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Telecom Animation Film Co., Ltd.

Logo used since 2013
Headquarters inNakano, Tokyo
Native name	株式会社テレコム・アニメーションフィルム
Romanized name	Kabushiki-gaisha Terekomu Animēshon Firumu
Company type	Subsidiary
Industry	Anime
Founded	May 19, 1975; 50 years ago (1975-05-19)
Headquarters	Nakano, Nakano, Tokyo , Japan
Products	Animated films Animated television programs OVA ONA Video games
Parent	TMS Entertainment
Divisions	Telecom Animation Film CGI Production Department
Website	telecom-anime.com
Footnotes / references [1]

Telecom Animation Film Co., Ltd. (株式会社テレコム・アニメーションフィルム,Kabushiki-gaisha Terekomu Animēshon Firumu) is a Japaneseanimation studio founded on May 19, 1975.^[1] The studio is a subsidiary ofTMS Entertainment and is located in the parent company's headquarters building.^[2][3]

Telecom Animation Film is a well-established studio known for its production cooperation on films produced byTokyo Movie Shinsha, including the Japan-US co-productionLittle Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland,Hayao Miyazaki'sLupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, andIsao Takahata'sJarinko Chie.^[3][4]It is known in the industry as a prestigious studio, and has had many famous creators on its roster in the past, including Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata,Yasuo Ōtsuka, who was their former tutor and animation director on their works,Kazuhide Tomonaga,^[a] who worked on thecar chase scene inThe Castle of Cagliostro,Nizo Yamamoto, art director atStudio Ghibli, andYoshiyuki Sadamoto, character designer forNeon Genesis Evangelion.^[6]

The studio has in-house staff of keyframes, inbetweenings, background art, direction, and production assistants who manage these tasks, allowing the general flow of production to be done in-house.^[2]Unusually for an animation studio, Telecom has an in-house art department.^[2]It is particularly known for its background art, and is highly regarded in the industry for its high level of technical ability. Its appeal lies in its high drawing power and3D layout precision.^[4][6][7]

It has participated in various productions in the form of production cooperation, and have been involved in the creation of background art for blockbuster films such as Hayao Miyazaki'sThe Castle of Cagliostro, Studio Ghibli films,Makoto Shinkai'sWeathering With You, andMamoru Hosoda'sBelle.^[6]While participating in the production of Studio Ghibli'sPrincess Mononoke, the studio was consulted about the lack of time for coloring and suggested digital painting, which led to Ghibli's introduction ofcomputer graphics.^[7]

In 1975, Telecom Animation Film was established by Tokyo Movie Shinsha (TMS) to train animators who could draw full-animation.^[6][8]Yutaka Fujioka, the president of TMS at the time, dreamed of making a big breakthrough in the United States.^[8][9]So Fujioka decided to make a full-animation film that could compete withDisney, but in Japan,limited-animation adopted and developed byOsamu Tezuka was the mainstream. Therefore, he planned to establish a new studio, Telecom Animation Film, and use it as a base to produce a Japan-U.S. co-production of an animated film using full-animation.^[10]

In the summer of 1978, Fujioka acquired the rights to adapt the legendary American cartoonLittle Nemo into a film.^[8][10][11]When Telecom advertised in a newspaper for staff, they received over 1,000 applications, and Fujioka hired 43 people with no animation experience. Rather than selecting animators with experience in limited-animation, Fujioka chose to select entirely inexperienced amateurs and train them into elite animators with full-animation skills.^[10]Sadao Tsukioka, who was said to be a genius, was invited as an instructor for the first year. He used a unique method of training the new recruits, such as eliminating the influence of the TV series, as he considered it unnecessary for making a feature film.^[9][10]In 1979, Yasuo Ōtsuka moved fromShin-Ei Animation and took over Tsukioka's position.^[b][9]Since there were few animators who could actually do the work, Ōtsuka transferred Nobuo Tomizawa from Nippon Animation,Atsuko Tanaka and Keiko Oyamada from Shin-Ei Animation, and Kazuhide Tomonaga, Tsukasa Tannai, and Shojiro Yamauchi fromOh! Production to Telecom.^[9]However, because of difficulties in securing production funds and organizing staff, production of the film never got off the ground, so Telecom decided to first work on another TV series and films under Ōtsuka.^[8]So Ōtsuka invited Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata to join Telecom as directors, and they moved fromZuiyo. Miyazaki directed the secondLupin III film,The Castle of Cagliostro, and Takahata directedJarinko Chie.^[10]Fujioka frequently held screenings of those two films for Hollywood film professionals in order to promote Telecom and the Japanese animation industry, which at the time was regarded in the U.S. as having low production capabilities. The films attracted a lot of attention, especially from young animators, includingJohn Lasseter.^[8]The event also brought about an unexpected response, such as requests from countries outside the U.S. for TMS and Telecom to produce a TV series.^[12]TMS began production of the Italian-Japanese co-produced TV seriesSherlock Hound in 1981, after receiving a request for a TV series fromRAI, the Italian national public broadcaster. The series was actually animated by Telecom Animation Film, and directed by Hayao Miyazaki. However, the collaboration was dissolved after six episodes were produced, and the remaining 20 episodes were subsequently produced with funding from Japanese companies.^[c] Kyosuke Mikuriya took over as director from Miyazaki, and with Telecom leaving to focus on the filmLittle Nemo, TMS outsourced the animation toGallop, a fledgling studio.^[13][14]Telecom then took on the actual production of animation works for American production companies such as Disney,Warner Bros., andFilmation, which had been commissioned by TMS, and became proficient in the art of full animation in the 1980s.^[15]

