For the audio commentary of episode 1 of Violet Evergarden TV series, we had Ishidate Taichi (director), Fujita Haruka (series direction), and Takase Akiko (chief animation director and character designer).
They started with Ishidate asking Fujita to explain the role of series direction, since it was not common. Fujita said that series direction meant she was involved from the start of the anime's conception, and a key part of her role was to look at details to make the series better.
Ishidate then cut in to mention that film scoring was done for the start of this episode. (I guess that explains why "A Doll's Beginning" was used only once in the TV series. See this post for the list of songs used in the TV series.) He went on to explain that film scoring is different from the usual process, where the music composer would just compose a set of songs without looking at the visuals. Meanwhile, for the beginning of episode 1, Evan Call composed the music while looking at the episode itself.
This was Takase's first time working as the animation director and character designer. She was worried at first if she could do the job, but saw it as interesting now. She supervised (as in actually touched up the key frames) the entire episode 1, about two-thirds of the next few episodes, and about half of the remaining episodes.
They then talked about the visual design for Violet. Takase wanted to make Violet look emotionless but a bit worried that Gilbert is not around. Violet had an innocent look in episodes 1, 2, and 3, and Ishidate also asked Ishikawa Yui (Violet's voice actor) to voice act in this way. He also did not really provide a lot of direction to Ishikawa during recording, although sound director Tsuruoka went into the booth once in a while to talk to Ishikawa. Ishidate said that Violet was not emotionless, but just did not understand emotions. Violet has emotions but she was just not able to express them properly.
They then talked about the visual design for Violet. Takase wanted to make Violet look emotionless but a bit worried that Gilbert is not around. Violet had an innocent look in episodes 1, 2, and 3, and Ishidate also asked Ishikawa Yui (Violet's voice actor) to voice act in this way. He also did not really provide a lot of direction to Ishikawa during recording, although sound director Tsuruoka went into the booth once in a while to talk to Ishikawa. Ishidate said that Violet was not emotionless, but just did not understand emotions. Violet has emotions but she was just not able to express them properly.
Ishidate also mentioned that he did not really focus on Violet's mechanical hands during the storyboard but it ended up that way.
They then talked about typewriters. During the production of the commercial for the light novels, Kyoani bought an actual typewriter from an antique shop just to see how a typewriter works. While they were playing around with it, a large magnet fell out but it could still type. This typewriter was loaned out to the sound recording staff for the recording of typewriter sound effects. It also became the model for the typewriter used by Violet in the anime. Ota Minoru was the staff in charge of typewriter design, and he even created blueprints upon which 3D models were created. As the antique typewriter they bought wasn't really in full working condition, they also referred to a properly working typewriter to understand how typewriters actually work.
Ishidate then mentioned that because Violet was a bit fantastical as a character, he tried to make everything else more realistic. They also changed the size of her eyes for a more realistic look (making the eyes smaller than during the commercial).
Finally, Ishidate mentioned each of them drew Violet's body ratio differently, and that Fujita tends to draw Violet taller. But Takase would make sure to standardise the results for what would be Violet's body ratio in the anime.
My overall thoughts on Violet Evergarden The Movie
Events:
Translations of short stories:
The Tailor and the Auto-Memories Doll (unofficial translation of 仕立て屋と自動手記人形) Gilbert Bougainvillea and the Fleeting Dream (unofficial translation of "ギルベルト・ブーゲンビリアと儚い夢")
Violet Evergarden short stories: "Logbook entry" and "Diary entry" (unofficial translation)
The Starry Night and the Lonely Two (unofficial translation of 星降りの夜とさみしいふたり)
Diethard Bougainvillea's If (unofficial translation of ディートフリート・ブーゲンビリアIf) Tellsis (Nunkish) translation:
Last line of Violet's final letter to GilbertInsights on the movie:
Audio commentary notes:
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