Anime (
Japanese:
アニメ,
[anime] (
listen);
English 
i//) are
Japanese animated productions usually featuring hand-drawn or computer animation. The word is the abbreviated pronunciation of "animation" in Japanese, where this term references all animation; the term may ultimately derive from the French
dessin animé, referring to an animated picture. In other languages, the term is defined as animation from Japan or as a Japanese-disseminated animation
style. Arguably, the stylization approach to the meaning may open up the possibility of anime produced in countries other than Japan. For simplicity, many Westerners strictly view anime as an animation product from Japan.
The earliest commercial Japanese animation dates to 1917, and production of anime works in Japan has since continued to increase steadily. The characteristic anime art style emerged in the 1960s with the works of
Osamu Tezuka and spread internationally in the late twentieth century, developing a large domestic and international audience. Anime is distributed theatrically, by television broadcasts, directly to home media, and over the internet and is classified into numerous genres targeting diverse broad and niche audiences.
Anime is a diverse art form with distinctive production methods and techniques that have been adapted over time in response to emergent technologies. The production of anime focuses less on the animation of movement and more on the realism of settings as well as the use of camera effects, including panning, zooming and angle shots. Diverse art styles are used and character proportions and features can be quite varied, including characteristically large emotive or realistically sized eyes.
The anime industry consists of over 430 production studios including major names like
Studio Ghibli,
Gainax and
Toei Animation. Despite having a fraction of the domestic film market, anime achieves a majority of DVD sales and has been an international success after the rise of televised English
dubs. This rise in international popularly has resulted in non-Japanese productions using the anime art style, but these works have been defined as
anime-influenced animation by both fans and the industry.
Definition and Usage
Anime is an art form, specifically animation, that includes all
genres found in cinema, but it can be mistakenly classified as a genre.In Japan, the term
anime refers to all forms of animation from around the world. English-language dictionaries define
anime as "a Japanese style of motion-picture animation" or as "a style of animation developed in Japan".
The etymology of the word
anime is disputed. The English term "animation" is written in Japanese
katakana as アニメーション (
animēshon, pronounced
[animeːɕoɴ]), and is アニメ (anime) in its shortened form. Some sources claim that
anime derives from the French term for animation,
dessin animé, but others believe this to be a myth derived from the French popularity of the medium in the late 1970s and 1980s. In English,
anime, when used as a common
noun, normally functions as a
mass noun (for example: "Do you watch anime?", "How much anime have you collected?"). Prior to the widespread use of
anime, the term
Japanimation was prevalent throughout the 1970s and 1980s. In the mid-1980s, the term
anime began to supplant Japanimation. In general, the term now only appears in period works where it is used to distinguish and identify Japanese animation.
In 1987 Hayao Miyazaki stated that he despised the truncated word "Anime" because to him it represented the desolation of the Japanese animation industry. A desolation he equated with animators lacking motivation and mass-produced, overly expressive products which rely on fixed iconography for facial expressions and protracted and exaggerated action scenes but lack depth and sophistication because they do not attempt to convey emotion or thought.
Format
The first format of anime was theatrical viewing which originally began with commercial productions in 1917. Originally the animated flips were crude and required played musical components before adding sound and vocal components to the production. On July 14, 1958,
Nippon Television aired
Mole's Adventure, both the first televised and first color anime to debut. It wasn't until the 1960s when the first televised series were broadcast and it has remained a popular medium since. Works released in a direct to video format are called "
original video animation" (OVA) or "original animation video" (OAV); and are typically not released theatrically or televised prior to home media release. The emergence of the internet has led some animators to distribute works online in a format called "
original net anime" (ONA).
The home distribution of anime releases were popularized in the 1980s with the
VHS and
Laser Disc formats. The VHS
NTSC video format used in both Japan and the United States is credited as aiding the rising popularity of anime in the 1990s. The Laser Disc and VHS formats were transcended by the
DVD format which offered the unique advantages; including multiple subtitling and dubbing tracks on the same disc. The DVD format also has its drawbacks in the its usage of
region coding; adopted by the industry to solve licensing, piracy and export problems and restricted region indicated on the DVD player. The
Video CD (VCD) format was popular in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but became only a minor format in the United States that was closely associated with
bootleg copies.
