487472

2013
ANM8210.1177/1746847713487472Animation: An Interdisciplinary JournalKohara and Niimi

Article
Animation:

The Shot Length Styles of An Interdisciplinary Journal

8(2) 163­–184
© The Author(s) 2013
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A Quantitative Analysis
DOI: 10.1177/1746847713487472
anm.sagepub.com

Itsutoshi Kohara
Independent animation researcher, Japan

Ryosuke Niimi
Independent animation researcher, Japan

Abstract
How does a director express his or her film style in animated films produced by a group? To
address this issue, the authors analyzed the shot length of 22 Japanese animated films directed
by Miyazaki Hayao, Oshii Mamoru, and Hosoda Mamoru. Their analysis reveals the statistical
measurements of shot length were clearly dependent on directors. Miyazaki’s films show that he
avoids both longish and brief shots, Oshii’s shot length is relatively long on average, while Hosoda
prefers relatively short shot length. Furthermore, both Oshii’s and Hosoda’s first films deviated
from their subsequent films in terms of statistical indices, suggesting that they established their
style of shot length during their first or second time directing. The authors determine that all
three directors controlled shot length primarily through their own storyboarding as a crucial
process of determining the value, since the shot lengths correlated well with the designated shot
lengths on the storyboards. In conclusion, the authors identified the distinctive shot length styles
of the directors.

Keywords
anime, average shot length (ASL), cinemetrics, film style, Hosoda Mamoru, Japanese animation,
Miyazaki Hayao, Oshii Mamoru, storyboard

Introduction
Animation and individual style
Although a single animator may create short films and recently even features, most feature-length
films for theatrical release usually require numerous artists to create the work. Nevertheless, the

Corresponding author:
Ryosuke Niimi, c/o Department of Psychology, Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, The University of
Tokyo7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan.
Email: niimi@L.u-tokyo.ac.jp
164 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

distinctive style of an individual artist is still dominant in some cases. Kano (2006: 6) argues that
many people in Japan consider the films of Studio Ghibli as ‘Miyazaki anime’ as if they were cre-
ated by Miyazaki Hayao alone.1 Kano stresses the importance of understanding the films as prod-
ucts involving hundreds of crew members, although ‘the individuality of Miyazaki is pulsing in
every shot of every film’ he has directed. Auteurism and auteur theory claim that a distinctive artist
can control an entire film or that there is an individual authorship of a film. Furniss (2007: 21–22)
states that the concept of auteur as a powerful artistic controller may be more arguable for animated
films because ‘there has existed a relatively strong undercurrent that has worked against the control
of individuals and toward more automated, mechanised and (therefore) less expensive production’.
Her argument probably refers to animated shorts. Nevertheless, it is true that animated features are
often identifiable by the names of the artists – in particular, the director. In our view it is also criti-
cal to understand how individual style can be expressed (or cannot be expressed) in animated films
produced by a larger crew.

Film style and the quantitative approach

‘Film style’ refers to the manner in which filmmakers organise materials, such as actors and sounds,
in the mise-en-scène of a film as a unitary creative work. For instance, the art historian Panofsky
(1995[1947]) argues that a filmmaker arranges the ‘unstylized’ physical reality into the film that
has style. Therefore, the central issue in the style analysis of a film is the usage of film techniques,
such as lighting, camera movement, and editing. In the context of empirical analysis such as we
undertake in this article, film style is defined as ‘the repeated and salient uses of film techniques
characteristic of a single film or a group of films’ (Bordwell and Thompson, 2001: 434). For
example, filmmakers, including directors or editors, provide form to any given film by their choices
regarding film techniques. The forms of some films may be grouped by the artist’s characteristics.
In reference to Miyazaki’s The Castle of Cagliostro (1979), Kano (2006: 18) argues that the direc-
tor established his characteristic style, including ‘the stage setting utilizing differences in altitude;
the physical actions appealing directly to sense, such as running, flying, falling, swimming, and
eating; and the dynamic camera works chasing those actions’. In this case, film style is determined
as a cohesiveness of the shared characteristics within the group of films and supported by dissimi-
larity from other groups. Style may also correspond to an individual artist, to a studio, or to a cer-
tain period and region in the history (Bordwell, 1997).
How can film style be studied? As Bordwell and Thompson (2001: 329) propose, one of the
critical steps for film style analysis is to ‘identify the salient techniques used’. A given form of film
can be summarized according to a set of variables, such as shot size, camera movement, shot
length, dialogue, and music. If we find frequent and conspicuous characteristics in the observed
numerical values of those variables, they may reflect a film style. Quantitative analyses, in a dif-
ferent way from qualitative ones, can provide a clue to film style, and the former is undertaken in
this article.
Shot length among other variables has been examined quantitatively by some researchers. One
of the critical findings is the dependence of ASL on release year (e.g. Salt, 1992: 214, 2006: 320)
and Bordwell (2002: 16–17) reported a general tendency in a decreasing ASL of American films
as a function of release year during the latter half of the 20th century. More importantly, shot
length characteristics may reflect individual film style; some directors often employ a long ASL,
while others often employ a short ASL (Bordwell, 1985: 61; Salt, 2006: 322). It is also known that
film genres relate to ASL (Rasheed et al., 2005; Vasconcelos and Lippman, 2000). Besides ASL,
other measurements of shot length are useful for film analysis. Using several measurements of
Kohara and Niimi 165

shot length, including ASL, James Cutting and his colleagues (Cutting, DeLong et al., 2010;
Cutting, Brunick et al., 2011; Cutting, Brunick, Delong et al., 2011) recently conducted more
sophisticated statistical analyses of Hollywood films. Of course the shot length data alone do not
reveal all aspects of film style, but they can provide initial objective evidence, which is useful for
film style analysis. At least, knowing quantitative characteristics of shot length can help us to
understand shot length style, namely, the manner in which the shot length is chosen by a film-
maker or filmmakers.

