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PAST     PRESENT     FUTURE

AnimEigo calls it's self "The niche within the niche".  It is a very accurate and positive view of a company, whose name is synonymous with "Classic Anime".

During Katsucon 9, Senior Editor Matthew Anderson and Staff Reviewer Kathy Elgin sat down for an interview with Scott Carson, Production Manager and "face" of AnimEigo.

PAST:

DVJ: What do you do for AnimEigo?

Scott Carson: I’m classified as the production manager.  Essentially I oversee all aspects of production.  That includes in-house subtitling work, disc verification, and so on and so forth.  Basically I do all the pre pro(duction) work.  I also oversee all the arrangements we make with outside sources for the authoring with the companies who actually make the disc.  I also oversee the replication (with) the companies that run the product.  Everything is coordinated through me.  Basically, I juggle every day.

DVJ: How did you come to work for AnimEigo? 

SC: I started working in local television.  I was the commercial production manager at a TV station.  I coordinated all the in-house work as far as making on air television spots.  When I burned out in TV, I was still looking for another avenue in the video production realm.  At that time, AnimEigo was getting ready to expand its production department and (they) really needed someone to step in and make all the arrangements with outside sources.  Someone who understood production more than anyone else.

DVJ: How long have you been with AnimEigo?

SC: Going on three years. I started in November of 2000, so in November of this year it will be three full years.

DVJ: What was the reason to go to DVD from VHS?

SC: Well, initially, the concern was DVD going to stick?  When they brought me onboard that was one of things I had to investigate: finding out what the long-term effects of the DVD were.  When we realized that Hollywood was going to back the digital disc, we had to jump on board too.  As far as the financial aspects, DVD saves both the company and the consumer money because they don’t have to buy a subtitled tape and a dubbed tape.  They can buy one disc that contains both versions of that product.  It saves us money that we can then pass on.  It’s one of the reasons why DVD has the same cost as the VHS tapes in the old days, with a whole lot more value added to the disc.

DVJ: What are the differences in making a DVD as opposed to a VHS?

SC: For VHS, the biggest difficulty was the syncing, making sure your subtitle information or your dub track actually locked in with the video.  That was really the biggest hurtle, but you could tell within 3 or 4 minutes if that was actually happening.  If you were out of sync, you could simply reset and start again, and then make a master tape that all the VHS was replicated from.

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PRESENT:

DVJ: What was the key factor in choosing Macross?

SC: Is kind of two fold.  AnimEigo likes to compare it’s self as kind of a cornerstone in classic anime and Macross fits in that genre.  It’s exactly what the company is based on.  That was a huge draw for us.  Second of all, it’s a corner stone for a lot of the anime that came out afterwards. It's just a good show.  Plain and simple. It’s a show the fans wanted, the fans asked for.  I was told by Robert Woodhead that his first thought of getting it came from a fan asking him at a panel “I heard that Macross was available, are you thinking of getting it?”

Of course, Robert gave the standard answer of “No Comment”, and then made a couple of phone calls and found out it was available, and we were able to lock in really quick.

DVJ: How come it took so long for “You’re Under Arrest” to come out on DVD and for the TV series to be released?

SC: As far as You’re Under Arrest, the original OVA’s were licensed ages ago, and then the television series after that.  You’ve got your licensing adjustment, and then you have to make the contract.  Then, once you get it, you have to get the material from the licenser, you have to generate the scripts, generate the subtitles, but the longest portion of it is the English dub track.  (AnimEigo) has to hire all the actors, get them up, get every scene recorded, mixed down, it’s just a slow, slow process.  We can’t even start the disc authoring until subtitle work is done; all the dub tracks are dubbed and mixed.  All the pre pro work was done essentially last year, and the authoring is going quite smoothly.

DVJ: How long does it take for a series to be brought to the shelves?

SC: In general, it depends on your licenser.  Every licenser we have is very easy to deal with, but most of the titles we seem to attract are older titles, and even our licensers have to find images, old master tapes, film, all that kind of stuff.  A lot of times it’s just the interplay of things takes so long.  It’s really hard to say from the minute the deal is signed to the minute it hits the shelves.  It could take 6 months, it could take six years.  Macross was a project that took us probably two and a half years, and that was mostly due to the restoration process.  We were given a 15mm print, and from there we basically generated new masters. Each frame was painstakingly cleaned up.  We removed film splices, color enhancements were done, and grain was reduced.  It was a very extensive product.  At that time, the computer system used to do that kind of work had to be programmed especially to work with anime because the way cells are shifted to make movement are handled much differently by computers.  Their algorithms are set for natural movement, and anime doesn’t work in that way.  So we had programmers in Singapore writing code especially for us to make Macross happen.

DVJ: With Macross, did you do high-def transfers?