History
Anime arose in the early 20th century, when Japanese
filmmakers experimented with the
animation techniques also pioneered in France, Germany, the United States and Russia. A claim for the earliest Japanese animation is
Katsudō Shashin, an undated and private work by an unknown creator. In 1917, the first professional and publicly displayed works began to appear. Animators such as
Ōten Shimokawa and
Seitarou Kitayama produced numerous works, with the oldest surviving film being Kouchi's
Namakura Gatana, a two-minute clip of a samurai trying to test a new sword on his target only to suffer defeat. The
1923 Great Kantō earthquake resulted in widespread destruction to Japan's infrastructure and the destruction of Shimokawa's warehouse, destroying most of these early works.
The success of
The Walt Disney Company's 1937 feature film
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs profoundly influenced many Japanese animators. In the 1960s, manga artist and animator
Osamu Tezuka adapted and simplified many Disney animation techniques to reduce costs and to limit the number of frames in productions. He intended this as a temporary measure to allow him to produce material on a tight schedule with inexperienced animation staff.
Three Tales, aired in 1960, was the first anime shown on television. The first anime television series was
Otogi Manga Calendar, aired from 1961 to 1964.
The 1970s saw a surge of growth in the popularity of
manga, Japanese
comic books and
graphic novels, many of which were later animated. The work of Osamu Tezuka drew particular attention: he has been called a "legend" and the "god of manga". His work – and that of other pioneers in the field – inspired characteristics and genres that remain fundamental elements of anime today. The giant
robot genre (known as "
mecha" outside Japan), for instance, took shape under Tezuka, developed into the
Super Robot genre under
Go Nagai and others, and was revolutionized at the end of the decade by
Yoshiyuki Tomino who developed the
Real Robot genre. Robot anime like the
Gundam and
The Super Dimension Fortress Macross series became instant classics in the 1980s, and the robot genre of anime is still one of the most common in Japan and worldwide today. In the 1980s, anime became more accepted in the
mainstream in Japan (although less than
manga), and experienced a boom in production. Following a few successful adaptations of anime in overseas markets in the 1980s, anime gained increased acceptance in those markets in the 1990s and even more at the turn of the 21st century. In 2002,
Spirited Away, a
Studio Ghibli production directed by
Hayao Miyazakiwon the
Golden Bear at the
Berlin International Film Festival and in 2003 at the
75th Academy Awards it won the
Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.
Genres
Anime are often classified by target demographic, including
kodomo (children's),
shōjo (girls'),
shounen (boys') and a diverse range of genres targeting an adult audience. Shoujo and shounen anime sometimes contain elements popular with children of both sexes in an attempt to gain crossover appeal. Adult anime may feature a slower pace or greater plot complexity that younger audiences typically find unappealing, as well as adult themes and situations.
:44–48 A subset of adult anime works feature pornographic elements and are labeled "R18" in Japan, but internationally these works are grouped together under the term
hentai (Japanese for "pervert"). By contrast, a variety of anime sub-genres across demographic groups incorporate
ecchi, sexual themes or undertones without depictions of
sexual intercourse, as typified in the comedic or
harem genres; due to its popularity among adolescent and adult anime enthusiasts, incorporation of ecchi elements in anime is considered a form of
fan service.
Anime's genre classification is different from other types of animation and does not lend itself to simple identity.
Gilles Poitras compared the labeling
Gundam 0080 and its complex depiction of war as a "giant robot" anime akin to simply labeling
War and Peace a "war novel".
Science fiction is a major anime genre and includes important historical works like Tezuka's
Astro Boy and
Yokoyama's
Tetsujin 28-go. A major sub-genre of science fiction is
mecha, with the
Gundam metaseries being iconic. The diverse
fantasy genre includes works based on Asian and Western traditions and folklore; examples include the Japanese feudal fairytale
InuYasha, and the depiction of Scandinavian goddesses who move to Japan to maintain a computer called
Yggdrasil in
Oh My Goddess. Genre crossing in anime is also prevalent, such as the blend of fantasy and comedy in
Dragon Half, and the incorporation of slapstick humor in the crime anime
Castle of Cagliostro. Other subgenres found in anime include
magical girl, harem, sports, martial arts, literary adaptations and war.
Genres have emerged that explore homosexual romances. While originally pornographic in terminology,
yaoi (male homosexuality) and
yuri (female homosexuality) are broad terms used internationally to describe any focus on the themes or development of romantic homosexual relationships. Prior to 2000, homosexual characters were typically used for comedic effect, but some works portrayed these characters seriously or sympathetically.
Attributes
Anime is a diverse art form that is targeted and produced for the domestic Japanese audience and market. Anime differs greatly from other forms of animation by its diverse art styles, methods of animation, its production and its process. Visually, anime is a diverse art form that contains a wide variety of styles that share few similarities to one another.