Determining shot length individualities

In this study, we examine whether individuality is present in the shot length of Japanese animated
films directed by Miyazaki Hayao, Oshii Mamoru, and Hosoda Mamoru. In the case of animation,
it is likely that artists’ control strongly influences shot length because animated films are created in
a frame-by-frame manner, and the transition between scenes and shots is usually predetermined, as
there is very little wastage of shot material artwork that is different from live-action materials that
may be edited out in live-action film. In addition, in comparison with their American counterparts,
Japanese animation film directors seem to have more opportunities to control shot length; a direc-
tor usually has the final right to edit a film in the Japanese film industry, whereas this is not the case
in most Hollywood studios (Bordwell and Thompson, 2001: 33). In this study, we focus on three
directors for the following reasons. Each has directed five or more animated films, and the number
was large enough for our quantitative analyses. Most of the storyboards drawn by the directors are
published, which enabled detailed analysis of shot length (this is not the case for many other ani-
mation directors). And most importantly, each director appears to have a clearly distinctive style of
filmmaking in many respects, including visual motifs, narratives, and characters that differ from
others who directed films in the same studio. Miyazaki has created unrealistic, fantasy worlds in
his films, while the Studio Ghibli films directed by Takahata Isao focus instead on animated ver-
sions of the realistic world (Tsugata, 2005; 153); the motifs of Hosoda’s films produced in Mad
House studio seem distinguishable from those of other Mad House films, such as Kon Satoshi’s
intrusion of imagination in Paprika (2006) and Kawajiri Yoshiaki’s darkness in Vampire Hunter D:
Bloodlust (2001). It is likely that the directors exhibit distinctive characteristics in shot length as
well. For these reasons, we expect that our analyses of shot length can provide useful knowledge
for understanding the distinctive shot-length style that each director adopts.
This study seeks to address two issues regarding shot length. First, we examine the effect the
director may have on shot length statistics, attempting to find out whether the three directors could
be distinguished from one another on the basis of statistical variables of shot length. If the vari-
ables, such as ASL, are clearly dependent on the director, then it can be argued that those variables
are good indicators of each director’s personal style. Second, we examine the chronological transi-
tion of shot length statistics: even if each director has his own film style, it is still possible that the
director’s style can gradually change. A change in style may result from either internal or external
factors. As an internal factor, the directors may gradually develop their shot-length style of their
own intention or motives across their careers; for instance, they might not have settled on their
style when their early works were directed. There are a number of external factors, a few of which
we will mention. One is that various changes in the cultural, political and financial environment of
filmmaking may affect the director’s shot-length style; all three directors have changed studios
once or more times during their careers. As noted above, Hollywood films’ shot length character-
istic can also be dependent on the period in which a film is made, and on changing genre conven-
tions and audience expectations. This may be a reflection of some external factors, e.g. the influence
166 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

of TV, or the spread of nonlinear editing (Salt, 2006: 321; Thompson and Bordwell, 2010: 722). As
well, since the mid-1990s, digital technologies, such as digital painting and the use of 3D computer
graphics, have been rapidly introduced into the three Japanese directors’ animated films. If such
external factors affected shot length style, ASL and other measurements of shot length may show
similar patterns of chronological change for all three directors.

Methodology, subject films and shot parsing

We studied 22 animated films prepared for theatrical release and directed by either Miyazaki (10
films), Oshii (7 films), or Hosoda (5 films) (see Table 1 for the entire list).2 In the contemporary
Japanese animation industry, directors themselves usually draw storyboards for feature films. For
19 films out of 22, the storyboards (ekonte) drawn by each of the directors are available in Japan
as published books or supplementary booklets of video packages; exceptions here are Oshii’s two
Urusei Yatsura films and Hosoda’s One Piece: Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island.3
We used Japanese NTSC DVDs as our media source, and these may provide digital video data
at a frame rate of 30/1.001 (interlaced mode) frames per second (fps), 24/1.001 (progressive mode)
fps, or a mix of both. In order to convert video data into sequential image files of 24/1.001 fps, we
used open-source software for video filtering.4 Our computer program analyzed the sequential
image files and automatically listed possible points where the films may have been digitally or
manually cut (edited). This program was based on an algorithm through which substantial transi-
tions in the spatial deployment of colours across any two successive frames were detected
(Nagasaka and Tanaka, 1991). Next, we manually corrected the list of possible cuts by comparing
the list and viewing the film. Most of the corrections were performed in order to remove false
detections (e.g. in a shot with a flashing object), and we also carefully looked for and added several
cuts to the analysis that went undetected by the computer program. During the correction proce-
dure, we consulted the storyboards of the films. For gradual, temporal shot transitions such as dis-
solve, fade, and wipe, we estimated the approximate midpoint and considered that to be the position
of a cut. We counted the number of frames in every shot and determined the shot length.
In our analysis, we excluded shots with credits, film titles, or trademarks at the beginning and
end of the films. Cutting et al. (2010: 433) excluded only ‘trailing credits and beginning credits
without scenic content’; however, we excluded all credit shots because some were ambiguous with
regard to whether they were part of the film’s narrative and animated mise-en-scène, such as the
credit shots with a tapestry-like background in Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
(1984). As a result, we removed 1.5 percent of shots per film on average.

Shot length distributions: Raw and logarithmic

We analyzed the shot length distribution of each film (Figures 1a and 1b), specifically, the number
of shots as a function of shot length. As shown in the bar graphs, the shot length distributions show
asymmetrically skewed bell-shapes. Comparable shapes of live action films have been reported by
Salt (2006: 391–395). The asymmetry occurs because negative shot length is impossible while a
very long shot length is uncommon but still possible. Note that ASL, which is an arithmetic mean
of shot length, does not correspond to the peaks of those distributions but shifts rightward (is
larger) from the peaks (see Figures 1a, 1b and Appendix). The long trails on the right side of the
distribution bias ASL. This problem of ASL, being a central tendency of shot length, has been
indicated by Bordwell (2002: 26): ‘ASL is a helpful but fairly blunt instrument. Naturally, a film
composed of one long take and 800 short shots can have the same ASL as one with fewer but
approximately equal shots.’
Kohara and Niimi 167

Table 1. The 22 films analyzed in this study.

Director English Title Title in Japan Release in Japan

Miyazaki The Castle of Cagliostro Rupan Sansei Kariosutoro no Siro 1979
  Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind Kaze no Tani no Nausika 1984
  Laputa: Castle in the Sky Tenkû no Siro Rapyuta 1986
  My Neighbor Totoro Tonari no Totoro 1988
  Kiki’s Delivery Service Mazyo no Takkyûbin 1989
  Porco Rosso Kurenai no Buta 1992
  Princess Mononoke Mononoke Hime 1997
  Spirited Away Sen to Tihiro no Kamikakusi 2001
  Howl’s Moving Castle Hauru no Ugoku Siro 2004
  Ponyo Gake no Ue no Ponyo 2008
Oshii Urusei Yatsura: Only You Urusei Yatura Onrî Yû 1983
  Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer Urusei Yatura 2 Byûtihuru Dorîmâ 1984
  Mobile Police Patlabor Kidô Keisatu Patoreibâ 1989
  Mobile Police Patlabor 2 Kidô Keisatu Patoreibâ 2 the Movie 1993
  Ghost in the Shell Ghost in the Shell [Kôkaku Kidôtai] 1995
  Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence Innocence 2004
  The Sky Crawlers Sukai Kurora 2008
Hosoda Digimon Adventure Dezimon Adobentyâ 1999
  Digimon Adventure: Our War Game Dezimon Adobentyâ Bokura no Wô 2000
Gêmu!
  One Piece: Baron Omatsuri and the One Piece Omaturi Dansyaku to 2005
Secret Island Himitu no Sima
  The Girl Who Leapt Through Time Toki o Kakeru Syôzyo 2006
  Summer Wars Samâ Wôzu 2009

Figure 1a.  Shot length distributions of Miyazaki’s 10 films. ASLraw: average raw shot length.
168 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Figure 1b.  Shot length distributions of Oshii’s seven films and Hosoda’s five films.

