World’s First Online Anime Course Now Available In English

Anime Juku (www.anime-juku.com) is a web-based traditional animation course aimed at both beginning and professional animators. Initially offered in Japanese in April 2001, Telecom Animation Film co. Ltd. (www.telecom-anime.com) has created an English language version of the popular course and is now accepting students from around the world.
Courses are available for both beginners as well as those with animation experience. Emphasis is put on the dynamics of animation style character movement. This will greatly benefit anyone who wants to learn how anime characters are brought to life. The course provides the student with a wide variety of assignments. The beginner’s course takes the student though the techniques required for drawing anime step by step. By the time the student is done with the course, he/she should be able to draw simple animation scenes. The Standard course concentrates on dynamic character action for experienced animators.

The system is quite simple. The student signs in and chooses the assignment he/she interested in. Once that assignment is downloaded the student uses PencilMan School (offline) to do the necessary drawing to complete the assignment. Upon completion the assignment is compressed and uploaded to the Anime Juku server. The assignments are then graded and corrected and the student is notified via e-mail. The student can then log on and see his/her grade on the online Report Card and has up to 3 tries to get an A. Students who have all A’s and B’s will graduate and receive a certificate and a memento. Anime Juku is based on a special version of the award winning 2D software application RETAS Pro PencilMan (PencilMan School) developed by CELSYS Inc. (www.celsys.co.jp). PencilMan allows the animator to draw directly into the computer using a Wacom Intuos2 graphics tablet.

The Anime Juku site also has excellent resources for anyone interested in Japanese animation including an explanation of the production path used by anime studios and a glossary of anime terms. Information on course pricing and duration is available on the Anime Juku website.

Telecom Animation Film Co. Ltd. (www.telecom-anime.com) is an award-winning animation studio in Japan which has worked on such animation works as "LupinIII: Castle of Cagliostro", Feature; "Little Nemo", Feature; "Tiny Toon Adventures", TV Series; "Animaniacs", TV Series; "Pinkey and the Brain", TV Series; "Superman", TV Series; "Batman", TV Series; and "Cybersix", TV Series.

CELSYS Inc. (www.celsys.co.jp) is the Tokyo, Japan based developer of With over 10,000 installed systems worldwide, the award-winning RETAS!Pro (www.retas.com)is the industry standard for 2D animation software. RETAS software has been used to produce feature films and television series such as Pok�mon, Digimon, Batman, Superman, Spiderman, Princess Mononoke, Blue Submarine #6 and CYBERSIX.