Animation technique
Anime follows the typical production of
animation, including
storyboarding,
voice acting,
character design, and
cel production. Since the 1990s, animators have increasingly used
computer animation to improve the efficiency of the production process. Artists like
Noburō Ōfuji pioneered the earliest anime works, which were experimental and consisted of images drawn on blackboards,
stop motion animation of paper cutouts, and
silhouette animation. Cel animation grew in popularity until it came to dominate the medium. In the 21st century, the use of other animation techniques is mostly limited to independent
short films, including the stop motion puppet animation work produced by
Tadahito Mochinaga,
Kihachirō Kawamoto and Tomoyasu Murata. Computers were integrated into the animation process in the 1990s, with works such as
Ghost in the Shell and
Princess Mononoke mixing cel animation with computer-generated images.
Fuji Film, a major cel production company, announced it would stop cel production, producing an industry panic to procure cel imports and hastening the switch to digital processes.
Prior to the digital era, anime was produced with
traditional animation methods using a pose to pose approach. The majority of mainstream anime uses fewer expressive
key frames and more
in-between animation.
Japanese animation studios were pioneers of many
limited animation techniques, and have given anime a distinct set of conventions. Unlike
Disney animation, where the emphasis is on the movement, anime emphasizes the art quality and let limited animation techniques make up for the lack of time spent on movement. Such techniques are often used not only to meet deadlines but also as artistic devices. Anime scenes place emphasis on achieving three-dimensional views, and backgrounds are instrumental in creating the atmosphere of the work. The backgrounds are not always invented and are occasionally based on real locations, as exemplified in
Howl's Moving Castle and
The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Oppliger stated that anime is one of the rare mediums where putting together an all-star cast usually comes out looking "tremendously impressive."
The cinematic effects of anime differentiates itself from the stage plays found in American animation. Anime is cinematically shot as if by camera, including panning, zooming, distance and angle shots to more complex dynamic shots that would be difficult to produce in reality. In anime, the animation is produced before the voice acting, contrary to American animation which does the voice acting first; this can cause
lip sync errors in the Japanese version.
Characters
Body proportions of human anime characters tend to accurately reflect the proportions of the human body in reality. The height of the head is considered by the artist as the base unit of proportion. Head heights can vary, but most anime characters are about seven to eight heads tall. Anime artists occasionally make deliberate modifications to body proportions to produce
super deformed characters that feature a disproportionately small body compared to the head; many super deformed characters are two to four heads tall. Some anime works like
Crayon Shin-chan completely disregard these proportions, such that they resemble Western cartoons.
A common anime character design convention is exaggerated eye size. The animation of characters with large eyes in anime can be traced back to Osamu Tezuka, who was deeply influenced by such early animation characters as Betty Boop, who was drawn with disproportionately large eyes. Tezuka is a central figure in anime and manga history, whose iconic art style and character designs allowed for the entire range of human emotions to be depicted solely through the eyes. The artist adds variable color shading to the eyes and particularly to the cornea to give them greater depth. Generally, a mixture of a light shade, the tone color, and a dark shade is used. Cultural anthropologistMatt Thorn argues that Japanese animators and audiences do not perceive such stylized eyes as inherently more or less foreign. However, not all anime have large eyes. For example, the works of Hayao Miyazaki are known for having realistically proportioned eyes, as well as realistic hair colors on their characters.
Hair in anime is often unnaturally lively and colorful or uniquely styled. The movement of hair in anime is exaggerated and "hair action" is used to emphasize the action and emotions of characters for added visual effect. Poitras traces hairstyle color to cover illustrations on manga, where eye-catching artwork and colorful tones are attractive for children's manga. Despite being produced for a domestic market, anime features characters whose race or nationality is not always defined, and this is often a deliberate decision, such as in the
Pokémon animated series.
Anime and manga artists often draw from a common canon of iconic facial expression illustrations to denote particular moods and thoughts. These techniques are often different in form than their counterparts in Western animation, and they include a fixed
iconography that is used as shorthand for certain emotions and moods. These expression are often exaggerated and are typically comedic in nature. For example, a male character may develop a
nosebleed when aroused, stemming from a Japanese
old wives' tale. A variety of visual symbols are employed, including sweatdrops to depict nervousness, visible blushing for embarrassment, or glowing eyes for an intense glare.
Music
The opening and credits sequences of most anime television episodes are accompanied by
J-pop or
J-rock songs, often by reputed bands. They may be written with the series in mind, but are also aimed at the general music market, and therefore often allude only vaguely or not at all to the themes or plot of the series. Pop and rock songs are also sometimes used as incidental music ("insert songs") in an episode, often to highlight particularly important scenes.