Update 21 Dec, 2020: Official report from Kyoto Animation on this event has been released.
The official report is not a full transcript. For example, it does not report the part about Evan Call getting his then-girlfriend (now-wife) to help him read the novel. Director Ishidate also mentioned during the event that he forgot to mention the issue of 3D modeling of Leiden during the previous event, when the 3D staff was present.
In the official report, as an afternote, Suzuki confirmed that the written words in Violet's word were first translated from the original Japanese to English, then from English to another language (not specified, but we know it is Tamil), and finally, some of the more common letters are swapped.
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After watching
Violet Evergarden the Movie six times, the other day, Kyoto Animation announced that there will be a event on December 3, 2020 where the production staff will talk about behind-the-scenes of the entire series.
This is a good reason to catch the movie a seventh time.
As luck would have it, December 3, 2020 is also the day when the movie opens back home in Singapore, so in a way, I was watching the same movie as fans back home.
The
last time I watched the movie was at a Dolby Cinema, and my oh my, it made me realize the difference when I watched the movie again at a normal cinema. The colors aren't as vibrant, the images aren't as sharp, and the sound not as defined. However, I was still weeping throughout the movie. Some things don't change.
The screening was followed by the production staff coming on stage to talk about behind-the-scenes episodes about the entire series.
Director Ishidate Taichi, composer Evan Call, world concept Suzuki Takaaki, producer Hatta Shinichiro, and music producer Saito Shigeru were the ones at the event today. Music producer Saito played the role of MC to drive the event, asking questions to the other four as well as reading out prepared comments from screenplay writer Yoshida Reiko and author Akatsuki Kana.
It started with director Ishidate talking about how impressed with the original work. He and producer Hatta were both on the judging panel for the Kyoto Animation Award, and director Ishidate gave the work top score and a double endorsement, as if trying to tell the rest that he wants to be the one directing if the work is made into an anime. Producer Hatta said he recalled it was like an unanimous decision that Violet Evergarden would get the Grand Prize. He also mentioned that director Ishidate had to rewrite the anime proposal a few times because they sounded more like reviews of the work rather than a proper proposal. They also mentioned that the series was planned for an international audience from the start. They felt the setting and story would appeal to people outside Japan too, so they started by allowing people to freely propose songs for the commercial. This eventually resulted in the song Violet Snow, and the commercial that ended with "The anime project is in the works" in eight languages.
Director Ishidate revealed that it was screenplay writer Yoshida Reiko who came up with the idea to sequence the anime series in a way that introduces Violet and how she became an Auto Memories Doll. The light novel starts with Violet already an established Doll, but Yoshida felt there is a need to properly introduce viewers to this idea. Director Ishidate was originally against the idea because he loved the original work, but I guess we should be glad that Yoshida got her way.
Next up was world concept Suzuki Takaaki's involvement. Yoshida roped him in to help with the world concept, and he was actually quite surprised to be working with Kyoto Animation. You can see the pains he went to... they showed a few of the concepts he drew up, including a map of the continent with the climates of each region, the locations of key cities, and even their average temperatures and when the rainy season starts... wow. He also had to design a map of Leiden, and the map eventually ended with almost every street having its own name. Director Ishidate even got the 3D modeling staff to turn the map into a full 3D model. Which was used only ONCE in the anime (during Episode 1). He said he is sorry for making the 3D staff do all that work but only using the model once... but that 3D model helped them visualize the stories they are trying to write and portray, so it was a useful production tool. Suzuki also mentioned that EVERY book, letter, newspaper, etc. in the anime can be decoded. Including the books that were used by Gilbert to teach Violet to read. And I guess that means the books on the sea that Violet used in writing the poem for the sea festival shown in the movie.
Then the topic went to music, and music producer Saito talked about how they made the song Violet Snow. Composer Evan Call was roped in a bit later, just before they did the second commercial for the light novels. Evan said he wanted to impress the staff by bringing a music piece with him on the first meeting, so he had to read the novel. Which was difficult because it was a book, not in digital form (which can be voiced using text-to-speech software), so he struggled with the kanji characters. He got his then-girlfriend (now wife) to help him read the novel, which he managed to finish halfway before he needed to work on the music for the meeting. The first piece he created was the theme which eventually became used for the commercial as well as the anime series as the main theme. Evan also mentioned that the music for the anime was recorded in a studio in
Tokyo, which was adequate for a TV series, but lack the depth for a theater screening. So the music for the movie was recorded in Germany, which has huge studios that allow recording of music with the right amount of depth.
The staff also talked about visiting locations for ideas. Suzuki felt that a European setting was perfect for the story, but Ishidate and Yoshida felt there should be some Oriental element to it. Plus a European setting won't really work for Leiden, which is in the south and European buildings would be ovens in that climate. So he designed Leiden with a more colonial look--European-style buildings with larger windows for the hotter climate. They visited Hokkaido which has quite some buildings in such a style. They also talked about visiting Germany for inspiration. During their visit to Germany, the script for the Gaiden movie had already been written and they used that trip to get inspiration for that too, such as the setting for the dance scene. The impression I got was that the entire series--TV anime, Gaiden movie, and the finale movie--was all planned out even before the TV series aired.
It was also mentioned that in the first commercial, the typewriter was drawn and animated by hand. The entire thing (which was like a second or two of time) took the artist (the best at KyoAni) an entire month. That was when director Ishidate decided that the typewriter should be done in 3D instead.
Saito also read out a comment from Yoshida thanking fans for their support, and an excerpt of a letter from author Akatsuki Kana. The full letter was released on Twitter and the movie's official site. My translation of the letter can be found
here.
The event ended with an announcement that there will be a live concert in Omiya on February 6, 2021.
I am glad I made my way to this event. I had attended the
first cast greeting event as well as the
second one, but both were live broadcasts (viewed at the local theater) of the actual events in Kyoto. I didn't manage to go for the third event, which was also in Kyoto but not broadcast live. This time, the event (fourth one) was slightly nearer (in Shinjuku, Tokyo) so it was within reasonable travel distance. Yes, it was more than an hour away by train, and yes, I got back after midnight, but I am really glad I went.
Now to wait for the Blu-ray release... and probably get a 4K TV too. 😅
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