A common solution to such a problem is logarithmic (or ‘log’) transformation, namely, analyz-
ing log shot length instead of ‘raw’ shot length. Figures 2a and 2b show the distributions of log shot
length. We adopted the log transformation with base 10 (i.e. common logarithm), then 0 log shot
length corresponds to 1 (100) –second raw shot length, and 1 log shot length corresponds to 10
(101) –second raw shot length. Notice that on the axis of log shot length in Figures 2a and b, an
increment of 1 means 10 times longer raw shot length. As well, the log shot length data generally
show symmetric distributions and can be handled easily for statistical analyses. The average of log
shot length roughly corresponds to the peak of distribution. Fitting normal distribution5 to log shot
length data is equivalent to fitting lognormal distribution5 to ‘raw’ shot length data. Salt (2006:
391) found that lognormal distributions fit the ‘raw’ shot length of live action films very well.
Another advantage of using log shot length is that a subjectively perceived length of time may
better correspond to log length than to ‘raw’ length. For example, a one-second shot and a two-
second shot appear to be distinct from each other, whereas a 30-second shot and a 31-second shot
may be virtually indistinguishable. The physical unit of time, one second, does not correspond to
a psychological unit of time. This phenomenon is common in human perception and can be
described by a psychological law that the magnitude of perception is largely proportional to loga-
rithms of physical measurements (Fechner’s law; Gescheider, 1985: 10). This law suggests that
two seconds is clearly distinctive from one second since it is double one-second, while 31 seconds
is only 1.033 times as long as 30 seconds. Remember that the unit length of logarithmic axis rep-
resents multiplication, not addition. Although close investigations by experimental psychologists
have shown that perceived time does not strictly adhere to this law (Grondin, 2001; Macar, 1985),
Kohara and Niimi 169

Figure 2a.  Log shot length distributions of Miyazaki’s 10 films, where the base is 10. ASLlog: average log
shot length.

Figure 2b.  Log shot length distributions of Oshii’s seven films and Hosoda’s five films.
170 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Figure 3.  Log shot length distribution is best fit by normal distribution (left) and worst fit by normal
distribution (right). Normality indicates the resultant p-value of Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test.
Geometric distributions show the simulated log shot length distributions under the hypothesis that shot
length is determined in a completely random manner. Arrows ‘a’ and ‘b’ indicate the characteristics of log
shot length distributions in some of Miyazaki’s films: a peak shifted towards the right (b) and a shoulder on
the left side of the peak (a).

log shot length is still better than ‘raw’ shot length when analyzing subjective experience of a
film. For these reasons, we analyzed the data of log shot length and adopted lognormal distribu-
tion as a model for shot length.6
We measured the average and the standard deviation (SD) of log shot length. As noted above,
the average log shot length (ASLlog) roughly corresponds to the peak position of log shot length
distribution. The SD log shot length (SDlog) is an index of dispersion; for example, larger values
indicate that the film contained a relatively larger proportion of shot length that is far from the
ASLlog. For clarity, we denoted the average and SD of ‘raw’, that is, nonlogarithmic, shot length as
ASLraw and SDraw, respectively. We use ‘ASL’ to indicate both ASLraw and ASLlog.
The shape of a normal distribution N (μ, σ) is determined by two parameters: average7 (μ) and
SD (σ). Average represents the position of the peak, and SD represents the shot length dispersion,
namely, the extent to which the distribution spreads horizontally. For each film, we determined the
normal distributions by using ASLlog and SDlog as explained above; given the two measurements,
we drew a theoretical graph of the normal distribution that has the average and the SD as shown in
Figures 2a and 2b. In general, the theoretical distributions fit well into the observed distributions.
These facts suggest that log shot length, which is assumed to be a good index for perceived, psy-
chological length of time, is well modelled by the normal distribution; most shots have log length
close to the average (ASLlog), and very long and brief log shot length are equally rare.
However, in detail some films did not strictly conform to the normal distribution. For each film,
we conducted a statistical test of normality (Kolmogorov-Smirnov test) to evaluate how well its
log shot length data conformed to normal distribution. The log shot length data of 10 out of 22
films deviated significantly from normal distribution (p < .05): 4 out of 10 Miyazaki films, 5 out of
7 Oshii films, and 1 out of 5 Hosoda films.8 Figure 3 depicts the film with the highest normality
(My Neighbor Totoro, 1988) and the film with lowest normality (Nausicaä of the Valley of the
Wind) among the 22 films. We will discuss this issue later in the article.
Kohara and Niimi 171

Figure 4.  Chronological transition of ASLlog (A), SDlog (B), skewness (C), and kurtosis (D) of log
shot length distribution. Each plot indicates each film. Release year had no significant effect on the
measurements.

In the following sections we examine whether the shot length measurements (e.g. ASL) are
dependent on directors and release years.

Average and standard deviation of shot length

The results regarding ASL and SD are listed in Figures 4 and 5, and the Appendix. The ASLraw
of the 22 films ranged from 3.02 to 8.72 (average 5.44) seconds. Figure 4A shows the ASLlog as a
function of release year; however, there was no clear pattern of year-related transition. Release year
did not correlate with the ASLlog (r = −0.25, p = .26)9 or the ASLraw (r = −0.13, p = .58) of the 22
films. For each director, release year had no clear effect; as shown in Figure 4A, Miyazaki’s (plot-
ted by x) and Oshii’s (open circles) ASLlog remained largely constant across the period. Hosoda’s
ASLlog (filled squares) seemed to be increasing; nevertheless, it was difficult to conclude that this
tendency was reliable because the number of samples (5) was too small for reliable analysis on
correlation.
Figure 4B shows the SDlog as a function of release year, and again release year had no clear
effect on the measurement. Release year did not correlate with the SDlog (r = 0.34, p = .12) or the
SDraw (r = 0.09, p = .68). The SDlog of Miyazaki and Oshii remained constant across the period.
Hosoda’s SDlog was smaller for his first film than for his subsequent films; the issue of chronologi-
cal transition is discussed later in the article.
172 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Figure 5.  The ASLlog (average log shot length)-SDlog (SD log shot length) plot of the 22 films. Each plot
indicates each film. The films were clearly grouped by director. The upper bar graph shows the average
ASLlog of each director. The bar graph on the right side shows the average SDlog of each director.

