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Modeling the Process of Animation Production

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 Modeling the Process of Animation Production

Paper:

Modeling the Process of Animation Production

Hisato Nakanishi∗ , Naohiro Shichijo∗∗ , Masao Sugi∗∗∗ ,
Taiki Ogata∗ , Tatsunori Hara∗ , and Jun Ota∗
∗
The University of Tokyo
5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8568, Japan
E-mail: ota@race.u-tokyo.ac.jp
∗∗ National Institute for Science and Technology Policy

3-2-2 Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku 100-0013, Japan

∗∗∗ The University of Electro-Communications

1-5-1 Chofugaoka, Chofu-shi, Tokyo 182-8585, Japan

[Received February 18, 2013; accepted April 8, 2013]

In this study, a work process model for animation pro-
duction is developed. Interviews with animation stu-
dio workers and surveys of their working diaries and
shot progress charts are conducted to create a frame-
work for the work processes. The work hours neces-
sary for each operation of the work project are ex-
pressed using a gamma function. Workers are clas-
sified into two categories, managers and animators,
and their behavioral rules are modeled. To establish
a rule for the determination of the operation sequence
order for an animator to perform multiple work op-
erations, four typical dispatching rules, often used in
a scheduling theory, are selected, and the one that is
closest to actual data is regarded as the rule that the
animator actually follows. As a result of the analysis, it
is found that the Earliest Due Date (EDD) and SLACK
are closest to actual animators’ behavioral rules. Man-
agers are also found to move the sub-deadline (a dead-
line of each operation) up about 30% earlier than the
actual deadline. The knowledge we obtain is that, in
order to realize better working conditions, animators
should determine their operation sequence order by
using SLACK, and managers should designate sub-
deadlines by keeping a balance between the preven-
tion of deadline violation and the reduction of over-
time work.
Keywords: animation production, scheduling, job analy-
sis
1. Introduction
1.1. Background
Animations produced and broadcasted in Japan are
highly rated not only domestically but also by foreign
communities [1, 2]. The Ministry of Economy, Trade,
and Industry has proposed a strategy, “Cool Japan,” which
aims to promote the overseas expansion of Japan’s strate-
gic industry, i.e., its cultural industry including anima-
tions [3]. People in Japan’s domestic animation indus-
try have been trying to keep up the high quality of their
works and have completed them on schedule. However,
in order to be more competitive international, further im-
provements in the quality management and productivity
will be necessary, and not only will the skills of each an-
imator but also the productivity of the animation process
will need to be improved. In order to improve produc-
tivity, the process used in executing their animation pro-
duction work needs to be clarified. This process involves
multiple workers and multiple work flows to follow, and
the relations between these workers and work flows are
very complicated. Revealing these relations and making a
quantitative model of them will be of vital importance to
the process.
1.2. Previous Studies
Many studies have been done with a view to improv-
ing the productivity of animations and with an emphasis
on supporting animators in order to reduce the labor of
drawing animations. DeCarlo et al. proposed a method
of line drawing 3D shapes [4]. Todo et al. proposed a
method of modifying the shade and shadow of 3D CG
images to animation-like drawings [5]. The technology
of deforming and combining two images and obtaining
an intermediate image between them is called morphing,
and software that performs 2D vector image morphing has
already been developed [6]. The above studies were done
to support the technical aspects of animation drawing but
not to examine how the work process of animation pro-
duction should be clarified, controlled, or improved.
More general studies to improve the behavior of work-
ers and to enhance their productivity, studies focusing
mostly on industrial production, have been made in the
field of industrial engineering. Barnes [7] proposed a
method of making efficient work procedures for anima-
tors based on work analyses presented in Refs. [8] and [9].
In Toyota’s Just In Time production (JIT) strategy [10],
production volume is finely tuned in each process to re-
duce inventory. The work is standardized by modeling the

Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013 439

Nakanishi, H. et al.
waste in each process. Cheng et al. proposed a work per-
formance model for nurses [11, 12]. This study assumes
that each nurse has his or her own dispatching rule for
the work sequence based on a given work sheet, and has
derived a rule that can explain the relation between the
work sheet and what the nurse actually did. They also
proposed a new scheduling method of generating the work
sequence from work sheet on the basis of a simulated an-
nealing technique. This method shares the same interest
with the present study with respect to the work process
analysis, but it does not directly focus on the efficiency of
the work process of animation production.
In short, no studies previously done have analyzed the
work process of animation production to make a quantita-
tive model of it.
1.3. Purpose of the Study
With this situation in mind, the present study aims to
develop a quantitative model of the work process of ani-
mation production and to propose a new method of per-
forming work based on the developed model. To these
ends, the following two challenges need to be overcome.
(1) It is difficult to examine a framework to be used as
a base for modeling various aspects of the anima-
tion production, such as what processes the anima-
tion production work consists of, what processes in-
dividual animators take charge of, and what behav-
ioral rules they follow in their work.
(2) It is difficult to clarify the details of the above behav-
ioral rules. Because the worker members follow the
rules unintentionally, expressing it explicitly is not
easy.
To solve these problems, the present study takes the fol-
lowing steps. Basic actions taken to overcome prob-
lem (1) are interviews of animation studio workers, sur-
veys of their working diaries, and surveys of shot progress
charts. In addition, the framework of the work process
is developed by taking account of the behavioral rule of
animation studio workers, as this behavioral rule is nec-
essary for the successful performance of their duties. For
problem (2), if the above survey cannot clarify the detail
of the workers’ behavioral rule, possible rules will be ex-
tracted comprehensively based on the studies of produc-
tion scheduling problem, and the most likely behavioral
rule will be identified by comparing the work conditions
of each rule to actual work process data.
In section 2, a framework of the work process is shown.
In section 3, work performance rules of animation studio
workers are extracted for the modeling of the work pro-
cess. An appropriate work performance method is pro-
posed in section 4, and conclusions and future prospects
are given in section 5.
440
2. Work Performance Framework for
Animation Production
In this section, the survey method is first introduced,
and then the framework for the work process is described.
For the description of the framework, from a viewpoint
of a production scheduling model in manufacturing, work
processes of the target work and machines (workers in
the present case) involved in the processes are explained.
Next, the necessary working hours for each work process
and the behavioral rules (the task-assignment rule of pro-
duction managers for assigning work processes to anima-
tors, and the dispatching rule for animators to determine
the processing order of assigned work processes) are ex-
plained.
2.1. Survey Methodology
To make a descriptive framework of the work process,
we interviewed a total of 23 workers at an animation
studio producing television programs and surveyed their
working diaries. Their shot progress chart was also sur-
veyed. The details of the survey are given below.
• Interview: The workers were asked to describe, in
general terms, animation production, including the
type and frequency of troubles as well as the knowl-
edge that each member possessed.
• Working diary survey: The workers were asked to
record their daily work for two weeks.
• Shot progress chart survey: A shot progress chart
is a table that describes the progress of the work; it
will be explained in detail in section 3.5. The charts
of two programs were examined.
2.2. Framework Configuration
2.2.1. Process and Work Operation
The survey made it apparent that the work of animation
production consists of the stages and processes shown in
Fig. 1. Each rectangular box in Fig. 1 represents a work
process. Although some are the same processes as those
described in Ref. [13], the processes in this diagram are
more detailed. A stage, indicated by surrounding dashes,
is a set of processes. The stages in Fig. 1 have the follow-
ing meanings.
• Layout: Original background arts, original rough
drawings, and an animation exposure sheet are cre-
ated from a storyboard.
• Key animation: Key animation drawings are cre-
ated from the original background arts and the origi-
nal rough drawings.
• Inbetween: Inbetween drawings are created from
the key animation drawings and the animation ex-
posure sheet.
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013

