Animation Asia Conference 2009

The inaugural Animation Asia Conference 2009, which was held at the Suntec City theatre, was an opportunity to hear what some of the most prolific personalities from the animation and related media had to say on the topic of “Globalisation of Asia’s Soft Power”.

Tsuguhiko Kadokawa, Chairman and CEO of Kadokawa gave the keynote speech on how Japanese content was being spread all over the world with globalization. Kadokawa reminded the audience that despite the popularity of Japanese contents worldwide, there were still many challenges for Japan-made content hindering it from finding a larger market abroad, even when they are remade by Hollywood (Astor Boy, One Missed Call, Speed Racer, Dragon Ball, Transformers).

While Japan is creating excellent content, it is still not capable of doing business with the world, which is dominated by Hollywood. Ironically, a wider market has grown by illegal animation (piracy or those made by fans).

While the implementation of intellectual property rights is a breakthrough, there remains a need to find a good balance between creation, protection and application. In some cases, excessive protection can be negative. For this reason, the Kadokawa Group tied up with YouTube, in a sort of comiket (comics market) arrangement, and worked with the fans to produce new content and discover new talent.

“Finding a larger market is an important theme in Japanese content industry. New content creators are always born from among the masses. Monetization comes from Kadokawa badges and insert ads with the fan-made videos/content on Youtube,” he said.

A highly anticipated segment was when Mamoru Hosoda, director of Summer Wars and The Girl who Leap Through Time came onto the stage. He gave some interesting insights on how to create anime blockbusters. Hosoda revealed that he is a big fan of Hayao Miyazaki since elementary school and was subsequently inspired to produce anime.

Adding some buzz to the proceedings, Singapore based Stormlion announced their latest collaboration with I.G. Productions titled Titan Rain.

Edmund Shern CEO of Stormlion and creator of Freedom Formula, explained that any international co-production had to come from the heart and infused with genuine creativity. While artistic merit was a key factor, one could not set aside the importance of commercial success. The rewards were manifold as anime was a rich source for live action movies.

Next up was C K Phoon, deputy chairman of Imagi International Inc. who shared some interesting insights on distributing the recently released adapted animation of Astro Boy in three different countries: China, USA and Japan. Phoon sketched out the vagaries of the markets and shared that while Astroboy was well received in China, the movie performed poorly in USA and Japan. He gave a detailed account of why the movie was a hit or miss in each of these countries.

Shiro Sasaki, CEO of Flying Dog, shared with the audience the role that sound tracks play in adding a new dimension of storytelling into an anime series. Flying Dog manages talents like May’n, Fiction Junction and Maaya Sakamoto. Sasaki explained why they had decided against using well-known singers in the anime series Macross Fronter. By using a relatively unknown singer, fans would have the better experience of believing it was Sheryl Nome singing to them instead of some well-known singer like Madonna.

After the break, Danny Choo, CEO of Mirai Inc. did a presentation on Mirai platform and explained the role of consumer generated media in allowing users to express, connect. Choo urged the audience to embrace social media, citing the importance of asking the audience what they want and allowing them to post content. A useful way is to reward the end users with prizes.

Kotaro Sugiyama, senior vice president, head of solution (strategy) / creative department, Dentsu Inc then shared some of the marketing campaigns that were conducted by Dentsu. He revealed that Dentsu was responsible for conceptualising the Life Size Gundam and Honda x Ultraman Stepwagon CM.

The last speaker of the day was Vince Shortino, president of Crunchyroll Japan branch. He explained the challenges Crunchyroll faced when trying to obtain licences from the various publishers to stream anime online. He explained that by being able to deliver subtitled anime to fans in a timely fashion, it would reduce illegal distribution.

The ensuing panel session took up a discussion on how to engage the anime fans while protecting the intellectual property rights of the production companies.