However, given Figures 4A and 4B, there is a tendency for the ASLlog and SDlog to be sensitive
to the directors. As shown in the scatter plot (Figure 5), the films are clearly grouped by director
in the two-dimensional space spanned by ASLlog and SDlog.10 When the 22 points in Figure 5 were
statistically classified into three clusters (k-means clustering, where k = 3; the variable k repre-
sents the number of clusters to be made in the analysis), the resultant clusters are consistent with
the grouping by director. Miyazaki’s films are characterized by a lower SDlog, thereby suggesting
that longish or brief shots are relatively infrequent. Oshii and Hosoda show comparable SDlog, but
they are obviously distinctive in their ASLlog measurements; Oshii’s films have a longer ASLlog,
while Hosoda’s films have a shorter ASLlog. The ASLlog of Miyazaki’s films is in between. These
observations were confirmed by statistical tests (analysis of variance, ANOVA11 and multiple
comparisons by Tukey’s HSD11). The ASLlog is significantly dependent on the directors (F(2, 19)
= 34.9. p < .01).11 Miyazaki’s ASLlog is significantly larger than Hosoda’s (p < .01) and signifi-
cantly smaller than Oshii’s (p < .01). The SDlog is dependent on the directors as well (F(2, 19) =
39.0, p < .01). Miyazaki’s SDlog is smaller than Oshii’s and Hosoda’s with statistical significance
(p < .01), while the difference between Oshii and Hosoda was not statistically significant.
Oshii’s films are often impressive because of their slow and calm scenes. Ruh (2004: 39)
described the style of Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer (1984) as having an ‘unmistakable
visual style, using quiet, contemplative shots, often coupled with long monologues or dialogues’.
Of Ghost in the Shell (1995), Napier (2005: 106) commented that one of the characteristics of
the film seems to be the synergy of a slow, emotional narrative and action scenes of technologi-
cal combat. Such impressions are clearly consistent with the long ASL of Oshii’s films. In con-
trast, our analysis shows that Hosoda prefers short shot length. Actually, the proportion of shots
shorter than one second is 10.6 percent for Hosoda’s films, while it is only 1.7 percent and 1.9
percent for Miyazaki’s and Oshii’s films, respectively. This is one of the salient characteristics
of Hosoda’s films.
Kohara and Niimi 173

Figure 6.  A: Average log shot length distributions of the three directors, modelled by normal
distribution. For each director, μ was given as the average of the ASLlog of the director’s films, and σ was
given as the average of the SDlog of the director’s films. B: The simulated shot length distributions of each
director, determined by the assumption that 1000 shots conform to the average distribution shown in
panel A. In other words, this graph shows the most likely shot length distribution if each director made a
film of 1000 shots.

In order to demonstrate the individual characteristics of the three directors, we estimated the
average distribution for the animated features of each director. For example, the average ASLlog
of Miyazaki’s 10 films is 0.602 (corresponding to 4.00 seconds ‘raw’ length) and the average
SDlog was 0.261. Given these measurements, we determined the normal distribution N(0.602,
0.261). That is, we drew a theoretical graph that has an average of 0.602 and SD of 0.261. This
distribution represents the ‘average’ shape of the log shot length distribution of Miyazaki’s
films, and we called it average distribution for Miyazaki. The results are shown in the
graph in Figure 6A. Oshii’s average distribution has its peak at a relatively long shot length,
whereas the peak for Hosoda’s is at a relatively short shot length. Miyazaki’s average distribu-
tion has a sharp peak compared to the others because his shot lengths are more concentrated
around the ASLlog (i.e. smaller SDlog). Based on the average distributions, we estimated the
‘typical’ distribution of raw shot length for each director, assuming that the number of shots is
1000 (Figure 6B).

Skewness and kurtosis: More understanding of a director’s style

We analyzed skewness and kurtosis (explained further below) of the log shot length distributions
as well (Figures 4C, 4D, and 7). Skewness is an index for direction and degree of asymmetry of
distribution. Positive (negative) skewness indicates that the right (left) side of the distribution has
a longer trail and that the peak position is shifted toward the left (right). For example, the ‘raw’ shot
length distributions (Figure 1) have highly positive skewness (1.83~6.73). A normal distribution
yields zero skewness since it has a symmetric shape; however, if we were to add some longish
shots to the symmetric distribution, the skewness would become positive. Note that larger absolute
value of skewness indicates stronger asymmetry of the distribution shape. Since the log shot length
distributions were well fitted by normal distribution, their skewness values were around zero (rang-
ing from −0.414 to 0.550).
174 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Figure 7.  Skewness (A) and kurtosis (B) of log shot length distribution. The bars show the average
skewness and kurtosis of each director. The plots indicate the results of each film. The skewness of Oshii’s
films was generally positive; however, there was an outlier of −0.414 (Urusei Yatsura: Only You).

As shown in Figure 4C, we did not find that the release year had any apparent effect on the
skewness (r = 0.31, p = .16). The skewness for Miyazaki and Hosoda remained largely constant.
However, Oshii’s first film yielded an exceptionally small value of skewness. Although the skew-
ness was largely independent of release year, it was dependent on director (see Figure 7A). ANOVA
revealed that the skewness differed significantly among the directors (F(2, 19) = 6.66, p < .01).
Oshii’s films yielded significantly larger values of skewness than those of Miyazaki (p < .01, mul-
tiple comparisons by Tukey’s HSD). Figure 8 shows the instances of the smallest skewness and the
largest skewness, which are both from films directed by Oshii. The bars represent the observed log
shot length distributions, namely, the actual distribution of log shot length data. The solid lines with
black dots represent the normal distributions fit to the observed distributions.
The relatively large skewness of Oshii’s films suggests that Oshii frequently uses very long
takes, not to mention that he prefers long shot length on average. Note that positive skewness indi-
cates a relatively long trail on the right side of the log shot length distribution, and that such distri-
bution may be observed if we add some longish shots. The generally positive skewness of his films
may further promote the impression of their slow pace. However, it is noteworthy that the skew-
ness of Urusei Yatsura: Only You (1983), which was the first film Oshii directed,12 was exceptional
(see Figure 7A). It was the only film by Oshii showing a negative skewness (−0.414). As an issue
of chronological transition, this will be discussed later in the article.
Hosoda’s skewness was positive as well. However, as we have shown, he generally prefers short
shot length. Hosoda’s short ASL is not simply attributable to his avoidance of long takes; the skew-
ness should be negative if long takes are excluded and brief shots are preserved. His shots are rela-
tively short on average, although he still uses a few long takes. Actually, in his films, there are some
very long takes used as impressive highlights of the narratives; for example, the shot following the
profile of running Makoto (The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, 2006) lasted 52.5 seconds; the shot
with a horizontal pan, showing silhouettes of characters grieving (Summer Wars, 2009) was 42.0
seconds. The viewer’s perception of relatively few long takes in Hosoda’s films may be reinforced
when contrasted with his other shots, which are generally short. Such a style of using long takes as
Kohara and Niimi 175

