Heartwarming story of Ochibi & the beauty of Japan’s 4 seasons told through stop-motion animation.

ochibi-stop-motion-animation_cover

Masashi Kawamura is the director of a creative lab called PARTY. For this project he collaborated with renowned manga-artist Moyoco Anno who created the character of “Ochibi” (オチビサン).

Ochibi japan
[Left] Nazeni: A smart dog who is always reading a book and asking questions. [Middle] Ochibi: A boy who is curious about everything. [Right] Pankui: A gourmand dog who loves baking bread.

The comic series “The Diary of Ochibi” centres around the life of Ochibi and is written around the 4 seasons.

The Teaser

To be able to produce the other seasons, the project is now on indiegogo with a crowdfunding campaign. Below are the visual ideas for the animations of the other seasons.

Ochibi short movie 4 seasons japan
Summer: Traditional bamboo fan
Ochibi short movie 4 seasons japan
Autumn: Fallen leaves
Ochibi short movie 4 seasons japan
Winter: Japanese traditional tea cup

The development

The project originated when Masashi Kawamura was invited to participate in the “Japan Anima(tor)’s Exhibition”, which starts autumn 2015. A team has been gathered to make this film come to life: The animation will be drawn by the animators from Khara, Inc. and led by Hideaki Anno (the film director of “Evangelion”). The animation will be converted into stop motion by the studio dwarfinc which is well known for animations like “Domo-kun” for NHK.

Ochibi short movie 4 seasons japanOchibi short movie 4 seasons japanochibi-stop-motion-animationOchibi short movie 4 seasons japanOchibi short movie 4 seasons japan

If you`re interested in supporting this project check out their crowdfunding campaign over at indiegogo which still runs until  7th February 2015.