT: LOL, Yokoyama is doing #542. :p

XMURADX

The lists are confirmed, wow, having Kawamura, Ishizuka and Hisada again is awesome, but it's gonna effect the consistency.

Also, as I said before, Tate is just working on the second part of the One Piece x Toriko special. I think Tate will be replacing Inoue from now on, since it seems Inoue will be working on the new Saint Seiya Omega. He is doing storyboard for Ep 2, and eventually he will do animation direction.

Ep 539 (Atsuko Kawamura) covers Chap 520.
Ep 540 (Kazuya Hisada) covers Chap 521.
Ep 541 (Katsumi Ishizuka) covers Chap 522.
Ep 542 (Naoki Tate, Kenji Yokoyama) is Filler.
Ep 543 (Shigefumi Shingaki) Covers Chap 523.

Along with 535-538 This is one of the best rotas I've ever seen for a while now.

540 Preview (Hisada). looks good considering that he just worked on 537.

JulieYBM

Wait, so Tate and Yokoyama are sharing animation supervising duties on #542? Huh.

That's also a nice rotation, although I can't help but fear what it'll do to the battles.

Volpe

Can someone translate the episodes' names? :ninja:

Crossword

Huh? The actual credits for 539 have Ide as the animation director.

Volpe

Well, it makes more sense, but it is very weird.

Crossword

I doublechecked the Newtype link just to make sure and it still says Kawamura. Strange. Must be a mistake on their end. Maybe they forgot to to completely change the credits from the last set of episodes (everything else matches MURAD's list).

Kuroyanagi did some work, most notably the New Fishman Pirates' intros.

XMURADX

The episode did look like Takeo Ide, And the preview looks like Hisada as well, could it be possible that the mistake in newtype is for ep 539 only?

Also, It's not Kenji Kuroyanagi who worked on the ep like I initially thought, it's another Kuroyanagi, Although I have to say, the Sanji serving tea scene did look like Kenji Kuroyanagi's work. Unless he is credited with a different name, or a name typo?

I'll wait and see.

Crossword

Okay, once again Newtype seems to have goofed. Hisada is definitely not the one credited as 540's animation director. It's someone new.

EDIT: Appears to be Yusuke Isochi. Seems to be relatively new.

Sean D. Capitan

Well, for his first episode on the show, the art looks really good. Animation it's hard to say yet.

Next week preview:

New AD again? I don't think its Ishizuka…it's more Inoue-ish

Anyway, It looks freaking awesome.

goty

Well, looks like Newtype screwed up big time this month.No wonder the AD list felt off.

Crossword

Isochi's first episode definitely wasn't bad. I liked it. Kinda reminded me of Nakatani a bit.

Next week…that's definitely not Ishizuka.

XMURADX

As Crossword said Isochi Yusuke (五十内裕輔) is the AD of #540. A regular key animator of Toshio Deguchi and Masayuki Fujita episodes in his first appearances, but he have worked as well with Ishizuka, Inoue, Nakatani and even with Tate.

He was on my radar when I was researching Tate's episodes, but never found anything significant about him. Also I hope he is not just replacing Nakatani.

From the first ep, I think he did a great job. The Strawhats looked fantastic, and so was the rest of the episode.

BTW, Sumio Watanabe and Urata worked in the ep, Urata did the Queen avoiding bullets and slapping the theif.

Next week could be Deguchi.

Crossword

Gotta get these spockpiled episodes off of my computer and free up space!

!

Dark palettes are the bane of me!

Whitebeard. 1

I really don't like the animation of Fishman Island arc… I hope it gets better ! :/.

o-chan

I was going to put this in the simulcast thread BUT since that's been dead in the water since November I'll bring it up here since it is does affect how we see the animation. I'm sitting here watching a very well animated episode of Naruto: Shippuden on Crunchyroll in 720p quality after watching an episode of Bleach in the same capacity. Funimation needs to step up their game and possibly let us watch the latest episodes of One Piece on Hulu with the same benefits. I'm glad we have a simulcast, but it's kind of pathetic if One Piece's "Shonen Competition" gets better simulcast options.

O-chan

BroBro

It makes me sad how an anime like bleach gets animated REALLY well but OP gets this half-assed animation from toei.Oh and the new hxh anime is animated magnificently .:sad: Its like toei doesnt even care.

Electrivire

Its like toei doesnt even care.

I'd say it's a combo of the fact that this series may just make it past 1000 episodes, so they've gotta be smart with the budget, and a case of "One Piece is popular, people will watch even if we don't use our A-game animators all the time."

Also, the way these time-skip episodes look on a regular basis, what with the shading, bigger color palettes, ect, I'd say that each One Piece episode dished out week after week is pretty expensive, even the episodes that don't look so hot.

JulieYBM

It's not the length that's the problem. One Piece will continue to get sponsorship for years to come as it has received sponsorship up until now. Spending more money now isn't going to somehow lessen the amount of money that will be available five or ten years from now, not for a property that is literally driving their company now. Toei Animation simply doesn't play by the rules we'd prefer. They have multiple TV series' on the air at once (more so than other studios) and just as many specials and films in the works, too. They spread themselves thinly to hit every mark of their business. That's why they have near eleven thousand TV episodes and hundreds of films under their belt. Mix this in with how by-the-books (don't deviate from the source material) Toei tends to be with their long running titles and it makes for a boring, uninspired TV show.

XMURADX

Full staff

543

Script: Suga Yoshiyuki
Storyboard: Ueda Yoshihiro
Episode director: Tokoro Katsumi
Animation director: Shingaki Shigefumi

544

Script: Tanaka Hitoshi
Storyboard: Imamura Takahiro
Episode director: Imamura Takahiro
Animation director: Deguchi Toshio

545

Script: Suga Yoshiyuki
Storyboard: Ito Naoyuki
Episode director: Ito Naoyuki
Animation director: Kawamura Atsuko

546

Script: Nakayama Tomohiro
Storyboard: Komaki Aya
Episode director: Komaki Aya
Animation director: Takagi Masayuki

Next titles (rough translation)

543: Hero's end · The shocking truth of Tiger
544: The split of the pirates · Jinbei vs Arlong
545: Fishman Island shaking! Tenryuubito shipwrecked
546: A sudden tragedy! The assassination to lock the future

Courtesy of Archah.

Good List, as expected Shingaki for 543 as he said. I don't care much for this part the story,

! but I hope we get someone good to do the upcoming short Skirmish with Luffy and Jinbey.

BTW, There seems to be an animation book for One Piece featuring Eisaku Inoue's works plus a doujin, not sure about it. I'll confirm the translation then I'll update my post.
http://yonayonaseisaku.blog20.fc2.com/blog-entry-362.html

owakefka

Long time lurker, I don't really pay attention to the forums besides the spoiler section to fill my dopamine receptors reward circuitry.

Anyways, does anyone have a side by side comparison with all the animations and different animators?

Crossword

Well, you can check the links here, but they're a little outdated. I've been (slowly but surely) working on compiling post-timeskip strips for each animation director.