Because ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ never had a chapter on this

NOTE:  This was bumped up to the top of the blog since in the comments there were more answers added that you may have missed.  Come and enjoy if you have not seen them yet.

From, ‘whats the best way to work in anime?’ to the ever present, ‘How do I become a voice actor?’ there seems to be a lot of interest with how to break into the anime industry. I thought why not set the record straight and share some of the answers we’ve managed to pass along over the years. So here are couple of the more popular questions and because it wouldn’t be much of an article without them, we give you answers as well.

How do you break into the anime industry?

A very popular question, and one that doesn’t have any one answer.  The truth is almost everyone I work with, have worked with, or know from other anime companies got into this industry in a different way.  I will tell you that luckily there are a wide variety of jobs in anime that include marketing, graphic design, production, translations, writing, and, of course, voice acting. I can say that there are a few things that no matter what you are going for in anime will help you greatly with achieving your goal.

list of important items

1. Education – Be it a college degree or drama classes you have to have some advance knowledge of the area you want to work in.  Having an advance knowledge of anime will also greatly help you succeed.  I don’t just mean naming every character from DBZ (Mr. Popo rocks!) but more about how you tie your education in your field and anime to better help the company you will be working for.  Even the Accountant at an anime company can work better knowing how long One Piece is so they can expect to see sales profits coming in for a very, very, very long time.

2. Experience – Having worked in anime before naturally helps.  Of course this doesn’t help when you are trying to break into the industry. Show you have worked in your field outside of anime as well as have stayed active in external anime related things.  Example: 2 years experience working as a customer service rep for IBM and vice president of your local library’s anime club.

3. Passion – This I’m sure comes pretty easy with you if you are reading this.  One of the greatest things about the anime industry is that if you don’t have a passion for anime you won’t last all to long in it.  With the long hours and short deadlines you must be willing to work long hours for something you love as well as be able to understand what makes the fans happy almost immediately.  If you don’t have passion anime may not be for you.

What is the best way to talk to someone in the industry and not come off too…otaku?

This is actually easier than you may think.  Most people I work with are fans and love to talk about anime just as much as you, but I do have to say I have had more pleasant discussions with some fans than others.  This is mostly due to a few key things that you should keep in mind when talking to someone from the industry at convention, online, or any place else for that matter.

Ask questions

You would be amazed how many people miss this simple step or stray away from it after the inital contact.  Most industry types are more receptive to hearing your question about why a certain DVD was delayed by a week than a 10 minute monologue full recap of the Freza saga.  This doesn’t mean that you should only ask questions.  Be sure to add your two-cents when it fits.

Respect their time

Though most industry people would love to sit and talk to great lengths about all things anime they are not always able to do so.  Whenever possible it’s good to gauge how busy they may be before starting up a conversation.  For example, if I’m on the booth and there are only a few people there and I’m not talking to any of them that is a great time to talk shop but when I’m running down the hall heading some place that may not be the best time to chat.

Don’t talk about your fansub or bootleg collection

Talking about how you are not buying DVD’s since you are downloading fansubs or purchasing knock off plushy is a terrible way to start a conversation.  This screams, “I want to support anime but not enough to actually purchase some’.  With many industry people pushing anime DVD’s every day this is a topic always on their mind.

Don’t be a jerk

We understand that you may not like our product or that we did something that really made you mad.  We make mistakes and from time to time strange things happen and are more than happy to listen to your problems.  Running up and yelling demands and insults – not the best approach if you actually want the best help to fix your problem.  It is better to express your feelings in a calm manner.  You don’t need to sugar coat how you feel, it actually helps us if we know exactly what happened, but problems are easier to fix with more understood information than yelling ‘you —holes —-ed up favorite show!!’.

Alright, Here are conventions coming up this weekend:

Delta H Con April 24 – 26, Houston TX, University of Houston Main Campus in the UC Center

Tora-con April 25, Rochester NY, Rochester Institute of Technology

Arkansas Anime Festival April 25, Cosmopolitan Hotel, Fayetteville AR

Next week: Anime Central preview

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87 Responses to “Because ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ never had a chapter on this”

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  • 76
    Mario1-7 on April 28th, 2009 at 6:03 pm says:

    @Tyrenol@
    Off-Topic ▼


  • 77
    Adam S. on April 28th, 2009 at 6:09 pm says:

    For every rescue title beyond the initial shows we received from Geneon and the Shojitz/ARM deal we have to go through the same acquisition process as we would for any other new show. The speed of these are on a case by case basis so there isn’t really an average time we have noticed so far.

    For any product that has already been dubbed and released we usually get all the materials available and this helps speed things up greatly. It can make a show move from a 9 month release window to a 4-6 month time line.


  • 78
    Nekomimimode on April 28th, 2009 at 6:11 pm says:

    @Mario1-7

    I just had to chime in. I suspect that part of the reason why Bandai can get things faster to market is that essentially Bandai Japan = Bandai that we know in the US of A. They’re ultimately owned by the same company, so cooperation is easier between the two, and if Bandai Japan has a brand odds are those rights automatically extend to the Bandai we deal with locally. Whereas a company like FUNimation is much more of an independent anime company and has to contract for those properties instead of knowing they’re more or less coming their way already.

    It’s kinda like this, if you had a car that you bought, you’re more inclined to let a family member drive it without giving them a hard time about it, but if it’s an aquaintance or neighbor that wants to drive it, you don’t as easily just toss over the keys.