Figure 8. The log shot length distribution with the smallest value of skewness (left) and the largest value
of skewness (right). Normal and geometric distributions were fitted in the same manner as in Figure 3.
The arrow indicates a second peak found in Urusei Yatsura: Only You; however, such a peak was not found in
Oshii’s subsequent films, as can be seen in the right panel.

highlights in contrast with other short shots is clearly different from the usage of long takes in
Oshii’s films.
Miyazaki’s skewness seems distinctive from other two directors. His average skewness was
significantly negative, namely, significantly lower than zero (one-sample t-test, t(9) = −4.01, p <
.01; this test examined whether the average skewness was statistically different from zero). This
result implies that the director has a tendency to avoid long takes. Actually, we found only six
instances (0.04%) of shots longer than 30 seconds from Miyazaki’s 10 films. In contrast, of the
shots in Oshii’s films, 2.28 percent were longer than 30 seconds. Hosoda had an ASL shorter than
that of Miyazaki, yet 0.40 percent of his shots were longer than 30 seconds. The negative skewness
of Miyazaki is most apparent in the right panel of Figure 3, which shows the log shot length distri-
bution of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. This film yielded Miyazaki’s smallest (most negative)
skewness (−0.237); it has a shoulder (indicated by arrow ‘a’ in Figure 3) on the left side of its peak
(indicated by arrow ‘b’). Note that it has no shoulder on the right side of its peak and hence shows
a negative skewness. A similar pattern is found in several of Miyazaki’s films (see Figure 2a).
Ghost in the Shell also has the second peak on the left side (Figure 2b), but it has positive skewness.
This is probably because there is a substantial amount of very long shot length, i.e. the trail on the
right side of the distribution. The Miyazaki films have no such trail of long takes, so the shoulders
may determine the skewness values.
Kurtosis is an index for the degree of peakedness of a distribution; normal distribution yields
zero kurtosis. A larger kurtosis indicates that the distribution is more peaked than the normal
distribution of identical average and SD. Again, we found no reliable correlation of kurtosis
with release year (Figure 4D; r = −0.12, p = .59); however, the directors had a significant effect
on kurtosis (Figure 7B; F(1, 19) = 5.34, p < .05). Hosoda’s films yielded significantly lower
kurtosis measurements than those of Miyazaki or Oshii (p < .05, multiple comparisons by
Tukey’s HSD).
176 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

In summary, skewness and kurtosis were dependent on the directors. This result implies that the
shape of the log shot length distributions, as well as the average and SD thereof, may be sensitive
to an individual director. As noted earlier, the log shot lengths of most of Oshii’s films deviate from
the normal distribution. This result may be partly due to the large deviations from zero in the skew-
ness and kurtosis of his films. However, skewness and kurtosis are not so clearly dependent on
directors as with ASLlog and SDlog. For instance, as can be seen in Figure 5, all ASLlog of Oshii’s
films are longer than all ASLlog of Hosoda’s; all SDlog of Miyazaki’s are smaller than all SDlog of
Oshii’s and Hosoda’s. Such clear distinction was not found for skewness and kurtosis (see Figure
7).13 We found that the ASLlog-SDlog plot is the most clear-cut way to characterize the three direc-
tors using basic statistical measurements.

What determines SDlog? A director’s choice is not random

We found the individuality of each director in the shot length measurements. ASLlog may be easily
interpreted; for example, Oshii prefers a long shot length. However, we may need some additional
information to interpret SDlog. We found that SDlog was dependent on the director; in order to con-
firm that the filmmakers control SDlog (either consciously or unconsciously), we simulated the
SDlog that would be observed if there was no intentional direction for shot length and if cuts occur
in a random way (the random cut hypothesis). The simulation was as follows. For example, the
ASLraw of Hosoda’s Summer Wars was 4.71 seconds, which corresponds to 112.9 frames; this
means that a cut occurs with the probability of 1/112.9 after observing a single frame. If the cut
occurs randomly with certain probability (e.g. 1/112.9), shot length (a continuous period of time
and length of film between cuts) should conform to the distribution called geometric distribution.
Then, we calculated the SDlog of the geometric distribution (simulated SDlog).
As a result, for every film, the simulated SDlog was larger than the observed SDlog. The average
simulated SDlog was 0.530 for Miyazaki’s films, which was 203 percent of his average observed
SDlog, 0.537 (155%) for Oshii’s films, and 0.526 (148%) for Hosoda’s films. As demonstrated in
Figures 3 and 8, if the random cut hypothesis is valid, we would observe more shots with a very
short or very long length; evidently, the films were not cut randomly. The directors controlled the
shot length by avoiding overly short or long lengths, which would occur if shot length were ran-
domly determined. Therefore it is plausible that SDlog may reflect an individual director’s shot
length characteristics. How can each director influence SDlog? Interestingly, we found a significant
positive correlation between the SDlog and skewness (r =.59, p < .01). In other words, a film with
a larger SDlog is likely to have a shot length distribution with a long trail on its right side. The larger
SDlog of the films of Oshii and Hosoda was attributable, at least partly, to their use of relatively long
shot length.

Agreement of shot length and storyboard: Planned editing

How did the directors control shot length? Probably the primary source of shot length control is
storyboarding. In the Japanese animation industry, it is usually the director who draws the story-
board of a feature film (Condry, 2010: 83; Tsugata, 2005: 43), and this is also the case for the three
directors studied here (e.g. Condry, 2010; Iwai and Tanaka, 2008: 18; Kano, 2006: 12). A typical
storyboard contains sketches, dialogues, sound items and director’s instructions for every shot.
And importantly, on a storyboard, every shot length is designated; for example, a director writes ‘1
+ 12’ (1 second and 12 frames) alongside the sketch of the shot. Hence a director has the opportu-
nity to control shot length through storyboarding, and the three directors studied here drew the
Kohara and Niimi 177

