(UPDATED: Segment Located) First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

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(UPDATED: Segment Located) First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

I originally thought to do this as an aside later, but it is something kind of unusual, at least for me anyway, so I'll give it a bit of special attention.

Though I don't know much about it. I was hoping someone here could tell me more about it.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Marmalade Boy
Episode 38 - "Anju's feelings/I want to be next in line to Miki" - Unknown Sequence
Timing Sheet. - Cut. 193 (7+0) - Runtime Location (approx. 00:16:22:28)
Dialogue Matched To: SUZUKI Arimi (CV: HISAKAWA Aya)



Front, with curious doodle
mb38_timesheet_sm.jpg
mb38_timesheet_sm.jpg (511.12 KiB) Viewed 2393 times
This timing sheet was included amongst the items I acquired from AnimeJewell.

These were used to tell the photographer which cels to photogaph and when, from my understanding. That's about all I know about it. I'm guessing cut 193 is somewhere about the last 8 minutes of the episode, but I don't really know. Somebody even drew a toadstool in one of the blank spaces. Is that a joke? Might it be a clue to which cut is referenced? I don't know, but the documentation is cool all the same.

The white piece of paper in front is a douga from a different episode. That's one reason why I know so little the timing sheet. In fact, the douga is stuck to it. i'm sure the douga and timing sheet got combined in this way prior to reaching AnimeJewell-she strikes me as someone who is careful not to mix things up.

Anyway, here are more photos for analysis. Any light that can be shed on what is going on here, what this piece of paper really says about production of the episode would be greatly appreciated.

Close up of Front. NOTE the upper frame uses the A-6 format, while the lower omits the dash.
mb_timesheet_cl_sm.jpg
mb_timesheet_cl_sm.jpg (502.56 KiB) Viewed 2484 times
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Inside of Timing sheet- the most verbose part of the document.
mb_timesheet_cl_sm.jpg
mb_timesheet_cl_sm.jpg (502.56 KiB) Viewed 2484 times
Attachments
mb_timesheet_in_sm.jpg
mb_timesheet_in_sm.jpg (514 KiB) Viewed 2484 times
Last edited by Pixel on Sat Feb 24, 2018 3:26 pm, edited 5 times in total.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by jiangdc »

wow,old style time sheet! :cheers
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

jiangdc wrote:wow,old style time sheet! :cheers
Indeed, everything about Marmalade Boy is old-school as far as I can tell.

Such bits of documentation are neat. I just wish I knew more about what different parts of the sheet mean.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by jiangdc »

Pixel wrote:
jiangdc wrote:wow,old style time sheet! :cheers
Indeed, everything about Marmalade Boy is old-school as far as I can tell.

Such bits of documentation are neat. I just wish I knew more about what different parts of the sheet mean.
I can explain a little bit to you. It is the cut 193 with a length of 7 seconds.
A B C D means different layers. Each layer can be different parts such as one layer of mouth only, one layer for eyes only, one layer for face only, etc. 枚 means the number of drawn paper. So you suppose to have 8+8+6 gengas and 8+8+6 dougas in this cut.
Which also means that the whole cut contains 22 cels. You have the mark (stamp) of the director and Assistant director. You should be able to look up who they are by looking at wiki.
They way they fill up the sheet is how long each layer shows up in the real anime. Which is a super complicated thing. Each cell is one frame and 24 frames last for 1 second. As you can see from the left of the sheet, there is a "1". For example, you see A line have an A8, B8 and a slash all the way to the bottom, this means that the A8 and B8 cel will last for more than 1second. Meanwhile, Cel c4, c5, c6 will alternatively switch.
台词 means the script that the character says. There is far more information than I can explain. :cheers Good luck.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

jiangdc wrote: 台词 means the script that the character says. There is far more information than I can explain. :cheers Good luck.
You've give me a lot to go on, thanks so much.

I noticed the dialogue/script section has kana written in pencil. I was wondering if you could read it? I'm really having trouble with the hiragana with a loop in it. I'm guessing it's と (Japanese "to"), but it looks like script and hard to tell.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by jiangdc »

Pixel wrote:
jiangdc wrote: 台词 means the script that the character says. There is far more information than I can explain. :cheers Good luck.
You've give me a lot to go on, thanks so much.

I noticed the dialogue/script section has kana written in pencil. I was wondering if you could read it? I'm really having trouble with the hiragana with a loop in it. I'm guessing it's と (Japanese "to"), but it looks like script and hard to tell.
I have no idea. You can find this episode and get the Japanese subtitled version. Then it should be clear.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by sensei »

jiangdc wrote: Fri Jan 26, 2018 11:32 pm Each cell is one frame and 24 frames last for 1 second. As you can see from the left of the sheet, there is a "1". For example, you see A line have an A8, B8 and a slash all the way to the bottom, this means that the A8 and B8 cel will last for more than 1second. Meanwhile, Cel c4, c5, c6 will alternatively switch.
One clarification: timing sheets do divide up each second into 24 segments, but it is extremely rare to see a cut that is actually animated at 24 frames/cels per second. (One spectacular exception: Sakura's capture of The Fly Card at the climax of Ep. 1 of CCS, for which I obtained a copy of the timing sheet: that was animated at 24/second and required 200 unique cel layers and 213 individual 5-layer combinations of cels to create.)