Fig. 1. Animation production process.
Table 1. Workers of each process.
Stage Layout
Process Making Check Revision
Key Episode Animation
Worker
animator director director
• Ink-and-paint: Painted frames are created from the
inbetween drawings and color palettes.
• Background: Background arts are created from the
original background arts.
• Compositing (Photography): An animation is cre-
ated from the storyboard, background arts, painted
frames, and the animation exposure sheet.
It was also found that there were processes additional to
those in Fig. 1. Specifically, there is always a process be-
tween every two consecutive processes, a “management
process,” in which drawing images are collected at the end
of the preceding process and redistributed to the work-
ers for the next process. The animation production works
are carried out in the following way. If making an ani-
mated TV program is regarded as the whole work, each
episode corresponds to a single product. (For a TV pro-
gram of 12 episodes, the production work would consist
of 12 products, for example.) Each product (episode) is
then composed of “shots,” a shot being a series of image
frames taken by means of continuous camera work or a
single camera placement. The number of shots in each
episode depends on various factors, such as the length of
the episode, the story of the episode, and the director’s
preference for camera work. There are usually several
hundred shots in each episode.
The abovementioned work processes are performed for
each shot. In this paper, a process for a shot is referred to
as an “operation.”
According to the working diaries, retakes, mentioned
in Ref. [13], were done only in a limited number of cases,
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013
Modeling the Process of Animation Production
Key animation Management
Making Check Revision Management
Key Episode Animation Production
animator director director manager
such as when a worker decided to redraw something. It is
noted that “retake” means the work going back to an up-
stream stage in Fig. 1 (e.g. from “key animation” to “lay-
out”), and should not be confused with “revision” process
in each stage. Retakes will not be considered in this study.
It was also found that the animation studio contracted
out the stages “inbetween,” “ink-and-paint,” and “back-
ground” to subcontractor studios, so the studio checked
and controlled the progress of each stage, but did not over-
see the processes in these three stages in detail. Although
the management of the subcontractor studios is an impor-
tant issue, the present study is not directed to this prob-
lem; it focuses only on the stages of “layout” and “key
animation,” which the animation studio subjectively work
on and which largely affect the efficiency of the entire
project.
2.2.2. Workers Implementing the Work Process
The work categories of the workers who take care of
each of the abovementioned processes are shown in Ta-
ble 1. The processes of the same name in the stages “lay-
out” and “key animation” are usually carried out by the
same workers.
In Table 1, there are four kinds of workers: Key anima-
tors, episode directors, animation directors, and produc-
tion managers. The former three have common character-
istics that they are directly involved in making animation
frames. Hereafter in this paper, key animators, episode di-
rectors, and animation directors are comprehensively re-
ferred to as “animators.” In contrast to animators, pro-
duction managers take charge of maintaining the project
441
Nakanishi, H. et al.
Fig. 2. Required time distribution and estimated cumulative
distribution function.
progress and are not directly involved in drawing anima-
tion frames. Production managers are called “managers”
hereafter.
2.2.3. Time Required for Each Process
In this section, the time required for each work process
is estimated from the working diary data. Since the time
varies from worker to worker for the same process, it is
appropriate to assume that the time required for each pro-
cess is a random variable.
The time required for each work stage is estimated from
the working diary and plotted in a cumulative probability
graph. The time necessary for a key animator to finish
“making” process of “layout” stage was calculated from
their working diaries and plotted as crosses in Fig. 2. By
assuming that the plotted data can be approximated with
a gamma distribution [14], a cumulative distribution func-
tion of required time is obtained and presented as a curve
in Fig. 2. The probability density function of the gamma
distribution, p(X = t), can be expressed with parameters
k(> 0) and θ (> 0) in the following form,
t k−1 e−t/θ
p (X = t | k, θ ) = . . . . . . .
Γ (k) θ k
Here, Γ (k) is a gamma function. k and θ , which max-
imize the likelihood, are obtained by numerical calcula-
tion. For Fig. 2, we obtained k = 3.5 and θ = 5.2 × 10−1 .
These parameters were also calculated for the other pro-
cesses in the same manner. Since the time required for the
“management” process is extremely short, it was set to 0
in this study.
2.2.4. Behavioral Rule
As a result of the survey, it was found that animation
production work was performed by exchanging informa-
tion in the manner shown in Fig. 3.
(a) A manager (production manager) receives a group
of operations, in which an animation program is di-
442
vided into shots and work processes, and information
on overall deadline from a higher organization.
(b) The manager specifies the sub-deadline of each oper-
ation, i.e., the date each process in each shot should
be finished, and assigns each operation to animators
(key animators, episode directors, and animation di-
rectors) so that the workload of each staff is bal-
anced. The role of the animators in each process is
shown in Table 1.
(c) The animators conduct operations assigned. They re-
port the manager when an operation is complete. If
there are other operations to be processed, return to
(b). If no animators have unprocessed operations,
proceed to (d).
(d) The production of the animated program is complete.
In the above (b), note that each sub-deadline corre-
sponds to each operation, and it should not be confused
with the final deadline of an entire episode. It was found
that the scheduling was not made in a centralized man-
ner as done in ordinary scheduling problem solutions
but rather by autonomous decentralized decision-making
based on each worker’s behavioral rule. There were two
major rules for managers as follows:
• Operation assignment rule:
How to assign operations to animators?
• Sub-deadline determination rule:
By when should the operation be finished?
The rule animators use to conduct their operations are the
following two:
• Operation suspension decision rule:
How much operations does an animator do within
a day? Specifically, when does an animator stop
his/her work?
• Operation sequence order determination rule:
In what order does an animator carry out multiple
(1) operations assigned?
The framework of the work process of animation produc-
tion can thus be determined. It has the following charac-
teristics if compared to general business or manufactur-
ing.
• Animation production work is performed by many
workers and less automated. It is strongly dependent
on the implicit knowledge of individual workers and,
in particular, on their scheduling ability for the as-
signment of operations and the determination of the
sequence of operations.
• Unskilled workers often work as managers and as-
sign operations to animators. (This was found in the
interviews.) Therefore, their ability greatly affects
overall work efficiency.
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013

