
Never-Ending Man: Hayao Miyazaki [video] - Osiris30
https://kottke.org/18/10/never-ending-man-hayao-miyazaki
======
jandrese
I love Miyazaki films and their hand drawing is beautiful, but this article is
kind of funny in how he retired in 2013 and went "I wonder if there is any
merit to these weird 'computers' people keep talking about?"

Then he spends the next 5 years twiddling around with them and decides that
yes, apparently the world was right and they are in fact useful for animation.

~~~
aasasd
CGI was used in Spirited Away (afaik), but in very limited quantities. You
pretty much can tell the scenes when you see them.

Miyazaki retired like a dozen times, nobody believes him anymore. The last one
was the last year or 2016, iirc.

~~~
the_af
It was also used in limited form in _Princess Mononoke_.

~~~
aasasd
Huh, and all this time I thought Spirited Away was the first one—which would
also fit with the massive difference in style from the earlier films.

It means, though, that their flirtations with CGI go back full two decades to
right after the first Toy Story.

~~~
Bokanovsky
It's funny you should mention Toy Story. Pixar's John Lasseter is well known
to be a friend of Miyazaki. Studio Ghibli even released a DVD of the home
movie visit to America titled Thank You, Mr. Lasseter.

[http://www.nausicaa.net/miyazaki/lasseter/](http://www.nausicaa.net/miyazaki/lasseter/)

I remember seeing once that Pixar had a life size Cat-bus from Miyazaki's
Totoro installed in their studios.

The original home movie DVD release of Spirited Away was also introduced by
Lasster.

~~~
ZenPsycho
toy story 3 had totoro in it as a toy character.

------
stretchwithme
The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness is also pretty interesting.

[https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Dreams-Madness-English-
Subtit...](https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Dreams-Madness-English-
Subtitled/dp/B00PEJ1T1G)

~~~
mholt
I watched that one. Made me realize how fascinating Hayao Miyazaki really is,
and helped me to understand and appreciate his movies more.

I would say we need more filmmakers like him, but there's something special
about being unique in the ways that he is... that I almost don't want another
Miyazaki.

------
the_af
The clip they show him working on is the short that's shown in the Ghibli
Museum!

I absolutely love almost everything from Miyazaki, but I wonder what's it like
to work with/for him. This short trailer makes it seem he's probably a
difficult man... like all great authors, I guess.

~~~
Baeocystin
I felt genuinely bad for the animation team that worked on AI-generated
walk/movement when they showed their work to Miyazaki. It was downright
brutal.

That doesn't change the fact that he has told amazing stories. He is an
amazing creator, and has made some of my favorite films. But the hurt in those
folks' faces as someone they idolized called what they did 'an insult to life
itself'... It was ugly behavior.

~~~
miles
What they showed Miyazaki was so grotesque and horrifying, that it seemed like
they must either not be familiar with his work and character (almost
inconceivable in Japan) or that they desperately needed a dose of reality.
Given the material and their position relative to Miyazaki, I was surprised at
how politely he spoke in Japanese (which has different verb endings, words,
etc to express politeness/deference).

~~~
ando_alter
> it seemed like they must either not be familiar with his work and character
> (almost inconceivable in Japan) or that they desperately needed a dose of
> reality

Perhaps it was neither of the two? From a recent Dwango event, the team has
shown that they have reflected upon it (if you watch the event, they mentioned
a few times that they have been _scolded_ by Miyazaki and even conducted an
interview with him[0]) and develop a pretty interesting game called
ARTILIFE[1] (tldw; MMO tamagotchi?). Overall it was a good turnaround, I
think.

[0][https://youtu.be/Yx7yI4MG1GQ?t=1086](https://youtu.be/Yx7yI4MG1GQ?t=1086)

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIF2zQam7Ds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIF2zQam7Ds)

~~~
miles
> the team has shown that they have reflected upon it

My point exactly. Miyazaki offered them genuine feedback ("a dose of reality")
and they, to their credit, apparently acted on it. It was hardly, as the OP
posted, "ugly behavior"; if anything, it was "beneficent behavior".

------
vanadium
Watched this on NHK earlier in the year, and it's worth every minute.
Fantastic documentary and really gives you a thorough sense of who he is and
how he operates.

------
aasasd
What do you know, his glasses aren't always connected to his eyebrow ridges,
and in fact can come off completely. I was afraid that they've grown in by
now.

------
digsmahler
Yes! This makes me so happy that Miyazaki would unretire and make more movies!

------
ezoe
All of the current situation is his own fault.

He is a very sadistic overworked animation director who created the good movie
at the cost of stressful low wage workers like they are expendable assets. The
workers under the Hayao's lead quickly burned out so nobody followed his path.

That's why he can't retire but back to work to create more movie. The market
should eliminate these inefficient overworked idiot. But current technology
can't beat the good hand-made animations so the bad situation continues.

~~~
vertline3
Interesting viewpoint, I have heard manga artists being overworked. The
deadlines are crushing. Studio Ghibli for a long time had to rely on outside
animators due to cost, and american studios like Disney fired all of their
hand animators. It is a brutal industry.

