Original Art Work

We produced a brand film for ALPINE, a premium car audio brand from Japan with fans around the world. The concept is “SOUNDWARDS / Toward Better Sound.” A simple yet powerful brand message — that where the best sound resonates, the best people gather and the best spaces are created — is expressed through dynamic visuals and music. An amazing live performance, and the ultimate space created by the audience gathered there. The feeling of being drawn toward that space is portrayed through dynamic camera work, making extensive use of drones. The music is by KAITO, also known as Hiroshi Watanabe, who is internationally recognized for releases on Germany’s largest label. The video direction and DP were handled by Senzo Ueno, and the overall planning and production were done in collaboration with the creative agency Drill.

A work in which, inside a confined room, a single line weaves lyrics together as if placing all hope in them.

A launch film for the colored contact lens brand "IamMe". To visually integrate the product concept of “cosmetics lenses,” which applies the color approaches of hair color and cosmetics to colored contacts, along with the lens manufacturing process and wearing imagery, the film is structured into three continuous parts. Assuming it would be used as social media advertising, the person in the wearing imagery was not filmed in live action but instead deliberately created as a CGI virtual human. By combining the realism of a flesh-and-blood body with excessively aesthetic skin and eye textures that seem to have passed through a photo filter, the film emphasizes the lens’s dot design while creating a sense of positive discomfort.

A music video produced to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the release of The Weeknd’s 2011 hit song “Echoes Of Silence.”

【OPEN HUB Monoliths】 An entrance that recognizes visitors as partners in co-creation and welcomes them in. Seven life-size displays stand around the entrance space, linked to the check-in system, and project immersive visuals featuring personal graphics (OPEN HUB Personal Logo) generated from each guest’s initials, profession, and other details, welcoming them as members of OPEN HUB. The generated “OPEN HUB Personal Logo” becomes a symbol of communication that bridges the real and virtual, changing in response to online and offline activities at “OPEN HUB.” 【OPEN HUB Visualizer】 A massive display where you can experience the Smart World through data visualization. Data held by companies engaged in co-creation is collected, stored, and analyzed using the “Smart Data Platform,” then visualized on a huge LED display measuring approximately 3 m × 10 m. Through this dynamic, data-driven installation experience, it encourages the creation of new value.

I imagined this work from the concept of the girls in “Ne mo Ha mo Rumor” winning the Japanese dance championship and then appearing at the world championship as Japan’s representatives next. When I was told about this MV project, I wanted to incorporate something new, so aside from the giant monolithic structure that appears in the video, everything was newly developed for this MV. That includes 20 battery-powered wireless moving lights, 40 LED poles, and the WAVING LED RIBBON that appears in the bridge section. The stage set itself does not move, and I wanted to break away from the idea of “things that are behind the performers.” So I decided to try a theme where the artists and the space become one. In this MV, ribbon performers come right up close to the members’ faces, and by making the moving lights wireless, they can be placed even on the dance floor, allowing beams of light fused with the members to dance together. The LED poles also continuously change shape, dancing alongside the members by mimicking the hand motions of their right and left arms. While keeping the artists at the center, this MV keeps expanding the space around them. I have mainly worked on live performance direction up until now, and AKB48 also value the kind of live, in-the-moment experience you get in theater performances, so this MV was produced with the image of watching one show all the way through. I think there is a certain comfort in watching a performance continuously, and there are always new discoveries no matter how many times you watch it, so I hope people will watch it again and again. I don’t think I’ll be able to pour this much passion into something for a while（笑）。

This stop-motion animation was created by printing digitally produced graphics and filming them one frame at a time. It uses a risograph, a type of silkscreen printing machine, and six kinds of paper with distinctive textures. When printed with a risograph, irregularities and misalignments occur in the prints. In the film, these factors created a unique feel and texture. As a result, the visuals of the data created digitally and the printed data changed significantly. This phenomenon can be applied to “information.” For a single fact, different outputs—such as the angle from which it is framed or the way it is communicated—can create inconsistencies and shifts in impression even when the content is the same. In addition, when information passes through the filters of the receiver’s emotions, culture, and stance, an entirely different interpretation is ultimately produced. These are not negative things, but positive elements that generate new visual forms and interpretations. Isn’t ambiguity, rather than black or white, the diversity required in the coming era? This film translates such ideas into visual expression and has been completed as a work that suits the new post-COVID era.

Produced in collaboration with FUJIFILM DESIGN CENTER CLAY. The piece was created using stop-motion animation. It depicts the process of logo figures merging and giving birth to a new figure.

About the work A man trudges through the same place again and again in a dim wasteland, as if dragging his weary body behind him. His doubles, replicated like afterimages, drift through the air, forming a huge mass that hovers over his head. On the ground, tentacles cling to him as if to hinder his steps. Before long, the man collapses to the ground and sinks into a mental realm. A visual work that depicts modern people, constantly exposed to information and living alongside complex human relationships, in an unfamiliar brilliance. The contours and boundaries of the self, shaped by self-awareness, waver, mutate, and dissolve. It portrays human beings living through this cycle. Directed and produced by the unit of Ryo Kitabatake and Takuma Sasaki, winners of Best of Stash and the Telly Award Gold. Filmed at Dimension Studio in London using the latest volumetric imaging technology, with music by Max Cooper. Max Cooper How many artists over the past decade have, like Max Cooper, reexamined and expanded the relationship between electronic music, visual art, technology, and science? Through collaborations with artists and institutions across disciplines, including the Barbican Centre, Zaha Hadid Architects, and Dolby Atmos, Cooper works with a mixed-media approach to create immersive installations, psychoacoustics, visual art, and electronic music. Max Cooper▶ maxcooper.net/ Dimension Studio Dimension Studio is a London studio that provides innovative volumetric and real-time production for creating next-generation virtual production, digital humans, and XR content. With production studios based in the UK and the US, as well as mobile environments operating around the world, it is committed to bringing the virtual entertainment of the future to life. Dimension Studio▶ dimensionstudio.co/

Focus on the glitchy cat.

I was in charge of the animation for NHK Minna no Uta’s “Boku no Naka no Guitar Case” (“Me Inside the Guitar Case”). The image that came to mind was of a humble, steadfast me, living each day while carrying worries and anxieties. Turning the various thoughts and realizations that arise in everyday life into music, and that music enriching my life. I wanted to depict that adorable little life. I also felt that this song was not only for those who dream of becoming musicians, but for everyone who is pursuing different kinds of dreams. So I decided to make the animation feel like a collection of pieces from an ordinary, simple life. This time, the protagonist is me, carrying a guitar case, but I think many of you may find your own lives reflected in it as well. I hope your everyday lives will come to feel dear and precious to you. *The video shown is silent due to licensing restrictions.