Evaluation.

My animation

Official My Hero Academia / Boku No Hero Academia summary - My Hero Academia WikiHow -
last updated May 4th .21

My Hero Academia (僕ぼくのヒーローアカデミア Boku no Hīrō Akademia?) is a manga

series serialized by Shonen Jump and written by Kohei Horikoshi. The series has been
adapted into an anime series and three movies, as well as spawning the prequel series
Vigilantes and spinoffs: School Briefs and Team-Up Missions.
The story is set in the modern-day, except people with special powers called "Quirks" have
become commonplace throughout the world. In a world of chaos and confusion, Pro Heroes
have now risen as the new profession to fight off powerful super villains.

A young boy named Izuku Midoriya is Quirkless, meaning he has no powers, but he still
dreams of becoming a great hero one day.

I had to create an animation for the London Short Film Festival [2022]. The categories for
this festival were unlimited. After hearing this, I had changed my ‘coming of age’ like tale into
an animation, based off a storyline plot from a popular Japanese show. The short was to be
no longer than 45 minutes, and had no minimum play time. The requirements stated that
only completed shorts will be screened/accepted.
I had chosen to create this animation in the style of a music video. I had made sure with the
requirements of the festival that it was okay to create, and it fit their terms. The short would
be around 3 minutes 30 seconds, the length of the song.
My animation's purpose was to tackle the hidden story of the characters from BNHA, more
specifically the untold story of the abuse in the Todoroki family. From his first introduction,
the audience could see that “Dabi” would be an
important character. Theories upon theories flooded
of his importance, which was not canonically
recognised until recently. In April of 2020, his identity
was teased, only being revealed to one specific
character, but was censored to the reader of the
manga. [RIGHT OF SCREEN]. In November of the
same year, Horikoshi, the creator confirmed with the
chapter
290
“Dabi’s Dance” that he is in fact the eldest son of,
at the time, the Number One hero, Endeavour.
After 233 chapters, his true identity as the
suspected deceased Touya Todoroki, is finally
confirmed. This was a massive reveal, it even
overtook the 2020 election on the trending page
of Twitter. Another reason my animation was
created was to show the un-redeemable damage that can happen to a family, whether it be
just an individual or the entire household.
My animation fit the length of what I had planned, hitting the 3 minute 33 second mark. I had
a small plan to create a scene before and after the initial song, but stepped away as I didn't
want to confuse the side of the audience that aren't fans of the show.

From the audience of the show, Boku No Hero Academia, I had researched their target
audience and applied it to my own research for my target audience. The show's rating is 12
and up, rated this mainly for the violence presented in the show. I sent a survey out to
people I personally know that are fans of said show, and to those who had not watched it to
collect some insight on how people view the show as a whole. After collecting the age range
of the audience, it had shown that those who were interested in the topic and idea of my
animation, had fallen into a 13-17 age range. Both fans of the show and fans of general
animation were a part of this field.

The style of animation in Boku No Hero Academia is very bold and bright, leaning into its 12
age range to draw in audiences with its presentation. This style helps us as a watcher take in
the media in a happy and more optimistic light than what the actual plot is. The manga from
present time, is following a more serious and in depth plot line now. The show has always
focused on the injustices of the hero society, and the life of ‘villains’. With the rampant
determination of the group “League of Villains” the heroes are forced into morally grey
situations, this teaches everyone that not everything we can do is right, sending the
message that sometimes a wrong can make a right. We follow the story of Izuku Midoriya, a
child without a quirk* in a superhuman society. The overall chances of being born with
powers is 80%, and our character fell into the remaining 20%, without a quirk.

Quirk - A superhuman ability in the world of BNHA, each power comes with a specific
drawback, making it more realistic. An example would be Hydrokinesis, the control and
manipulation of water. The user would be able to control water at will, summoning water
 from a part of their body, the drawback here would be that they use the moisture in the air
to control it, so if they are in a desert of some kind, their powers would be limited.

The show is created by Studio BONES, creators of popular anime like Ouran HighSchool
Host club, Soul Eater and Fullmetal Alchemist. The styles of these shows are drastically
different, but the team is able to adapt to the manga creators style very easily. The designs
of the characters were easy to adapt to, each character I used in my film had a different and
distinct style and/or features to include so my audience was able to tell them apart. One of
the characters, Dabi/Touya, has two designs. His present look and him as a child. I chose to
connect these in a way that the audience who have not seen the show, understood the
connection between these designs and that they are the same person. This was evident in
the scene with the photo frame of younger Touya, the photo used for his memorial in the
Todoroki home. I had chosen to crack the frame, revealing Dabi. This became a metaphor
for someone's mask or lie being cracked and the truth being revealed, the truth being the
identity of the arsonist villain.