Your cut was animated "on threes" as Japanese animators would say. That is, each frame fills 3 x 1/24 sec or one eighth of a second. And so you can see the number change on every third line on the timing sheet. That was normal: if the frame was changed any slower than that, the eye/brain would see it as a distracting flicker. For some action scenes the timing is sped up to "twos" (every twelfth of a second), but only in the most insane animation situations (like in CCS) do you see animation on "ones."

It looks to me that this cut involved a mix of action and standing still. The front sheet shows that there were eight cels each for the A and B levels, but on the part of the sheet you show (the ending, it seems) A and B are staying unchanged on the screen, and the C level is changing. That would indicate a mouth layer, and one of the characters is standing still and just talking. And the dialog (as you've seen) is what's being given in the middle column in Japanese hiragana (one syllable each) characters.

Also worth noting: the left hand ABCD column is filled in by the key animator and uses the genga numbers (i.e., keyframes only). The right hand ABCD column gives the douga numbers and represents the actual timing of the frames used to make the cut.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

Oh wow, a couple those images got corrupted and lost some quality somehow when the board went down. That first one badly.

I remember you mentioned animation typically on the 3's during the discussion of the Arimi/Ginta E68 cel.

Speaking more generally, there are times you can see just a little bit of jerkiness that seems to be a telltale sign of this method.

I've tried to read the dialogue in hiragana. To me, it looks like "koto iu to" (I think that means "to say that...") The curlycue though is throwing me. Japanese "to" is the closest I can come.

I note you say the character is standing still, but talking. Is that literally standing up while talking, or could they be seated?

Could you please tell me, sensei, about where I should be looking in the episode for this Cut #193? Maybe to within about 2 minutes? I'd like to try to find it if I could.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by sensei »

When I said "stands still" I meant "does not move." There's no way to tell from the timing sheet whether the character is standing, sitting or flying. (Just not moving his/her body: Astroboy does the third trick a lot: A1 END cel plus rapidly moving background = "hero flying dramatically toward scene of disaster to save the day!" Osamu Tezuka invented all these animation time-saving hacks, including animating "on threes").

Generally there are about 300 cuts per 25-minute episode, so that would put Cut 193 about 2/3 of the way through, 16 minutes guestimate. Look for a longish cut: your timing sheet says seven seconds, which is unusual for anime where most cuts run 2-3 seconds each.
Last edited by sensei on Fri Feb 09, 2018 5:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by jiangdc »

sensei wrote: Fri Feb 09, 2018 11:52 am
jiangdc wrote: Fri Jan 26, 2018 11:32 pm Each cell is one frame and 24 frames last for 1 second. As you can see from the left of the sheet, there is a "1". For example, you see A line have an A8, B8 and a slash all the way to the bottom, this means that the A8 and B8 cel will last for more than 1second. Meanwhile, Cel c4, c5, c6 will alternatively switch.
One clarification: timing sheets do divide up each second into 24 segments, but it is extremely rare to see a cut that is actually animated at 24 frames/cels per second. (One spectacular exception: Sakura's capture of The Fly Card at the climax of Ep. 1 of CCS, for which I obtained a copy of the timing sheet: that was animated at 24/second and required 200 unique cel layers and 213 individual 5-layer combinations of cels to create.)

Your cut was animated "on threes" as Japanese animators would say. That is, each frame fills 3 x 1/24 sec or one eighth of a second. And so you can see the number change on every third line on the timing sheet. That was normal: if the frame was changed any slower than that, the eye/brain would see it as a distracting flicker. For some action scenes the timing is sped up to "twos" (every twelfth of a second), but only in the most insane animation situations (like in CCS) do you see animation on "ones."

It looks to me that this cut involved a mix of action and standing still. The front sheet shows that there were eight cels each for the A and B levels, but on the part of the sheet you show (the ending, it seems) A and B are staying unchanged on the screen, and the C level is changing. That would indicate a mouth layer, and one of the characters is standing still and just talking. And the dialog (as you've seen) is what's being given in the middle column in Japanese hiragana (one syllable each) characters.