In the spring of 1981, TMS established a local subsidiary in the U.S. and began full-scale efforts to produce the filmLittle Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland.^[10][12]On the Japanese side, Fujioka was appointedline producer, and on the U.S. side,Gary Kurtz was appointed film producer upon the recommendation ofGeorge Lucas.^[11][12]

Under producer Yutaka Fujioka's grand order to "produce a world-class animation film", creators from Japan and abroad were gathered, and many famous people such as Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata,Osamu Dezaki, Yasuo Ōtsuka,Ray Bradbury,Jean Giraud (Moebius), andChris Columbus were involved.^[12][16][17]However, various misunderstandings occurred between Japan and the US, and the production ran into difficulties. Miyazaki and Takahata, who were originally slated to direct the film, left the project, and the staff continued to change one after another, causing confusion.^[11][18]Kurtz was working as the executive producer of Disney'sReturn to Oz at the time, and spent most of his time inLondon andNew York. He visitedLos Angeles, the site ofLittle Nemo, only about once a month, and only for two hours in the afternoon. His autocratic production policy caused friction with the Japanese staff.^[19]Miyazaki submitted various reports and ideas for scenarios to Kurtz, but he never adopted them.^[d][10][20]The Japanese staff clashed with Kurtz, and Miyazaki left Telecom in November 1982, followed by Takahata in March 1983.^[10][20]

When production onLittle Nemo was halted in the late 1980s, Telecom was invited byKatsuhiro Otomo, who had heard that the studio had a talented crew, to join the production of his filmAkira.^[21]However, in the middle of production, Fujioka requested that they make apilot forLittle Nemo (produced by Osamu Dezaki andAkio Sugino), and Telecom staff were forced to withdraw from theAkira site.^[21]

The film was completed in 1988 and released in Japan in July 1989, but the box office gross ended up around 900 million yen.^[11]In 1992, the film was released in 2,300 theaters in the U.S., but failed at the box office. The video software that was later released sold more than 4 million copies, and the production costs were eventually recouped, but the film failed to attract an audience, and Fujioka's dream of making a hit film in the U.S. was not realized.^[18][20]The film took seven years to complete (it took 10 years for the U.S. release), and the budget eventually ballooned to more than 5 billion yen.^[17][16]It was the biggest project in the history of Japanese animation, but it ended in failure, and Fujioka took responsibility for it, gave up all rights related to Tokyo Movie, and retired from the industry.^[22][11]

In November 1995, theSega Group absorbed Tokyo Movie Shinsha into Kyokuichi, with Kyokuichi being the surviving company.^[23][24]In conjunction with the merger, Kyokuichi made Telecom Animation Film and TMS Photo, which had been subsidiaries of Tokyo Movie Shinsha, its own subsidiaries. Kyokuichi later changed its name to TMS Entertainment.

In the 1990s, afterLittle Nemo, the studio continued to work on international productions through TMS.^[6]The Warner Bros. animated television seriesThe New Batman/Superman Adventures, directed by Kenji Hachizaki, Yuichiro Yano, Toshihiko Masuda, and Hiroyuki Aoyama, won aDaytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Special Class Animated Program in 1998.^[25]

For a long time, Warner Bros. of the U.S. had subcontracted work to Telecom through TMS, but in 2000 Warner Bros. began outsourcing all production toKorea, where production costs are lower. Telecom then changed its policy and began to focus on production for the Japanese market instead of overseas. In addition, while taking on subcontract productions from TMS and other Japanese studios, from 2002Secret of Cerulean Sand, Telecom began to produce its own productions as the prime contractor and to co-produce with other companies.^[6]

In 2009,Hoshi Shinichi Short-Short, produced by Telecom and broadcast onNHK, won the Grand Prix in the Comedy category at the 37thInternational Emmy Awards.^[26]

Telecom has been in debt for two consecutive fiscal years since the fiscal year ending March 2017, and on August 10 of the same year, it reduced its capital from 98 million yen to 10 million yen.

• Telecom Animation Film Official Website
• TMS Entertainment Official Website
• Telecom Animation Film atAnime News Network's encyclopedia
• co-productions database

• TMS Entertainment
• Animation studios in Tokyo
• Japanese animation studios
• Japanese companies established in 1975
• Mass media companies based in Tokyo
• Mass media companies established in 1975
• Telecom Animation Film

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