Animator Spotlight: Chikashi Kubota

All gifs in order
Digimon Tamers: Runaway Locomon (2002)
Grrl Power (2004)
Re: Cutey Honey (2004)
Gunbuster 2 (2004)
Gurren Lagann Episode 14 (2007)
Gurren Lagann: Parallel Works (2008) Heavy AD by Yoh Yoshinari
Gurren Lagann: The Lights in the Sky are Stars (2009)
Attack on Titan (2013)
Space Dandy (2014) cuts shared with Yutaka Nakamura, Kiyotaka Oshiyama, and Norifumi Kugai
One-Punch Man (2015)
Flip Flappers (2016)
Atom: The Beginning (2017)
Dragon Ball Super: Broly (2018)
Raison D’etre (Eve Music Videos) (2019)
Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero (2022)
Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai (2022)

Happy Birthday Chikashi Kubota. For many of anime’s top animators, so much of what makes them special comes from the strength of their drawings/timing and Kubota feels like he has nearly maxed out those stats in regard to action and effects, with cuts brimming in seismic scale. Starting at Xebec and Toei before becoming part of the young brigade of early 00s Gainax talent (alongside Hiroyuki Imaishi, Sushio, and others), Kubota became the most formidable and adaptable member of the team. His skills ranged from productive effects on 1s, fast paced fights, and Itano Circuses to whom Kubota draws heavy influence from the inventor. He became a great freelancer on animes like One-Punch Man where he served the role of character designer, and the future Dragon Ball Super films where his style marred in the long lost days of mid 90s Dragon Ball Z bravado. Kubota is also a proficient digital animator, often opting to hybridize between paper and virtual applications. Without further ado, King Kubota.

As a young kid, Kubota lived in England as his parents were there for job related reasons. He admitted in class he did not understand a lot of what was being said so he would stick to drawing most of the time. Kubota began to copy manga strips, and started to learn animating through flipping pages. Once he returned to Japan, Dragon Ball got an anime adaptation to which Kubota took his biggest influence. Through animation he learned about animators such as Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru, and Masaki Sato who became gigantic influences on his future work.

Later into the late 90s, Kubota got his first initial work in the industry doing in-betweening on Martian Successor Nadesico. This was his Studio Xebec era, where he cut his teeth on shows like Love Hina, his involvement would eventually lead him to drop out and join Gainax. In Kubota’s words.

”When I started at Xebec I was busy to the point of exhaustion and I was there for about three years. There was a huge gap between the ideal animator I wanted to become and the effort I was putting in, so I realized I was getting no closer to my goal despite how physically and mentally exhausted I was. So I thought about quitting and actually did quit. Once I did, I thought about what I was so worried about on a daily basis. So in a sense I felt relief to get that off my back. Then I tried to do a different kind of work and it didn’t really suit me, so I went to Toei Animation. There I worked on a Digimon movie (Digimon Tamers Movie 6: The Runaway Digimon Express) with Sushio-san, who of course worked on the original FLCL. He’s two years older than me, so despite our close age, he has a very high level of skill. I looked up to him a lot, so from Sushio-san came the idea that I should join Gainax and work as an animation supervisor. So I participated in the regular interview process and joined. Once I joined, even though the level of work was high, it was fulfilling. I was able to see the gap closed compared to when I was working at Xebec. I definitely saw my skill level go up being surrounded by such talented individuals. It might be an exaggeration, but to me working for Gainax changed my life.”

To bring up the aforementioned Runaway Digimon Express, this would be the first instance Kubota really took off as an animator. sakugabooru.com/post/show/114364 he started to test his skills at an Itano circus and excel in volumetric rotations. He was also fairly decent at animating Digimon action goodness sakugabooru.com/post/show/114363.

Before his Gainax era its important noting another standout scene from early on the Ashita no Nadja OP

Kubota 1:10-1:22 highlights Kubota’s brisk pace yet being steady and beautiful with his drawings.

So with Kubota sitting at a new desk, he joined a new era of Gainax talent. He had already made acquaintances with them in 2001 where he animated alongside Hiroyuki Imaishi on a quick scene in Mahoramtic sakugabooru.com/post/show/184585\. Kubota was joined alongside the two very talented Imaishi and Sushio who had made their first mark on FLCL, and a few more including Atsushi Nishigori, and Akira Amemiya. In 2004, Gainax was incredibly busy. Dead Leaves, Re: Cutey Honey, and Gunbuster 2. Throughout the slew of work this year only a few shows align with his present day style.