Also worth noting: the left hand ABCD column is filled in by the key animator and uses the genga numbers (i.e., keyframes only). The right hand ABCD column gives the douga numbers and represents the actual timing of the frames used to make the cut.
Thanks for the clarification! I used the word "cell" to describe each small square in the sheet, I am not sure whether that is the proper usage of word, but anyway, each cel should be one number marked on the sheet and it usually last for 2 or 3 frames. BTW the CCS cut was nice, I love great special effect drawing. :cheers
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by sensei »

jiangdc wrote: Fri Feb 09, 2018 3:46 pm Thanks for the clarification! I used the word "cell" to describe each small square in the sheet, I am not sure whether that is the proper usage of word, but anyway, each cel should be one number marked on the sheet and it usually last for 2 or 3 frames. BTW the CCS cut was nice, I love great special effect drawing. :cheers
Oh that CCS cut was insanely animated. I give up auction browsing for Lent and generally stick to it, but something one chilly day whispered to me that the celga-no-kami wouldn't mind if I made just one peek. And THAT set of gengas was up for auction! I had 20 cels from various moments in that cut before (the singleton "melting Flys" went for nearly nothing back in the day). But having all the animation background was a real insight into Madhouse practice. I notice that this page in my gallery has recently shot up into the "Top 50," I'd guess thanks to people who enjoy learning about how anime was actually created.

I just avoided "cell" to keep from seeming to say that one second of animation required literally 24 painted "cels" (= celluloids). Tezuka-sama figured out how to do whole episodes of Astroboy with as few cels as possible. One rumor holds that he actually created a 25-minute episode with just 1000 cels. That's an average of one-and-a-half cel per second! Jonathan Clements, whose Anime: A History does a good job of explaining Tezuka's time-saving approach, thinks the rumor is credible, though most likely it meant 1000 new cels produced only for this episode. Like all studios, he commonly used banks of cels to cover situations, especially battle scenes, which were recycled verbatim from episode to episode. Anyhow, 1500 cels was normal for a whole episode, which makes Madhouse's ordering 200 separate cels for just one cut a Looney Tunes artistic decision.

But yeah, there are 24 frames (the term I prefer, though it may not be what an animator would use) on the timing sheet to represent one second of footage. But the actual animated images may stay on the screen for one, two, or three frames, meaning 1/24 second, 1/12 second, or 1/8 second of screen time.
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

This may be slightly off topic, but how many cels make up one second in a feature-length animated Japanese movie?
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Re: First [NOT] Cel of the New Year - Special

Post by Pixel »

Okay, I think I actually managed to find the set of frames that this timing sheet is referencing.

I also restored a photo of the outside of the timing sheet that seemed to become corrupted during the recent board outage.

The dialogue on the timesheet is indeed- "...koto iu to" (to tell [something])

That's not enough context, so going backward in runtime a tiny bit yields the phrase "hontou no koto iu to." (I think this means, "-to tell you the truth.")

One last step backward to the complete sentence - "Ureshikatta no, hontou no koto iu to." (I was actually happy about it, to tell you the truth.")

(Complete sentence in the English sense. Japanese only requires a verb for a grammatically complete sentence. Anything not explicitly stated is to be taken from context. At least, that's how I understand it.)

I had to listen several times.

Was I surprised when I found out which cut and character this timing sheet referenced. I wasn't really expecting it to be her from a random ~1 second timing sheet.

The context - Ginta meets Arimi at her school, to offer an apology for his boorish behaviour "the other day". He is delivering his reply to her "Jet Memo" message in person. (NOTE: A "Jet Memo" is a rocket-shaped plastic and electronic toy which the user can use to pass brief on-screen messages back and forth with others, by simply typing a message on it and exchanging the toy itself. Incidentally this is also a real-life toy, officially licensed from the series by Bandai. Talk about clever marketing.)

She agrees that yes he should be apologizing-he really embarrassed her. He explains his behaviour, in the process offering profuse apology. The dialogue on the timing sheet is the last piece of Arimi's initial response. She was happy that Ginta stood up for her. (I'm going on memory here a little bit. The flashback shown was actually from a prior episode, which I haven't watched in a long time.)

Below are video files containing what I think is the segment the timing sheet was used to photograph. I've arranged them in order of runtime from shortest clip to longest. I have subtitled the relevant complete sentence in green.

The actual clip is very short. It is hard to here the Japanese clearly, at least for me. On the other hand, the dialogue comes at a point when HISAKAWA-san has very softly and gently raised the pitch of Arimi's voice to indicate that yes, Arimi is happy about it. While her normal voice isn't bad at all, this higher register vocal state does lend a special pleasantness to Arimi's tone.

Marmalade Boy Episode 38 - Videos of Referenced Segment

Timing Sheet Referenced Segment (~0:01)
Full Cut #193 (~0:07)
Full Context (2:37)

Below is a single frame, though I don't know if just the one frame can provide a good match for the timing sheet. This is the start of Arimi saying "ko".

mb38_tsref_1frame.png
mb38_tsref_1frame.png (278.96 KiB) Viewed 2392 times

As the scene continues, Ginta's apology becomes much more.

Is the final animation here consistent with the timing sheet? If I have indeed properly located the portion of the episode the timing sheet references, it could be handy information at some point.
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