Animation Process

BONES’ animation process is one of many steps. Firstly, the chapter chosen for the week's
episode, usually two or two and a half chapters. The main frames and scenes are scanned
digitally, and then handed to the animators of that scene. They start with all keyframes, and
then deliver the drawn scenes to “in-between'' artists.
These artists then take the already drawn scenes and
create all the small frames that go in between to create
the fluent part. An example of this could be taken from
any episode where talking and lip movement is shown.
It takes around 20-25 animators, and a full 24
animated episode could take around a month or two to
fully create. This is why animators will start animating
before the season or show has been announced, this
gives them time to create trailers, start of episodes and general planning. Episodes from
BNHA come out every weekend, around 10:30am. The team preps the episodes for
scheduled airing so there's a new episode weekly.

In terms of how I animated my piece, I had a similar

method. After storyboarding, I had selected the main
frames in my short, and chose what to animate first,
most to least important frames. An example of this
would be when I was animating the scene of Rei
shouting at Endeavour/Enji as the line “Be careful, Be
cautious” played. I drew out the scene naturally,
[image, right] and then later edited each frame to fit and
sync with the song,
both mouth and lyric
movement to create a fluid clip in my animation. [TIME CODE - 0:36] This scene took me
around 5 hours [including breaks] to create and has a total of 38 frames, of which
35 were used in the final product. One thing I had learned from this was that if i were to
create a mouth movement related scene again, it would be better to fully reference mouth
charts, as i did, and to get a real clip of the emotion in a face as they speak, instead of using
a basic chart. Another thing to improve on is the timing of the lyrics in a scene, by creating
doubles of frames with slight differences to fill up areas where notes are held in songs really
helps as it gives the watcher something to focus on or for them to not just be looking at a
solid frame for a few seconds. In my original plan I had thought of having my lyrics move, a
small bounce to add a little life to scenes that were mainly still, or just repeated sequences. I
learned that I would have needed more time, and more patience to do this as in the
beginning, it would have doubled, or even tripled my frame rate, and that would have made
things difficult for not only the editing process, but for the actual creation of each frame. This
would have caused more stress and possibly disturbance in my plan, and drive for the
project, something that was not needed. Fortunately, the idea of the lyrics appearing as the
song played helped even more, creating a less cramped frame, and it made it easier for the
audience to follow the song.

I asked my audience what their favourite feature was of my animation. I wanted to see if my
audience were focused on the story from the visuals, the visuals themselves or the music
choice. As well as this, I also asked for their least favourite feature, to understand what really
turns my audience off in my animation. This was to collect information on if my animation
was a success in a technical aspect, for viewing.

The responses I received for my first question, What feature of my animation was your
favourite?, had some range. Many of the responses praised my drawing ability and the
overall look of the visuals. This made me confident in my work as I was happy that my
research and practice into perfecting the design of Horikoshi's characters. Each member of
the todoroki family has a unique style but they still link and with the idea of their quirks, it
really helps the audience understand that this is a family. In terms of what I kept to
differentiate each character, I focused on any body scars, as scars are a main theme in the
household, hair colour and eye colour. The reason I chose hair and eye colour specifically
was to drive home the idea of the similarities between endeavour and his children, not only
to show that they were related but to enforce the idea that they are like him, they will always
have a part of him in themselves, whether it is good or bad. One thing that I realised in the
design process was the idea that Touya, originally born with red hair and blue eyes, was the
physical copy of Endeavour/Enji, also born with red hair and blue eyes. Shoto was born with
white & red hair, as well as grey and blue eyes. This created the notion that Dabi was
destined for a fate similar to Endeavours, as they resemble each other so much, becoming
parallels of what the Hero society can do to a person. One person being swallowed
completely into the idea of heroism, and the other completely repented and resented it, but
in the end,their fate was them hurting those around them and becoming drunk with power.
Shoto was different. He is aware of his likeness to his father, and embraces the side of his
mother to balance it out. Rei was not innocent in the abuse of the family, neither of the
parents were. Shoto uses this to remind himself that he would not turn into his father, he is
still his mothers child. To this day, the youngest of the Todorokis fights to become his own
person, not known for being Endeavours prodigy, or an abuse victim. This whole idea was
what pushed me into keeping the significance of hair, eye colour and scars.

