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Translator's Note: Kunio Okawara Walker, published by Kadokawa Shoten in August 2015, is a career retrospective dedicated to the mechanical designer Kunio Okawara. It includes an interview discussing Okawara's background and the early years of his career, which I've translated here. |
So just who is Kunio Okawara? What kind of profession is mechanics design? We've traced the origins of Japan's first and strongest mechanics designer, from Mr. Okawara's birth and upbringing to the making of his masterpiece, Mobile Suit Gundam.
I come from an old family that's lived in the same house since the Edo period. Our house had a storehouse filled with antique machines that had been entrusted to us by relatives, like grandfather clocks and hand-cranked record players. So ever since I was a child, I was always taking them apart and playing around with them. Back then, machines were typically analog devices, so the functions of the parts and the power source were clearly visible. To a child's mind, figuring out how they were constructed was more interesting than anything.
And I think the teacher who taught arts and crafts when I was in elementary school also had a big influence. We had lessons where we built and flew rockets made from thin sheets of aluminum, and made brooches from polyester resin. It was an ordinary elementary school, but looking back at it now, letting grade-schoolers work with polyester resin must have been pretty unusual even at the time.
Sometimes, we also had lessons on "building moving toys." Once time I made a doll whose limbs moved when you pressed its head. Of course we also had drawing classes, but to me, the handicrafts were much more fun.
That's right. Then I enrolled in Tokyo Zokei University, which had only just been established. In my first year I studied graphic design, but in my second year I transferred to textile design. Since it was a newly established school, the first class of students had a special exemption allowing them to change majors.
After graduation, I inevitably got a job in the clothing industry. At first I joined Onward Kashiyama and was working on menswear, but I just couldn't find it interesting. (laughs) So I decided to quit when my probationary period ended, and I started a new job at the baby clothing company "Otogi no Kuni" which was headquartered in Kobe. That's actually where I met my wife. But if we were getting married, it seemed inappropriate for a husband and wife to be working at the same company. I decided to quit that job as well, and as I was wondering what to do next, I happened to see a job advertisement from Tasunoko Pro.
At first, though, I was going to be a production assistant. There weren't many people back then who had driver's licenses. But I joined the art department instead on the advice of the executive director, Mr. Kenji Yoshida, who said "After all, you went to the trouble of graduating from an art school." If it hadn't been for that, I'd probably have quit Tatsunoko pretty quickly, too. (laughs)
For the first three months after I joined the art department, I was studying basic techniques for painting backgrounds. In the middle of my training, Mr. Mitsuki Nakamura of the art department asked me if I'd like to draw some mecha for Science Ninja Team Gatchaman. Since I was a novice, at first I couldn't draw very well, but perhaps Mr. Nakamura was thinking of it as a kind of test.
Before long, Mr. Nakamura said he was having trouble doing all the background art and mecha design by himself, so he was going to leave the mecha to me. I was very grateful that he'd entrust such an important job to a new employee who was little better than an amateur.
But mecha design doesn't just mean drawing robots and aircraft. If it's required for the drama, you have to design everything down to a pair of scissors or individual screws. So a single episode of Gatchaman might yield up to seventy pages of setting. Of course, I was also drawing backgrounds like base interiors that were primarily mechanical.
In short, the job of mecha design involves preparing all the stage setting and props required for the drama. But in the sense that you're constructing a worldview from scratch, I think that's the true pleasure, the really interesting part.
Actually, when Gatchaman was over, I was supposed to go back to doing background art. But strangely enough, the mecha design work continued with Hurricane Polimar and Tekkaman the Space Knight. Around the time of Gordam, I asked the company if they'd let me start working from home. I took advantage of that to stealthily work for other companies as well. (laughs)
I was 27 years old, so it was exactly three years after I joined. But I was still under exclusive contract with Tatsunoko, so I continued working mainly for them, on things like the "Time Bokan" series.
When it comes to mecha design, everyone just wants to do cool things, but it's also fun to try doing comical mecha like Yatterman. I've been able to do that and serious mecha at the same time, and personally I learned a lot from that.
First of all, it's no good trying to force yourself to draw mecha like that in a cute way. If you let professional calculations take precedence, they generally won't be cute or interesting. If you relax, and have fun drawing loosely, they'll be more visually attractive.
Right. We were originally introduced by Mr. Yoshikazu Tochihira, a producer who'd gone from Tatsunoko to Sunrise. I got along well with Mr. Eiji Yamaura, who was the planning chief at the time. He told me about the company's business situation, the plans for their upcoming programs, and all sorts of other things, down to the smallest details. Thanks to that, I felt like they could guarantee me work for the next two or three years.
Particularly in the case of Sunrise, they were trying to cover the budget for creating high-quality anime with royalty income from merchandising rights. In other words, from the planning stages onward, they were thinking about selling the characters as toys. I was very fortunate to have been associated with such an aggressive young company from an early stage.
Yes. My first job for them was internal diagrams for Robokko Beeton, but as far as planning, my involvement began with Sunrise's first original work, Daitarn 3. But Bullmark, which was supposed to sponsor Daitarn 3, went bankrupt in the middle of the planning. Thus Super Machine Zambot 3, which they'd been working on with Clover, ended up going first.
It was around that time I started making wooden models for presentations. In those days, TV programs were made on the basic premise that the characters would be turned into toys, so the program itself would never materialize unless you'd come up with the combination and transformation gimmicks beforehand.
Since I wasn't the kind of person who naturally liked drawing pictures, I thought it would be quicker if I did the presentations by actually making a three-dimensional object. Ever since I was a child, handicrafts were always my strong point.
That's right. My initial vision for the products was that the Gundam would be centered on the Core Fighter, and the upper and lower parts could be interchanged. So in my design the Core Fighter was exposed, but when the animation direction Mr. Yoshikazu Yasuhiko cleaned it up, he changed the design so that the Core Fighter was completely stowed away.
With the calves as well, the director Mr. Yoshiyuki Tomino said "I want to go all-out." So although they were originally designed with a more mechanical form, Mr. Yasuhiko changed them to create a more humanoid silhouette.
I think that's fine, though. I'm not an artist, so if the director requests it, I'll even design a Yatterman-style Gundam. I'd never mutter something like "The Gundam has to be like this!" After all, the original motif for the Gundam's head was just a chonmage topknot. (laughs)
Well, I can't make anime programs all by myself. I've never had any notion that I had a great design sense or was good at drawing. The ultimate craftsman is someone who can handle any offer, and I'm just steadily working day after day towards that goal.
Mobile Suit Gundam is copyright © Sotsu • Sunrise. Everything else on this site, and all original text and pictures, are copyright Mark Simmons.