  • 79
    Tyrenol on April 28th, 2009 at 6:19 pm says:

    @ Mario

    Spoiler ▼


  • 80
    Tyrenol on April 28th, 2009 at 6:25 pm says:

    @ Nekomimimode

    What Bandai was doing was fine. “Eliminate the middleman and the world becomes your stage.”

    But then Bandai became Bancolding$. And everything they created from Gundam Seed and onwards became garbage.

    I guess “driving someone else’s car” would make a lot more sense since you’d buy it from a legitimate used-car dealer. :)


  • 81
    Mario1-7 on April 28th, 2009 at 6:33 pm says:

    @Tyrenol@

    Spoiler ▼


  • 82
    Prede on April 28th, 2009 at 6:36 pm says:

    Mario1-7: To answer a question that got lost in the shuffle, Bandai dubbed Kurokami so fast, because they dubbed off of the storyboards, and incomplete animation, this way by the time all the animation in Japan was done, the dubbing here was too, and the dubbing there was done. This was done with a lot of help from the Japanese and their ties to the Japanese companies probally helped out a lot. This allowed for a simulcast. I must imagine it still cost them a lot of money, and was not too easy to do either. I can’t imagine dubbing off storyboards would be too easy… Plus the fact that it’s on a TV channel no one has, probally won’t do much to stop the fansubs. But it was a great test, and a nice effert to beat them to the punch. If it worked out well for them, maybe they can attempt it again, only get it on a more mainstream station? That might help kill the fansubs for a show.

    Adam S: I have a question for you, how will the sequels to the Geneon titles (for example “When They Cry 2″) be handled? Will Geneon license the next series for these shows that they want and you guys will just do distrobution? Or will Funimation directly license the titles, and Geneon will license anything new? I know you may not know the answer to that, but if you have any clues it be nice. Thanks ;)


  • 83
    Baru on April 28th, 2009 at 6:39 pm says:

    Spoiler ▼

    Moving back on topic…

    Does FUNimation being a distributor for Geneon make it any easier or harder to license sequels to former Geneon titles? And also, do you know if FUNimation is looking to license them at all at some point?
    I have noticed that after the original distribution deal, FUNimation has been taking upon it a number of other former Geneon titles, such as the just-announced Heat Guy J, so would acquiring sequel titles require a similar process?
    From reading the earlier post, I’m grateful for FUNimation for prioritizing the license of great new titles like Soul Eater and such, however I’m sure fans would want to finish the stories of the titles they started, so again, I’d be glad to know if FUNimation is at least considering the titles.


  • 84
    Tyrenol on April 29th, 2009 at 8:55 am says:

    Spoiler ▼


  • 85
    Adam S. on April 29th, 2009 at 9:10 am says:

    For any sequels or continuing seasons for the shows we acquired from Geneon we would work directly with the Japanese licensor. We won’t need an companies in the middle to help facilitate this process moving forward.

    I do not know if Geneon has any plans to license anything in the future. One can always hope.

    Distributing shows that we originally acquired from Geneon is similar to the distribution deals we have with 4Kids and Nelvanna. It’s not as much easier or harder and more a different way to proceed. Working through another company means adding in a few more procedures to think about when putting out a DVD.

    FUNimation has no plans to acquire Geneon. Most, if not all, of the remaining shows that they had that we didn’t pick up in the first batch have gone back to the original Japanese licensors so any negotiations for these titles and their sequels will be a direct discussion.


  • 86
    joelgundam01 on April 29th, 2009 at 2:31 pm says:

    @Rojas

    We need a category called “The Top Spot” and have this post in it. That way you won’t need to keep on bumping it up. :)


  • 87
    zwei on May 14th, 2009 at 3:29 pm says:

    i’ve always had something in mind dear funimation, after reading all that long post, i want to make clear first show i like, show i buy “if it’s available that is.” anyhow, throughout the time, i’ve come to hate one specific fact, of the dvd relases.
    wich is:
    *** the quality control over the on time screen subtitles, and concatenation.
    what i mean by this?
    what i mean is, say: a scene where u have 2 characters asking/answering
    at this point in time in the 95% of every dvd’s i’ve ever bought is the same deal. the subtitle shows up as follow:
    - Hiroki what are you doing?
    - i am getting ready to go home.
    just as it is, doesn’t seem like a big deal huh… and now is where people say: this dude, is out of his mind etc etc.
    but hey: the dvd releases are all like that through out the whole episode, although the vast majority of DVD’s disregard the translation of the signs, there are some every now and then for example, letters, love letters, important signs, etc.
    when you add those 2 simple lines, to say the translation of a love letter, you end up having a load of text on screen, i’m not joking, you see not least than 6 or 7 lines on screen, and the pixel type is what 720*480, that means u almost have half screen full of text.
    i saw it in every dvd’s i’ve ever bought, since i mainly get romance type shows, i got to see those kind of things very often.
    the worst case i’ve ever seen was in “happy lesson” **shrugs**

    now the deal is this dear funimation although i support all of your work, i’d like to ask this:
    is there a professional reason, that keeps R1 anime companies, from translating the signs and blend em into the video? to avoid those glitches?
    and ost of the times, i know they decide on not tling the signs at all now a days but to me that is kind of a drop down in the quality rls, the reason being that the vast majority wants to know, what some of the real life size untranslated signs means, they are so big that can hardly be ignored, yet there is no translation of it in the dvd, is kind of buggy.

    i may have posted this in the wrong place, but i would like to have an answer to that if possible.


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