I asked my audience if they understood the

narrative. From what I could assume, the
majority of the audience that understood the
narrative, were fans of the show. I was
happy that
many
understood the
context and
meaning of the
piece, but felt like I could work on my overall story telling skills
as some said that they didn't understand. 35% of the audience
that took my survey did not understand the storyline of my
animation. I feel like the constant “time” change of the
characters could have been what confused them. Instead of
having the story reflect constantly on the past from present
time, next time i should aim to play it in chronological order, or
make it very clear and obvious that it was a flashback, like
changing the colour of the background, the colour of said
characters, or use a filter to show that its a flashback, like a
white flash border.

The question I asked next was, What was your least favourite feature of my animation?'' I
was weary of answers for this one as many find it hard to critique work. I was happy with my
responses though as it opened up my thinking to other suitable ideas, as well as what I could
do to improve it, or for next time I create something like this.

I received a mix of improvements, nothing too drastic but more so pointers or things to be
aware of next time I create
something.
A lot of my answers were in
agreement about the blank
spaces in my animation. This
was one of my weak spots during animating and I never fully planned something to fill in
these gaps. I overestimated the time frame, thinking it was only a few seconds, but was in
fact longer and the blank screen made it slightly awkward to sit through. This was a risk on
my end as this could send viewers away, leading to an unsuccessful delivery of my message
and story.
The critiques I received helped me understand that most people are reliable on visuals, and
when it comes to an abrupt stop and doesn't continue the flow, it could lose people.

I was praised on my work overall, but asked what people

thought was the best part of my animation? I gave
examples like [music? Storytelling? Etc] and i received a
plethora of answers. The first answer I got was about
editing. They praised my editing, which in turn I am happy
about as I was very confident in my
editing. I had a small plan for it and was
able to edit before the final piece was due
so I could practice a little bit of it.
The second response plays into the first
response. I had originally planned for all lyrics to play on screen at the same time, but that
made things crowded. So I went back to each scene and created this fade effect
as each frame played. During the editing process I edited each frame so the lyrics played in
time with the song, so the watchers were able to see what the lyrics were saying and how
they relate to the scene. I opted to highlight/bloden the words that I had changed in the song
so the audience would not get confused at the two different words, on screen and playing.
An example is when i changed the pronoun “her” to “his” to fit the character on screen and
the context of the scene and story, the other example being the change from “fairy” to “hero”,
again to fit the context that the story was about, the hero society.

In terms of my piece, I wanted to see which codes and conventions I had used and followed,
and ones that I had missed in my overall production. After looking at all the terms and
applying them to my work I felt as if most were actually present in my work. I followed
straight ahead action in two places of my animation, the sigh from Rei at the beginning, and
the expression of Touya during the line “make me a fairy/hero whatever it takes”
With anticipation, I feel like I mildly followed this as the anticipation was through the short,
wanting to know what happens with Dabi and Touya next.
My staging of characters could have been improved as I barely had characters in the same
scenes. With better storytelling skills I felt like I could have added scenes where the
characters interact to show that they have a connection. In animation, I followed arc, which is
how many artists follow jaw and mouth movements. I did this twice, once in the beginning
with Rei sighing, and the other when she sings the line “Be careful, Be cautious,”. I was
praised on my drawing skills, and felt confident that my drawings were solid and easy to tell
what was happening in each scene. In terms of music videos, I managed to follow codes and
conventions.
I had a story narrative for my style of music video. My music video for this song was telling a
story with its lyrics. My “camera” shots could have been more diverse, but I had a range of
different shots for my audience. Better perspectives could have been used but I am overall
happy with what I had made.
Codes and conventions I could have incorporated or improved more in my piece were very
crucial, but my piece could still work without them . I had originally planned to include fire
crackling and fire sound effects, but found it to be inconvenient for my process of production,
although I would like to incorporate sound effects in any future projects and they emphasise
the scene or action a lot. Another could be lighting. In the process of drawing, I could have
added highlights from the fire of Dabi/Touya to emphasise the importance of it.