On Dead Leaves Imaishi’s debut as a director Kubota is showing off more Imaishi traits due to heavy animation direction, with a lot of jerky cuts on 3s and 4s, but there are occasional moments on 1s and 2s when Kubota wants to get more fancy sakugabooru.com/post/show/120911\. This missile cut is a good example sakugabooru.com/post/show/120913\. Then you have works like that year like Grrl Power, and Re Cutey where you see more Kubota-isms take over. Fast cuts on 1s and 2s that are seemingly uninterrupted with any timing modulations sakugabooru.com/post/show/234637 sakugabooru.com/post/show/185202\. The Power cut sees Kubota’s character acting which I think is decent, definitely has similarities to some of Sushio’s albeit less expressive.

Throughout the run of Gunbuster 2 from 04-06 Kubota expressed some nice mid 00s Gainaxian action along with Sushio sakugabooru.com/post/show/224481 sakugabooru.com/post/show/224482\. Contrary to Sushio, Kubota is much more looser, and quicker with his timing, giving his scenes a greater sense of weight and scale.

After a year of full-tilt Gainaxing and freelancing, Sushio and Kubota’s minds came together on the impressive One Piece Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island

If you have been following the animator spotlight’s many of you may know how I have gushed and awed over the animation of this movie. With director Mamoru Hosoda at the helm, it is simultaneously the least detailed yet most impressively animated One Piece movies. Being only the sixth film in the franchise, its amazing Toei entrusted the movie to primarily a Gainax crew in the latter half along with several freelancers. This was Kubota, and Sushio’s first hand at character designs, while their third co-designer Takaaki Yamashita had previously done his debut designs on Digimon Adventure which was also with Hosoda. The film’s most obvious trait is how heavily it deviates from the show’s original look.

Most One Piece movies (especially during this period) stayed pretty close to the show adding more shading for dramatic effect. Two movies ago this was just apparent in a subtly more detailed approach to designs.

While in Movie 6, Hosoda strips everything back. Adding an almost abstract angularity to the characters, yet keeping much of the same charm intact.

While a lot of the initial input likely comes from Yamashita, on the AD side Sushio and Kubota smoothly guide the action. Made very apparent in the final fight, but also remains consistent earlier in the film sakugabooru.com/post/show/180742 for example this scene from Sushio has some DNA from Kubota as the ways the waves split from the boats resemble his work on Grrl Power. The last fight between the Baron and Luffy is a series highlight, and even invented a new sakuga term, the seldom used Hisashi Punch created by the enigmatic freelancer Hisashi Mori sakugabooru.com/post/show/180818\. Another cool fact about the film is Katsuyoshi Nakatsuru and Keisuke Masunaga were key animators on the film, I can’t even imagine how high spirited and excited Kubota was to meet his heroes for the first time.

Here’s a quick look into the art of the film, primarily drawn by Sushio.

After breaking ground on One Piece Kubota continued the winning streak the next year on The Girl Who Leapt through Time yet another Hosoda feature.

This was Kubota’s second work on AD and he does a great job. Many of the minds of Baron were present such as a few like Hiroyuki Aoyama, Hideki Hamasu and others. But Kubota would also make acquaintances with some young talents like Ryo-Timo who arguably does the most stand out segment of the film with the run scene sakugabooru.com/post/show/117179\. Kubota would later join Timo years later on Yozakura Quartet: Hoshi No Umi. Just another stand out on Kubota’s resume, yet would sadly be his last work with Hosoda.

Kubota’s departure wouldn’t be as big of an issue as his next contribution would be on to one of Gainax’s most seminal works Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Hiroyuki Imaishi’s magnum opus, and Yoh Yoshinari’s sakuga cakewalk. Also the shining star of Atsushi Nishigori’s designs. Despite the higher up talent decorated atop the candelabra of this animation utopia such as Amemiya, Sushio, and even the OG Gainax veteran Tadashi Hiramatsu, Kubota still manages to stand out. Kubota takes reign during the early half of the show animating a good chunk of character acting sakugabooru.com/post/show/62533 sakugabooru.com/post/show/112369\. Even shows up on the OP

Kubota 0:15-0:21
Though doing minimal work early on, his biggest standout would be his Itano Circus on Episode 14 sakugabooru.com/post/show/189839 an absolutely phenomenal display of missiles flying. Imaishi knew an Itano Circus is longstanding tradition in mecha and Kubota was the right person for the job sakugabooru.com/post/show/18983\.
On the movies Kubota only contributed to one scene and that was the quick sword fight with the Antispiral sakugabooru.com/post/show/202861\. Super tight and rapid animation on 1s, with the smoothest approach.