storyboards and designated the shot length in this way. Storyboards of 3 films out of the 22 are not
available, but the storyboards of 19 other films are publicized as the works by the directors.
Then we examined how extensive the agreement is between the designated shot length on the
storyboards and the actual shot length of the films. Throughout production, shot length may be
changed from the storyboard designations. One of the critical stages to determine shot length is
editing, when an editor may control shot length, although the directors usually supervise the edit-
ing. For instance, the editor Nishiyama Shigeru, commenting on Summer Wars (directed by
Hosoda), said that ‘both Hosoda’s and my idiosyncrasies pervaded the editing’ (Hikawa, 2009;
authors’ translation).
Before the analysis, we excluded the shots which are not consistent between the storyboards and
the actual films (e.g. some shots on the storyboards were omitted). The percentage of the shots
found both in each actual film and its storyboard was 99.3, 98.1, and 98.7 percent of the actual
films for Miyazaki, Oshii, and Hosoda, respectively. The correlation between designated shot
length and actual shot length was very high; r = 0.95, 0.97, and 0.97 on average, for Miyazaki,
Oshii, and Hosoda, respectively (see Table 2). The discrepancy between actual shot length and
designated shot length (the absolute value of actual shot length minus designated shot length) was
small: 0.48, 0.66, and 0.54 seconds on average, for Miyazaki, Oshii, and Hosoda, respectively. The
proportion of the discrepancy, given by dividing the discrepancy by designated shot length, was
10.8, 12.0, and 14.6 percent on average, for Miyazaki, Oshii, and Hosoda, respectively. Even in the
case of the largest average discrepancy, it was still small (21.0%, The Girl Who Leapt Through
Time). These results suggest that the shot length of the 22 films were very controlled by the direc-
tors’ storyboarding, rather than through editing (note that none of the three directors has worked
with only one editor for all his feature films). In the Japanese animation industry, storyboards are
considered as the central device of direction (Condry, 2010; Takahashi, 2011), and storyboarding
is the process in which a director’s individuality pervades most strongly in his or her films (Tsugata,
2005: 44). Our results provide the quantitative evidence that directors are primarily responsible for
storyboarding and that storyboarding can materialize the expression of directors’ individual char-
acteristics in shot length.

Chronological transition in shot length

Although previous studies have reported that the ASL of Hollywood film has been decreasing
throughout the last half of the 20th century, we found no reliable evidence that release year affects
our measurements. As well, this finding for Hollywood films may not be true for films produced
within different cultural and industrial contexts. It is striking that Miyazaki has maintained a low
SDlog and moderate ASLlog throughout his long career. The shot length style of Miyazaki’s films
may have been established, at least partly, before 1979. Interestingly, Kano (2006: 12) claims that,
in The Castle of Cagliostro, Miyazaki established his style of direction, which is mainly based on
storyboarding.
In contrast, the first film of Hosoda, Digimon Adventure (1999),14 seems to deviate from his
other films (Figure 5). It seems plausible that his style of shot length was not as established at that
time. Supporting this view, Hosoda recounted that he managed to reach a thorough understanding
of direction and storyboarding when he directed his second film, Digimon Adventure: Our War
Game (Oguro, 2007: 550). Another possible reason for the deviation is that it is a short film,
approximately 20 minutes, while all the other films we tested are longer than 40 minutes. The
directorial style for directing a short film may be different from that of directing a feature-length
film. For example, Hosoda stated that he dared to give up narrative because it was very short (20
178 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Table 2. The analysis of the correspondence between the designated shot length on the storyboards and
the actual shot length of the films – % Corresponding Shots – indicated the proportion of shots that can be
found both in the storyboards and in the films. Shot Length Correlation indicates the correlation coefficient
(r) between the designated and the actual shot length. We measured the discrepancy in shot length as
an absolute value of the difference of the actual shot length from the designated shot length. Average
Discrepancy in Shot Length (sec) indicates the average of the discrepancy of each film. Average Discrepancy
in Shot Length (%) indicates the average proportion (%) of the discrepancy to the designated shot length.

Director Title % Corresponding Shot Length Average Average

Shots Correlation (r) Discrepancy in Discrepancy in
Shot Length (sec) Shot Length (%)

Miyazaki The Castle of Cagliostro 98.9 0.956 0.407 10.6

  Nausicaä of the Valley of 98.3 0.959 0.384 9.8
the Wind
  Laputa: Castle in the Sky 99.4 0.978 0.290 8.2
  My Neighbor Totoro 99.4 0.954 0.504 10.2
  Kiki’s Delivery Service 99.6 0.956 0.508 10.0
  Porco Rosso 98.7 0.966 0.411 8.7
  Princess Mononoke 99.5 0.949 0.500 12.7
  Spirited Away 99.3 0.943 0.570 11.6
  Howl’s Moving Castle 99.6 0.951 0.601 13.1
  Ponyo 100.0 0.934 0.654 13.6
Oshii Urusei Yatsura: Only You (Storyboard Unavailable)
  Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful (Storyboard Unavailable)
Dreamer
  Mobile Police Patlabor 99.2 0.966 0.476 8.3
  Mobile Police Patlabor 2 99.5 0.983 0.610 9.4
  Ghost in the Shell 98.8 0.965 0.646 12.3
  Ghost in the Shell 2: 95.3 0.947 0.749 17.9
Innocence
  The Sky Crawlers 97.4 0.985 0.808 11.7
Hosoda Digimon Adventure 99.7 0.980 0.272 9.3
  Digimon Adventure: Our 98.1 0.976 0.402 13.5
War Game
  One Piece: Baron Omatsuri (Storyboard Unavailable)
and the Secret Island
  The Girl Who Leapt 97.8 0.952 0.978 21.0
Through Time
  Summer Wars 99.0 0.972 0.508 14.5

min), whereas such a strategy was not adopted for the second Digimon film (40 min) (Oguro,
2000a: 144). In addition, among Hosoda’s films, Digimon Adventure is the only instance in which
digital painting was not adopted. One might assume that this is the reason for the deviation of
SDlog, as digital technologies may affect film style (Thompson and Bordwell, 2010: 719–722).
However this remains unclear because we did not find such difference in SDlog of digital-painted
films from traditional (i.e. cel animation) films for Miyazaki and Oshii.
We also observed a similar deviation in Oshii’s early work. Among his films, only Urusei
Yatsura: Only You yielded negative skewness (Figures 4C, 7A), and its SDlog is the lowest among
Oshii’s films. The difference in log shot length distribution is evident from Figure 8: in Urusei
Yatsura: Only You (the left panel), there are two peaks in the distribution. The second peak, that is
around one log shot length (10 seconds) and indicated by an arrow in Figure 8, is virtually absent
Kohara and Niimi 179

in his subsequent films (see Figure 2). Such a difference implies that some aspects of Oshii’s shot
length style may have been established after Urusei Yatsura: Only You.
Oshii declared: ‘It was the happiest time as a filmmaker when I directed Urusei Yatsura 2:
Beautiful Dreamer (1984), as there was a joy that finally I understood how to make a film’
(Masutomi, 2008: 17, authors’translation). In contrast, he judged Urusei Yatsura: Only You as fol-
lows: ‘It’s no film. It failed to be a film’ (Oguro, 2000b: 66, authors’ translation). The large discrep-
ancy in skewness between Urusei Yatsura: Only You and his subsequent films may reflect a
breakthrough in the development of Oshii’s style. After Beautiful Dreamer, the shot length statis-
tics of Oshii’s films are largely constant; the only exception was the high kurtosis observed in The
Sky Crawlers (2008). Interestingly, Oshii (2008: 11) said that, in this film, he purposely suppressed
the direction method that he had developed. It seems difficult, however, to determine his new
direction method and its effect on kurtosis measurement at this time. Further analysis of his future
films is needed.
The findings discussed above suggest that the three directors established their individual style
of shot length relatively early in their careers. However, it remains unclear whether the style for
elements other than shot length, such as camera work,15 is constant as well. For example, the fre-
quent use of wide-angle shots looking down at the characters is impressive in Hosoda’s second
Digimon film (War Game), while such style is absent in the first Digimon film. In contrast, it seems
that Hosoda has his own individual style for camera work, declaring ‘Fixed camera is my principle,
so I’m rarely at a loss to determine a keynote of camera work’ (Oguro, 2006: 460, author’s transla-
tion). The issue of styles for elements other than shot length is a subject for further study.

