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Answerman - What is 'NAFCA' and How Are They Trying to Help Animators?

The anime industry has had to compete with game makers, for animators, too, hasn't it? Aren't working conditions and pay in the gaming industry better (simply because the revenues are higher -- there's more money coming into the production companies)?

The anime industry has had to compete with game makers, for animators, too, hasn't it? Aren't working conditions and pay in the gaming industry better (simply because the revenues are higher -- there's more money coming into the production companies)?

dm wrote:

The anime industry has had to compete with game makers, for animators, too, hasn't it? Aren't working conditions and pay in the gaming industry better (simply because the revenues are higher -- there's more money coming into the production companies)?

Yes because quite often the production company(game studio) itself is the IP holder and if not then they have royalty deals based on game performance or other incentives baked in to their contracts with publishers. Plus a lot of those game studio's that are the IP holder usually give out bonuses based on sales or aggregate critic scores as well.

Thulebox wrote:

dm wrote: The anime industry has had to compete with game makers, for animators, too, hasn't it? Aren't working conditions and pay in the gaming industry better (simply because the revenues are higher -- there's more money coming into the production companies)? Yes because quite often the production company(game studio) itself is the IP holder and if not then they have royalty deals based on game performance or other incentives baked in to their contracts with publishers. Plus a lot of those game studio's that are the IP holder usually give out bonuses based on sales or aggregate critic scores as well.

And that is again barely have to do anything with actual baseline workers like 3DCGI modeling or animators in game industry - because that people usually do not even belong to the same company that holds the IP rights (and per usual case developer studios not even have access the IP rights either - it belongs to the game publishers) at all and being outsourcers.

For more clear example - credits of Metaphor: ReFantazio include over 10 different outsource studios just for modeling design, graphic design and animation, including at least four different studios that work with anime (Graphinica, Domerica, Shirogumi, TMS Jinni's) and at least couple of supporting studios from the same anime industry.

Do you think they all get bonuses from Atlus or Sega if the game do well? Hell no, they are nothing but outsource that get their job done for already paid check, nor do Atlus need to care to bring the same people back if they suddenly want to create a sequel.

And that is how the work in game industry actually goes, along with massive closure of studios or reducing staff for underperformance that is way more common that in anime industry (or literally just trying to cover the financial blackholes because of mismanagement), high employee turnover (to the point that some studios barely have even the quarter of same staff working for them after just a few years), massive strikes or game companies going against workers who trying to establish unions to defend their rights.

“The problem is that animation schools are not able to educate specialized people properly. To teach anime, you need to draw a lot of pictures, but due to copyright and other issues, it is impossible to use the material of the broadcast anime. Therefore, when it comes to materials each school prepares, it is difficult to teach all the knowledge and skills necessary in a professional studio setting.” I think this adequately addresses why students are missing out on some of the specific line training required to enable them to slot in comfortably and quickly on a douga production line.

Another contributing factor to the recruitment and training challenge is the decreasing number of new students due to the declining birth rate, which increases the competition between schools to attract the most talented students each year.

If you do make it into an animation training school, the grueling training that is the basis of anime production, otherwise known as "line practice," may not be for everyone. Line practice is “very deliberate and sober work.” Fukumiya admits that “if you force students to practice this traditional and earnest way, the number of students who will quit will increase. As a result, schools will be unable to manage the business, so it is difficult to educate students too strictly. Therefore, even if you have graduated from an anime vocational school, you will need to be educated almost from scratch when you enter a production company.”

Not only that, you also got animation that is being labeled as anime but turns out that animation wasn't done by a Japanese studio like for example, how many of you know about Acura's Chiaki's Journey Type S "anime" shorts from 2022. The animation may looked like an anime on the surface, but if you examine closely with a good eyes on detail and did some research you'll find out the animation studio that did this "anime" for Acura wasn't done by a Japanese studio, but an animation studio in the UK was responsible for this "anime" for Acura. That's how far they'll go to label an animation to be labeled as "anime". It's not only Netflix, but Acura did this too.

So is it possible in the future because of the success of Netflix's Castlevania and American/western animation studio like Powerhouse Studio, Titmouse, and maybe South Korean studio like Studio Mir could do animation on behalf of Japanese franchises/IPs to blur the definition of anime?

I can't ruled out the possibility, the idea of Bandai-Namco Studio (formerly Sunrise Studio) and Bandai-Namco parent company allowing a western animation studio like Powerhouse Studio to do a full Gundam TV series instead of their in-house animation studio would be intriguing and somehow surprising to many anime fans out there (including me) and blurring the line and definition of anime. But I assume in return I hope Sunrise/Bandai-Namco Studio is given a western IP to allow to adapt to animation like let say ExoSquad for example.

Here's another scenario: Square-Enix teamed up with The Line Studio (the same studio responsible for doing the Acura's Chiaki's Journey "anime") to adapt a Dragon Quest animation done by that UK studio and the animation does resemble animation done by any Japanese studio, how would DQ & anime fans react to a UK animation studio doing a anime-esque animation of Dragon Quest done with SE's approval?

I mean we've already seeing Japanese animation being outsourced to other countries like South Korea, China, Taiwan, and SE Asian countries like Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, etc.... I mean it's inevitable because of that, of course it wouldn't take that long for Japanese animation to be outsource to American and Western animation studio if they can make their animation look as good as their Japanese animation counterpart. I mean I'm aware that Studio Ghibli sometime outsource their animation to a well-known South Korean animation studio, DR Movie. DR Movie is the only South Korean studio to worked with Ghibli. How long do you think until a Japanese producers may decide to work with Studio Mir to do a "anime" of a Japanese manga or light novel? I don't ruled out that possibility.

The anime industry has had to compete with game makers, for animators, too, hasn't it? Aren't working conditions and pay in the gaming industry better (simply because the revenues are higher -- there's more money coming into the production companies)?

I will say, it's kind of strange to me to keep reading that supply isn't meeting demand since there is more produced each season than a person can reasonably watch