Directed the web CM for Suntory Gin Sui Character concept by Tsubasa Yamaguchi, creator of Blue Period

YOASOBI "The Blessing" MV Animation Director Digital Animation

“Mr.” is the first music video in a collaborative project between YOASOBI and four Naoki Prize-winning authors. The song is based on the novel My Own Owner by Rio Shimamoto, and the music video was planned and directed with the idea of what it might look like if the world of the novel were animated. The story sequences were created through hand-drawn animation, while the music video feel was achieved by combining several forms of motion graphics. Character designs by pomodorosa.

Ending animation for Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, which aired from October to December 2022. This work is the first school-themed story in the Gundam series. The two characters appearing in the film are Suletta, a girl who transferred in from Mercury, and Miorine, the daughter of the president of a mobile suit development corporation group. Their relationship is portrayed through enclosed, garden-like spaces such as cockpits and the academy, as well as the curses they each bear, with mirrors and barriers evoked from the motif of “witch,” and those images are rendered more symbolically through reflected and refracted spaces using minerals as a metaphor.

Ending animation for Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury Season 2, broadcast from April to July 2023. To weave the story of Season 2 together through symbolic visuals, the main keywords were “synesthesia” and “dreamlike theater,” and the animation was created to move between the hearts of the protagonist Suletta (the red-haired girl) and Miorine (the white-haired girl). In the story, the two protagonists’ hearts continue to miss each other, and this was symbolically expressed by showing Suletta standing on a theater stage and Miorine projected from a film projector, physically passing by one another, representing their relationship. Within the main story, there are references reminiscent of Shakespeare’s play The Tempest, and the ED animation also begins with an opening shot inspired by stage drama. It was created with the image of characters who operate behind the scenes, as if making the two protagonists dance on the stage set called the school. On the other hand, by giving it a strong film-grain look, the animation symbolically expresses how the protagonists struggle against the story burned into film as “the curse of Gundam.”

“Chimera Project,” an original concept, story, and character design by voice actress Aoi Yuki. It tells the story of Chimerios, or chimeras, born from the words spoken by humans through virtual communication such as social media. The seven Chimerios are characters personifying the days of the week: for example, Monday is gloomy because it comes right after the weekend, while Friday has a carefree, party-loving personality because it comes just before the break. While expressing the Chimerios’ terrifying yet adorable world, the music video depicts their desire to eat the words spoken by humans.

A music video sung by the weekday Kymerio from “YUKI×AOI Chimera Project,” a project themed around the bestial transformation of words, for which Aoi Yuki serves as planner, original concept creator, and character designer. The story parts, created with hand-drawn animation, depict the mysterious Kymerios that devour words, along with the frightening side hidden beneath their adorable appearance. The cutout parts, assembled by taking the character pieces apart and turning them into digital stop-motion animation, highlight the Kymerios’ personality and charm. Composed of these two forms of expression, the video portrays the Kymerio’s dual nature.

Planned as part of Suntory’s #ZONe IMMERSIVE SONG PROJECT. A novel served as the basis for the story, which was then expressed as a music video. The specific narrative was abstracted and visualized graphically by combining hand-drawn animation and motion graphics.