3DA - For the character's animation, we know that you have used motion capture, but also animation by keyframe. How have you animated the characters in any shot?

Ikuo - In most shots, we used motion capture and refined the motions to emphasize the power manually. And we added facial animation and finger animation also.

3DA - In reference to the facial animation, was captured the moves of the actor's faces anyway or they were only used as reference? Can you tell to us how you animated the characters faces?

Ikuo - No captured. We did them totally by keyframe. But we could shot videos of Kaneshiro during voice recording. We used it and films and photobooks for reference.

3DA - In the cinematics we can see all kind of creatures, gigantic insects, winged beasts, but also skeletons and humans. Which were most difficult to animate? What made them more complicated?

Ikuo - Well.. most difficult one was main Ninja character. He has all factors to make it difficult. Close-up shots to capture facial expression and lips, complicated finger movements to handle the sword.

Ikuo - We made the hair by Shag:HAIR and cloth by clothFX. The look of hair is one of the most challenging. His dark long hair were modeled one by one with object. So his head data grow so heavy! We wanted the hair to be natural and no striking when he was human. It was diffucult to show it natural as possible. On the other side, when he changed his appearance, his white hair movements grew so unnatural, so it was easy to animate relatively.

3DA - In reference to lighting and render have you used global illumination or HDRI? Which lighting technique have you used?

Enrique - We used HDRI lighting in most shots. We also have used GI for openair scenes.