All The Announcements from Anime NYC 2024

HAIKYU!! The Dumpster Battle Anime Film Had 1,200 Animation Cuts

ANN's coverage of Anime NYC 2024 sponsored by Yen Press and Ize Press!

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The panel began with a celebration of the 10th anniversary of the anime and played a trailer for the film, HAIKYU!! The Dumpster Battle. To talk about the film, they brought in the anime's producer, Keiko Matsushita, TOHO producer Shochiro Taguchi, and Riki Azuma, the current editor of the manga. Following their introduction, the panel became a long behind-the-scenes discussion about various aspects of the film's production.

Keiko Matsushita spoke about the work of the anime staff, who could not attend the panel. She explained how the manga scattered much of the relationship between the characters Hinata and Kenma throughout various parts. Still, director Susumu Mitsunaka wanted to focus on Kenma's perspective for the film and got approval from Shueisha to center it around him. To better portray his point of view, they used various methods such as focusing the sound direction to realistically depict the distance between him and the other players and having Kenma voice actor Yūki Kaji perform a particularly long scene in a single take to highlight Kenma's emotions and exhaustion throughout the match. Matsushita also mentioned how the staff requested to avoid displaying the scoreboard during the match to capture Hinata and Kenma's desire for it not to end. While they weren't sure how well fans would receive such a change, the feedback that they saw was generally positive. They especially hoped that fans would appreciate many of the details put into the film, such as Hinata's facial expressions towards the end of the match as they wanted to capture his sense of excitement. The team worked until the last minute to depict it how they wanted.

From there, the guests answered some pre-selected fan questions regarding Haikyu!!'s production. They mentioned that Mitsunaka typically watches all kinds of volleyball games as research for the anime and pays careful attention when depicting the various personalities of the characters and how they play off one another. They also noted that the film had over 700 staff members and about 1200 cuts of animation compared to the 300 cuts of a typical TV episode. The lead animator, Hideki Takahashi, provided around 300 animation cuts himself. As the panel came to a close, the staff gave a final message to fans, saying that they are continuing to work hard on the series and to stay tuned for more Haikyu!! content in the future.