Conclusions and further research

In conclusion, we found quantitative evidence that Miyazaki, Oshii and Hosoda have their own
styles of shot length. Oshii uses shot lengths that are longer than Miyazaki’s and Hosoda’s. While
he still uses some very long takes, Hosoda uses shorter shot lengths than Miyazaki and Oshii. Such
style provides a clear contrast of shot length and enables the director to use long takes as highlights.
Miyazaki tends to avoid long takes; his SD shot length is small and his skewness is negative. This
study confirms that with regard to shot length as a part of a director’s film style, an individual style
can be expressed in studio-produced animated feature film, in particular, through storyboarding.
The shot length style of each of the three directors seems to have been established in his first or
second film. Although they have experienced some critical changes in their filmmaking environ-
ment, their shot length characteristics have remained largely consistent. The consistency of ASLlog
and SDlog, however, does not necessarily mean that the directors’ shot length styles are completely
fixed and unchanged. It is still likely that they modify their shot length style for each film even
though their ASL and SD are unchanged. Our findings suggest that the each director’s overall pref-
erence on shot length remains consistent, while other aspects of shot length style (e.g. rhythm,
continuity) may change across the films.
In addition, we confirmed that log shot length is useful for statistical analysis of shot length. By
analyzing log shot length rather than ‘raw’ shot length and by combining multiple variables – ASL,
SD, skewness, and kurtosis – regarding shot length, we reached the above-mentioned conclusions.
This is an important finding from a technical point of view.
It should be noted that these quantitative results do not imply that stable ASLlog and SDlog
measurements are qualitative criterion for ‘good’ or ‘stylistically consistent’ artists; some direc-
tors may test a new style of shot length for every new film. Statistical measurements like these
can be useful tools for analyzing film style, but the measurements and results themselves are
180 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

independent of artistic value. Furthermore, it should be clear that statistical measurements do not
constitute film style per se. They are only sensitive to film style in some cases. For a general
understanding of film style, it is obviously important to analyze a film through multiple view-
points and a variety of methodological tools. Further study is needed to test whether the above
conclusions are also true for other aspects of Miyazaki, Oshii, and Hosoda’s film styles, such as
camera movements, music, etc.
One of the limitations of this shot length study is that we did not take shot continuity into
account; the shot length distributions and the basic statistics, including ASLlog and SDlog, are con-
stant even if the order of a shot is shuffled. A continuity of shot length sequence may also be stud-
ied by autocorrelation analysis (Cutting et al., 2010; Salt, 2006: 396). We examined the
autocorrelation indices used by Cutting et al. (2010), but the indices of the 22 films were dependent
on neither release year nor directors. In order to understand each artist’s distinctive features of shot
continuity, we need to develop other means of analysis. The validity of our approach for other films
could be tested in the future since we examined only three directors in this study, and further stud-
ies of other directors may enhance our findings.

Acknowledgements
The authors thank Higashi Kentaro for his helpful comments on this research.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit
sectors.

Notes
  1. In this article we transcribed Japanese words as follows. A person’s name is written in Hepburn romaniza-
tion. For the English film titles, we adopted the titles commonly used in the English literature. Otherwise,
we adhered to the romanization standard ISO 3602 (e.g. book title).
  2. Consequently, we omitted several films that those artists participated in (but did not direct). TV anima-
tions were omitted as well because films for cinema are more likely to reflect individual style of shot
length. In TV animation, a director is commonly encouraged to reduce the number of shots because the
budget is relatively low; e.g. the limit may be 300 shots for a half-hour program (Daichi, 2009: 111).
This means that ASL is limited. In the case of Japanese TV animation, direction (ensyutu) is typically
dissociated from storyboarding (ekonte). Hence, it is doubtful whether the shot length may be primarily
determined by a director. Future study is needed to examine whether an individual shot length style of
director can be found in TV animations.
  3. We found no credit for the storyboard in the 22 films (except Oshii’s two films), confirming that the
storyboards were not drawn by any crew other than the director. One exception could be Urusei Yatsura:
Only You; however, as only Oshii is credited with the storyboard, then practically it is not an exception.
Another exception is The Sky Crawlers, in which Takeuchi Atsushi is credited for storyboard for the CGI
part (i.e. the shots of aircraft combat); however, Oshii considerably revised the storyboard drawn by
Takeuchi (Oguro, 2008: 392).
  4. We used MPlayer (http://www.mplayerhq.hu/) and its ‘pullup’ filter, which accomplishes inverse telecine.
  5. Normal distribution is the most frequently used probability distribution in statistical analyses and has
symmetrical shape and a single peak. Theoretically, it is considered to be a reflection of random factors
Kohara and Niimi 181