During the production of Gurren Lagann Kubota was also working on Mitsuo Iso’s *Dennou Coil doing minor character animation sakugabooru.com/post/show/159474 sakugabooru.com/post/show/161816, yet on Episode 25 he did some pretty invigorating action joined alongside Ryo-Timo, Ikuo Kuwana, and Takashi Mukouda ( <- Run with The Wind animator) sakugabooru.com/post/show/110554

From the late 2000s, to early 10s things were changing at Gainax. Though Kubota had contributed standout animation on the Corpse Princess OP sakugabooru.com/post/show/157583, and had been doing a ton of freelance work many of the best animators were leaving. After The Mystic Archives of Dantalian had an underwhelming reception it was pretty much lights out for the studio. Atsushi Nishigori had left to direct the Idolmaster, and Masahiko Otsuka and Hiroyuki Imaishi went on to found Studio Trigger comprised mostly of former Gainax animators and employees. This begins Kubota’s freelancing period. Breaking out of Gainax onto multiple other projects.

While not a particularly productive era from 2010-13 there are some highlights. Kubota’s work on Letter to Momo (likely brought on by Mukouda) is pretty decent even if overly AD’d by Masahiro Ando and Hiroyuki Okiura sakugabooru.com/post/show/16519\. His scene on Anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day to Kubota personally was one of the most emotionally powerful scenes he said he had ever animated on sakugabooru.com/post/show/126731.

The standout of the early 10s era of Kubota, came on Shinsekai Yori or From the New World

Coming right off of Anohana the early era of A1 Pictures was putting out some ambitious work for a young studio. Directed by Masashi Ishihama, the show adapted a still running manga a show about magical powers delved in a certain darker novel approach. Kubota was responsible for adapting Yusuke Kishii’s designs and he does a good job.

Capturing the galaxy wide eyes, of the main cast.
Kubota was AD on Episode 1, and 25. 25 being amazing with key animators like Masaru Sakamoto, Hironori Tanaka and others coming into the frame. The most standout is Takashi Kojima who does an incredible Tanaka-inspired scene sakugabooru.com/post/show/19592\.

2013 wasn’t too crazy with Kubota doing a little cut on the Attack on Titan OP sakugabooru.com/post/show/108227, but then he came on to Space Dandy!

With Shingo Natsume and industry game changer Shinichiro Watanabe at the helm Dandy was a thriving environment for all types of animators young and old to show off their stuff. Kubota tells what came of the experience.

”My most significant memory of working on Space Dandy were the many different styles used by the animators. The creators were free to do as they pleased with the series, almost too much. The staff also had a lot of liberties so it was a fun project work on. There were a lot of ideas thrown into the melting pot. My role was more traditional in the sense that I was mostly following what the character designer wanted and bringing to a level what the other styles brought into play. In a sense I was matching the other animators and creators with an orthodox style.”

Kubota had done some character acting early in the show doing a cute dance sequence sakugabooru.com/post/show/196745, he once again then proved he can animate an Itano Circus on Episode 23 sakugabooru.com/post/show/8688\.
The most standout would be Episode 26, where a quartet of animators put their brains together. First Kiyotaka Oshiyama, a former Xebec animator like Kubota who came to prominence working on Ghibli films, and being a wild card of glorious animation. Next Norifumi Kugai, a young webgen animator who at the time who’s looser style got the attention of Natsume. Last, and certainly not least is Bones destroyer of worlds Yutaka Nakamura. One of the most influential sakuga animators of all time Nakamura brings any scene to life with his contrasting sense of scale, and super powered dynamic fights, and here is no different.

Kubota from 06-08, shares cuts with the four from 09-017.
Kubota digitally animated in the snake like beings, you can see it more prominently in the genga sakugabooru.com/post/show/13542\. Almost forgot to mention legendary Austrian freelancer Bahi JD does the final explosion and shot of Dandy, wrapped in his art-style.

The next year, Kubota would keep coming with the bangers working on Shingo Natsume’s and Madhouse’s adaptation of One-Punch Man

A freelancer daydream, the show was brought to life by some of the most incredible talent in the industry thanks to the serious connections Shingo Natsume had. Kubota was brought on as Chief Animation Director, and AD’d Episode 1,12 and the OP

The show is filled to the brim with so many highlights its hard to even put in to words. Best put in Kubota’s words.

“When I first received the request from Natsume-kantoku, I had heard about the series. I hadn’t had a chance to actually review or read it, so at that point, I took a look at it. I knew Murata-sensei and was aware of him. When I did read the manga, there was an impression left from the very first chapters. There was a scene with a purple creature, the big monster from the very first one, and I was shocked at the quality of artwork involved in the comic and felt a lot of pressure as a character designer to replicate that work and make it a reality for the anime version.”