In comparison to work I had researched, I felt like I had accomplished a standard piece of
work. I was heavily influenced by the “Dabi BNHA”
animation. I created a parallel and unplanned reference
to the animation in one of my shots. As the line ‘But they
love you,’ plays in Burned Out, Hawks is facing the
opposite direction to us, and looking up and away,
towards what most would assume to be Endeavour, as
he is Hawks’ idol. This references when Hawks in the
animation I studied is facing away from us, his wings
spreading, and preparing to fly.
The message I took from this scene was that, facing
away from us shows that he is not ready, he still has a
goal and a mission. I attempted to mimic this scene to create that
idea as well, but after choosing its placement in my song, I wanted
to emphasise the persona Endeavour created. Hawks is a loyal fan
of Endeavours and sees him as his idol, as in the past, their paths
crossed. This made my piece more structured with my narrative
that Endeavour is not who the world thinks he is.

Another brief comparaison to work I looked at was SAD-ist, and her

way of mouth movements in her character's speech. I wanted to
mimic the fluency of her scenes, and followed both her mouth
movements for vowels, and a mouth chart diagram for each letter of
the alphabet, with each movement mimicking emotion. [EXAMPLE
OF CHART USED, RIGHT]

These charts helped me with not only mouth animation, but resting
mouths and smiles for certain scenes. One thing I wish I did was to
add more mouth movement scenes. I felt like with more movement,
there would be more life and interest in my piece. I'm unaware of the
technique SAD-ist follows but the specific way she animates her
movements was something I aimed to pick up on. When comparing a
scene of hers to my scene “Be careful, Be cautious”, you can see that
her movements are fully connected to the face, eyes, nose and jaw
all move together to create a life-like action, whereas I only moved
the mouth. This is something I need to learn and improve if I
continue in this field. Jaw movements are how we are able to talk
and communicate. A way I can practice these movements is
taking a real clip of someone speaking a small phrase, and
marking out where their jaw, mouth and eyes move to create that
realistic effect.
In terms of research done, I used many different sources and information to try and create
the perfect representation and presentation of each character. As my topic covered a dark
subject, I looked at how realistic survivors of abuse deal with the aftermath of either the
extermination of the relationship or the recovery of it. I wanted to see how different it was
compared to the glorified and over exaggeratedly unrealities of Hollywood, and their
presentation of abuse victims and abusers. The overall information learned from that, was
that Hollywood glamorises abuse and sometimes praises abusers and demonises victims. In
my short, I aimed for a more realistic approach. As a victim myself, I wanted to tell those who
don't understand or have never experienced abuse that problems dont change once the
abuser is out of the equation. Bonds between friends, siblings and even parents change
drastically. I wanted to show that a family can get emotionally worse after that abuser has
left. The abuser is the unwanted pillars of the family, the power holder, and usually the
leader of the household, a parental figure and once you take or try to change the negative,
the foundations break and the rest fall.

The animation itself had over 300 frames, which were all saved as PNGs. Earlier in the term,
we had created stop motions, and were taught that we should edit with JPEGs instead. So
after a total of 2 hours, I had converted each of my PNGs into JPEGs and began editing. I
did not start chronologically as some scenes were unfinished or needed tweaking as lyrics
where misspelled and others were off center and awkward.
I had edited the entire piece over 3 days, but took breaks in between. Overall, I would say
that the whole editing process took around one and a half full school days [8-9 hours]. I
started with a small practice piece of Rei [the mother] sighing. Originally, it was meant to be
a simple practice of my animation skills, and to test the waters, but in the end I was
extremely happy with the results. I then referenced the first frame, changing a few things,
and then produced this small animation. I was planning on using this piece in the final
product, but chose to redo the edit and stretch the piece to fit the time frame I had planned.

Overall this production was extremely eventful for me. I learned new skills and improved
past skills of mine. This project has opened my eyes to new fields and aspirations for the
future, if I chose to follow this field of filmmaking. This project was very challenging for me,
as I had never created something like this before, and as a result of that I found myself
under extreme stress for it. I found that the stress of this project paid off and I am happy that
I chose this idea for my FMP. During this, I did have a few breaks in production as the tools i
was using had broken. I used an iPad to animate the frames, and during the 3 and a half
weeks, I had a total of 17 nosebleeds. I put in a lot of hardwork and I am happy to say that I
am proud of my wor. Minor things like codes and conventions applied to my work could be
improved, as well as more indepth target audience research to truly understand my audience
could have been made but I am glad that I was still able to produce this piece.