such as a machine error. On the other hand, lognormal distribution has skewed shape with positive skew-
ness. If a variable x conforms to lognormal distribution (e.g. raw shot length), the logarithm of x (e.g. log
shot length) conforms to normal distribution. If a variable x conforms to normal distribution, ax conforms
to lognormal distribution (a is a base, any positive number such as 10).
  6. Note that models other than lognormal distribution may be adopted for other purposes of film analysis.
For example, Erlang distribution and Weibull distribution were proposed by Vasconcelos and Lippman
(2000) for automatic and efficient cut detection by computer.
  7. As a mathematical term, this parameter should be called by the term mean. However, we used the term
average instead of mean to maintain consistency with the ASL term.
  8. The test is more likely to report significant deviation from normal distribution for data of a larger sample
size (i.e. films with more shots). As a result, we should be cautious in interpreting the results from films
of various lengths. Nevertheless, we report it because most of Oshii’s films were significantly deviated
from normal distribution despite the fact that they have a relatively smaller number of shots compared to
Miyazaki’s and Hosoda’s films (see Appendix).
 9. ‘r’ represents correlation coefficient. When r = 0, it indicates that there is no correlation. A positive value
of r indicates a relationship in which a larger value of one variable tends to accompany a larger value of
another variable; for example, the age and height of children (older children are usually taller). A nega-
tive value of r indicates an inverse relationship; for example, the average air temperature and latitude of
cities on Earth (it is hotter in cities at lower latitude). A larger absolute value of r indicates a stronger cor-
relation. We determined the value of r between the release year and the ASLlog of 22 films to be −0.25, a
weak negative correlation. In addition, we conducted a statistical test to examine whether r significantly
deviated from zero. The reported p-value (0.26) is an estimated probability that the observed correlation
(r = −0.25) would be accounted for by accidental and random factors. Because the probability was higher
than the standard criterion (0.05), we could not conclude that there was a significant correlation between
the release year and ASLlog.
10. One might assume that the grouping by director would also be found in the ASLraw-SDraw space; however,
this was not the case. Because of the highly asymmetrical shape of the ‘raw’ shot length distributions,
ASLraw and SDraw have a strong positive correlation (r = .89). In principle, correlated measurements are
not informative when determining clusters in a multidimensional space, which is a secondary reason why
we focused on log shot length rather than ‘raw’ shot length. Actually, the scatterplot of the 22 films by
ASLraw as x-axis and SDraw as y-axis showed single spindle-shaped cluster of 22 points, which was quite
dissimilar from Figure 5. It is difficult to find clear sub-clusters among such scatterplots.
11. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is a method to determine whether there is or are a statistically significant
difference or differences in the averages of two or more groups, e.g. ‘is there any significant difference
in the average weight of a cow among farms A, B, and C?’ If the averages of A, B, and C are 650, 700,
and 800 kg, respectively, one may infer that farm C is better skilled to produce heavier cows. However,
if the averages are 699, 700, and 702 kg, respectively, the differences are minor and not reliable. ANOVA
tests whether the differences of the averages are statistically reliable. The result of ANOVA is reported in
F- and p-values. F-value is reported with two parameters (degrees of freedom), such as F(2, 19). A larger
F-value indicates that the differences of the averages are more reliable. On the other hand, the p-value
is an estimated probability of the difference of the average that would be accounted for as a result of
accidental and random factors. A smaller p-value indicates that the differences of the averages are more
reliable. As a rule, when the p-value is smaller than .05, the difference of the average is considered statis-
tically significant (note: this criterion may differ depending on the research field and purpose). However,
ANOVA reveals only whether the averages differ significantly among the groups. To identify which dif-
ference is significant (e.g. a difference between A and B or between A and C is significant, whereas that
between B and C is not), one should perform a multiple comparison test. Tukey’s honestly significant
difference (HSD) is one of the frequently used methods for multiple comparison tests that accompany
ANOVA.
12. Before this film, Oshii co-directed a feature-length animated film Nirusu no Husigi na Tabi (The Wonder-
ful Adventures of Nils), but its theatrical release was cancelled.
182 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

13. The relatively stronger effect of the directors on ASLlog and SDlog than on skewness and kurtosis was also
confirmed by the results of ANOVAs reported in this study. The F-value for the effect of director was
F(2, 19) = 34.9 on ASLlog and F(2,19) = 39.0 on SDlog, but was F(2, 19) = 6.66 on skewness and F(2, 19)
= 5.34 on kurtosis.
14. The American theatrical version Digimon: The Movie (2000) is a compound of three drastically cut and
edited films, including Hosoda’s two Digimon films.
15. Here we refer to simulated camera work in hand-drawn animation; e.g. a camera panning may be simu-
lated by moving a background sheet horizontally, and wide-angle distortion may be simulated by the
scenery drawn in a distorted perspective.

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Author biographies
Itsutoshi Kohara is an independent animation researcher, a member of the Japanese animation research group,
Dôkan-yama Kikaku. As a professional researcher, he received his Master of Science in Engineering from
Waseda University (Tokyo), and is engaged in computer software development at a corporation in Japan.
Ryosuke Niimi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology, University of Tokyo. This article
is a reflection of his work as a member of the animation research group, Dôkan-yama Kikaku. As a profes-
sional researcher, he studies human visual cognition and has published papers primarily in psychology jour-
nals, such as Psychonomic Bulletin & Review and Perception.
184 Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal 8(2)

Appendix
The 22 films studied in the paper and the observed statistical measurements. ASL: average shot length. SD:
standard deviation. ASLraw and SDraw are results from ‘raw’ shot length data. ASLlog, SDlog, skewness, kurtosis,
and normality are results of log shot length data. Normality indicates p-value reported by Kolmogorov-
Smirnov test on log shot length data.

Director Title # Shot Analysed ASLraw (sec.) SDraw ASLlog SDlog Skewness Kurtosis Normality

Miyazaki The Castle of Cagliostro 1435 4.08 2.74 0.524 0.278 −0.126 −0.049 .011 *

  Nausicaä of the Valley of 1574 4.30 2.68 0.560 0.258 −0.237 0.397 < .001 *

the Wind
  Laputa: Castle in the Sky 1645 4.37 2.91 0.567 0.254 −0.112 0.694 .026 *

  My Neighbor Totoro 951 5.18 3.15 0.647 0.241 0.014 0.152 .472  
  Kiki's Delivery Service 1138 5.18 3.21 0.644 0.247 −0.020 0.257 .161  
  Porco Rosso 1072 4.99 3.14 0.623 0.260 −0.212 0.231 .139  
  Princess Mononoke 1673 4.60 3.37 0.574 0.278 −0.085 0.495 .009 *

  Spirited Away 1414 5.11 3.34 0.629 0.264 −0.133 0.316 .058  
  Howl's Moving Castle 1397 4.92 3.35 0.605 0.278 −0.107 0.222 .402  
  Ponyo 1128 5.20 3.23 0.646 0.247 −0.015 0.155 .228  
Oshii Urusei Yatsura: Only You 834 6.95 5.00 0.740 0.310 −0.414 0.582 .051  
  Urusei Yatsura 2: 633 8.72 9.43 0.783 0.359 0.217 0.143 .274  
Beautiful Dreamer
  Mobile Police Patlabor 788 7.18 8.21 0.690 0.361 0.351 0.380 .005 *

  Mobile Police Patlabor 2 860 7.59 8.60 0.722 0.346 0.550 0.358 < .001 *

  Ghost in the Shell 684 6.72 7.24 0.665 0.362 0.300 0.034 .008 *

  Ghost in the Shell 2: 890 6.23 6.53 0.635 0.365 0.169 0.101 .004 *

Innocence
  The Sky Crawlers 844 8.10 9.96 0.768 0.325 0.363 1.300 < .001 *

Hosoda Digimon Adventure 363 3.02 2.43 0.381 0.287 0.240 0.055 .084  
  Digimon Adventure: Our 692 3.33 3.25 0.366 0.366 0.145 −0.419 .088  
War Game
  One Piece: Baron 1280 4.10 4.74 0.448 0.362 0.329 −0.003 .063  
Omatsuri and the
Secret Island
  The Girl Who Leapt 1091 5.11 5.45 0.533 0.386 0.147 −0.272 .021 *

Through Time
  Summer Wars 1369 4.71 4.76 0.510 0.381 −0.066 −0.044 .115  

*p < .05