In the same interview Kubota clears up a common misconception that high-quality animation isn’t based on budget but skill of respective animators, with One-Punch Man it was primarily freelancers.

”A lot of people have this common misconception that the quality of the actual animation is based on the production’s budget. But in Japan, the TV production world, especially when it comes to anime, generally they all have the same budget. There are really rare situations where some have a little less and some tend to have a little bit more, but nothing that is very drastic. So, in reality, it is based on the staff."

With that in mind the show has a slew of talent, and I can’t mention them all. Kubota brought on some great animation directors with Se-Jun Kim of Gundam Build fame, Yoshimichi Kameda from Bones, and even great in-house Madhouse staff like Hidehiko Sawada. Even legendary Madhouse director Yoshiaki Kawajiri storyboarded Episode 8 and 11. The talent on hand is mind-blowing that this many titans in sakuga, even for the time were here.

The only scene Kubota contributed sakuga for was on Episode 12, with the final fight between Saitama and Boros. A relay race of animators, and arguably a contender on top ten anime fights of the 2010s.

We open with prominent Symphogear and Jojo animator Fumiaki Kouta from 1:36 to 2:09 doing some more limited action yet carried by strong drawings. Right after comes Attack on Titan animator Arifumi Imai who’s deliberately detailed effect animation is visually stunning and tooth gritting. Some of the mileage he’s able to get out of the probably once more simply boarded scenes is awe inspiring. Next Takashi Tomioka delivers Boros’s energy blast, I love the heavy hatching in his drawings likely brought on by Gosei Oda who was action AD. Washio follows up after with a punch. Isao Hayashi and Norimoto Tokura then do the power up with Tokura handling the successive punches.

Yutaka Nakamura then handles the tower action portion doing one of his best scenes ever. Nakamura was brought on as a special guest star, and even his non-Bones roles he shows out more than necessary, even showing Imai out. Not only are we getting Yutapon Cubes and Kutsuna Lightning but the impact frames are depth defying with him animating a total of 18

Gosei Oda delivers the kick from Boros, and Shin Ogasawara sends Saitama back with the space cut. Hidehiko Sawada comes on Boros’s initial onslaught with Saitama blowing a single gut punch having him cough up blood. Norifumi Kugai follows through with Saitama’s rapid punches breaking Boros apart then reclaiming himself back together, with Yoshimichi Kameda dealing the Collapsing Star Roaring Cannon!, and Chikashi Kubota sending it right back to him

An anime event for the ages

A quick gallery of Kubota’s design sheets. Still amazing he didn’t read the manga before pre-production even started

Kubota mentioned a "purple guy" (Vaccine Man) that he tried his hardest to replicate Murata’s style, and he came really close despite a lot of the hatching not being present and him Dragon Ball-ifying the original

Kubota’s finished genga

vs Murata

not only is Kubota paying great tribute to the character designs, art director Shigemi Ikeda and Yukiko Maruyama do a great job of adapting Murata's background designs as well, even with their own unique take.

After dealing a serious success on One-Punch Man, Kubota took a victory lap of sorts by hopping back on to freelancing. First on Flip Flappers doing a great scene on Episode 6 sakugabooru.com/post/show/27304\. Then Kubota takes his first trip on to magical girl transformation on Six Heart Princess doing a super detailed and vivid cut. I love the character drawing the kanji with fire.

Kubota 0:09-end

On the grandiosely storyboarded Atom The Beginning OP by Bahi JD, Kubota contributes to the fantastically animated robot fight. A shame this didn’t carry over into the show’s actual animation

Kubota 1:21-1:27

In 2018, Kubota was brought on to the highly lauded after FLCL Progressive

The Force Awakens of anime ahaha. Progressive was a show that happened, and many talented people worked on show. Kubota said these things about the show

As far as the production of FLCL itself, it happened irrespective of Adult Swim in a sense. It started as any other animation project. The original FLCL is legendary so there may be fans that think it should stand alone and a sequel isn’t necessary. So we thought how can we recreate this project in a modern sense with a new team? I wasn’t really involved in the initial creation process since I was invited to the team by someone I knew. So I joined and worked on the character design.

While not reaching the quality of the original at all, I have to give Kubota props for at least giving his take on the original designs. They are more modern and look fairly good. Episode 5 was pretty standout with Kei Suezawa adding jagged line art and reducing details, making it the most standout episode of the show.

...moving on