Anime Voices of a Distant Star

[Syk3]

I didn't see a topic for this anime in the thread directory, so I decided to go ahead and make this thread. It's only a half hour, sure, but the movie is rather impressive.

For those of you who havn't heard about this anime, it was created by a man and his wife on their home computers (I'm assuming they had more than one) and took close to five years to make. The guy handed out bootlegged copies to his friends and such, and needless to say he soon got a huge contract with an anime company. It's so awesome, because he and his wife basically created this whole thing from scratch, and since there are only two main characters, and they're the only ones that talk, they both voiced their respective characters, haha.

The story takes place in the future and follows a young couple, split by the tides of war. The girl chooses to join the military right out of high school to fight these invading aliens using high tech mechs, and the guy is left on Earth trying to live his life. Forcing them from the Earth's atmosphere, she helps the military persue these aliens to unknown planets and galaxies, keeping in contact with her boyfriend by text messaging through cellphones. Due to the time difference, however, it often takes years for the messages to arrive, and by that time the girl may have moved to a different galaxy. As you may have guessed, it's really a heart warming story as it examines how the couple deals with a [i]really[/i] long distance relationship when they both very much love each other.

I saw this anime in my school's anime club, but I might have missed a little bit of it when I went to get the pizzas from the front office. :/ The animation is absolutely steller, probably some of the best that I've seen in any anime. Due to the fact that it was made with technology that is not often used to make anime, however, some of the characters faces look slightly different than ordinary anime, the noses in particular.

So who else has seen this anime, and what did you think?

[Panda]

Voice of a Distant Star is wonderful. Makoto Shinkai is truly a talented artist. The art is beautiful, great long distance love story and what makes it even better for me is how much dedication it must have taken to stick with this project. If you watch the DVD there is also a interview with the creator that was very interesting, an addition to the DVD that was worth watching. Highly recommended to those who have not seen it yet.

[Guest tearsofglass]

I'm just curious on what programs were used to create Voices of a Distant Star. If anybody could give me a list or something, I'd really appriciate it.

[LazLong]

I just saw this recently after catchng part of "5mm per second" at Otakon, and it is fantastic. I can't wait to see the rest of what this artist has to offer. I would pay money ust to watch the backgrounds in "5mm" ... just amazing.

As for Voices of a Distant Star, I really loved the simple nature of how the story was told. It's such a simple story told against a hgh tech bacground. The contrast between those two elements was brilliant.

I watched the interview with the artist on the DVD and I think he pretty much did everything on his Mac.

Has anyone seen any of his other films?

Laz

[Panache]

I saw this. The whole concept was what got me. It was sad and almost inspiring at the same time. I tried to watch Early Days a few times but I was just to tired to try and grasp the subject matter. I will get around to it one of these days though.

[LazLong]

I agree. it's been a while since anything I've watched has really grabbed me like that movie. Definitely want to check out more from the creator. I don't think "5 cm" will be coming out till next year in the states. It tells 3 stories and I'd put it on par with "Voices"