SC: No.  At that time there were too many variables on what the aspect ratios were, quality levels were for HD.  So each company, Sony, Panasonic, each were pitching different information.  So we couldn’t go that direction, not to mention the film we had to work with was 16mm, so they were set up more for the 4:3 aspect ratio.

DVJ: Are you producing any more VHS?

SC: No.

DVJ: What is your favorite part of the job?

SC: I have two days.  Day one is when we sign off our project, and it goes into replication.  Basically, our work is done except for receiving the product and we know it’s coming out.  It’s a very, very relaxed day. 

The second(thing) I enjoy about working for the company is that we are doing a heavy convention cycle, so I actually get out to a majority of the shows, especially this year.  I get to interact with fans before actually buying a product.  Find out what kind of stuff exactly they are looking for; find out what they like, or what they don’t like on the disc.  It’s just good feedback all the way around.

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FUTURE:

DVJ: What future projects do you have in the works?

SC: Right now, one of the biggest projects we are working on is our Samurai Cinema catalogue, the live action stuff.  We are getting ready to send Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo into replication.  It looks great.  We followed the same sort of format we did with Macross.  They were old films and they needed a lot of work. Those we did work with HD format right off the top.  We did all the film transfers, color corrections, noise reductions, all in a high definition realm, and then we did down conversion for your 4:3 (aspect ratio) and stuff like that, but it will be presented in a wide screen anamorphic.  Mostly because the cost associated with an HD format are just astronomical and we would have to price the disc too high.  

DVJ: There are a lot of episodes.  How many do you have?

SC: We have licenses for a total 7 of the films.  Up till now the only two we have ever released were Zatoichi meets Yojimbo and Zatoichi the outlaw.  We have already made arrangements to pull in the others.

DVJ: Why decide to release live action films instead of just anime?

SC: Well, the company has carried the “Samurai Cinema” selection for a number of years.  It got to the point where fans that were buying it, like anime fans, started asking “Why is this not out on DVD?”  They’ve got their favorites, and we have to treat that clientele the same way we have to treat our anime clients.  If that is what they are looking for, that gets moved into the production line.  Things like Lone Wolf and Cub, it’s a fantastic film series. 

DVJ: Are their any plans to acquire any new “classic” anime?

SC: There are always plans (evil laugh)

DVJ: Are their any other titles that you have announced that we should pay attention to?

SC: The big thing is the Samurai (Cinema).  We are really excited about doing that.  It seems that every year we can take on one really super nice project.  Two years ago it was Macross, then it was You’re Under Arrest, and now we are doing the live action stuff.  For us, every year we get to tackle a project and really lay the AnimEigo thumbprint on it.

DVJ: What are the release dates of “You’re Under Arrest” and how many box sets?

SC: There is going to be a total of four box sets.  Box set two is already in replication and we are expecting to take delivery by the end of March, so it will be available early April.  Box set three will probably be a month and half to two months after that, followed by box set four.  The box set 1,2,and 3 will each contain 12 episodes (3 discs of shows and one and then one bonus disc) The fourth box will contain 4 episode discs, no bonus material.

DVJ: It seems that AnimEigo still has very strong roots in it’s fan-based past.  Is that why AnimEigo has done so well, because it has not forgotten it’s fan based roots?

SC: Well, we can’t.   We are technically “The Niche within the Niche”.  There are a lot of anime companies that are much larger than us; they are turning out a lot more discs than us.  The more series that are out, great for everybody, but our audience is a little tight knit.  So we have to make sure that we keep a good clientele base going.  We have to make sure we keep the web site as updated as we can, and we send out mass emails and letters and stuff.  The goal is to keep a good fan base

For example, at the conventions, we are doing give always, shaking hands, passing out flyers, basically trying to make a presence, so that people feel more comfortable using us.

DVJ: What is your favorite AnimEigo title?

SC: My personal favorite is Riding Bean.  I was sitting in the office one day when I first started working in the company, (and) I just started screening all their shows.  In the midst of the marathon, I came across Bean, and I just dug it.  What it is, without an apology, it’s full on, start to finish, nothing but a race, chase scenes, violence.  It’s basically, just plain gratuitous.

DVJ: Where do you see AnimEigo in 5 years?

SC: The biggest thing we are going to be developing on is expansion into the retail market.  The biggest thing that we’ve got that comes back to us is that even in today’s technology, there are people who still feel uncomfortable buying on the web, or buying over the phone or mail order. They want to buy it in store.  Maybe they feel uncomfortable; maybe they want to handle it to get a kind of feel for it, so we are making a big push to become more venders friendly.  So you will see more of our products in the stores, sooner than you might think.

DVJ: Where do you think anime is going to be in 5 years?

SC: I think the biggest thing you are going to see is more “blockbuster” style anime.  We are going to see more films in the theater for people to enjoy.

DVJ: Thank you for taking your time to talk with us.

SC: No problem.  My pleasure.  

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