Fig. 3. Production process with focus on workers.
• The working time of animators varies with the situ-
ation. This is because working hours are extended
during busy times. This fact is not taken account of
in ordinary scheduling problems. (Ordinary schedul-
ing problems assume constant available time for all
machines.)
• Although there is a kind of core working period like
usual flextime scheme, working hours policy in an-
imation production industry is relatively loose, and
the variation of working periods among animators
is large. Therefore it is difficult to predict working
hours of animators.
3. Estimation of Behavioral Rules
In this section, the behavioral rules discussed in sec-
tion 2.2.4 is again discussed but in greater detail. The rule
of operation assignment (section 3.2), rule of sub-deadline
determination (section 3.3), and rule of operation suspen-
sion (section 3.4) are identified based on the interviews.
The rule of operation sequence order determination (sec-
tion 3.5) is obtained by comparing the results of simula-
tions performed under rule candidates and the actual work
process (shot progress chart in section 2.1) and by finding
the most suitable rule.
3.1. Formulation
The work process of animation production is formu-
lated in the following manner. The work process of ani-
mation production is formulated in the following manner.
• The entire work consists of Ne episodes. An order
is placed for one of the episodes every Nw weeks.
The work for each episode has to be finished within
D days after the order date. The number of shots in
each episode is fixed at Ns . There are 6(= N p ) work
processes in the work, as shown in Table 1: Layout
making, layout check, layout revision, key animation
making, key animation check, and key animation re-
vision.
• Each work operation is labeled by j = (e, s, p) where
e (e = 1, 2, . . ., Ne ) is the episode number, s (s =
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013
Modeling the Process of Animation Production
1, 2, . . ., Ns ) is the shot number, and p (p = 1 (lay-
out making), 2 (layout check), . . . , 6 (key animation
revision)) is the process number.
• The time required for each operation t j is determined
randomly according to the required time distribution
given in section 2.2.3.
• Since the animators and managers does not know the
actual working hours, estimated value t˜j given ran-
domly within the range of ±20% around the above
true value, is used for various purposes.
• The animators are divided into Ng groups. This
means that each group takes care of a total of Ne /Ng
episodes. Each group has WKA key animators, WED
episode directors, and WAD animation directors.
3.2. Work Assignment Rule
Taking the interviews into account, it was considered
adequate to make the following rule: “Operations should
be assigned to animators proportional to the reserve mar-
gin of their working abilities.”
Algorithm 1 shows a manager’s algorithm that assigns
operations that are the work processes ρ and ρ + 3 (ρ =
1, 2, 3) of shots 1, 2, . . ., Ns in episode ε to animators.
Here, the order date of ε is expressed as Eε . Oε denotes
a set of operations in episode ε that is not assigned to
any animator. It is noted that |Oε | = Ns × N p = 6Ns holds
at the initial condition. OKA ED AD
ε , Oε , and Oε are the sets
of operations that should be conducted by key animators,
episode directors, and animation directors, respectively.
Therefore OKA ε + Oε + Oε ≡ Oε holds. Li means a set
ED AD
of operations assigned to animator i but not finished yet.
j.e, j.s, and j.p in algorithm 1 present the three values
of an operation j = (e, s, p). j(p ← n) denotes an opera-
tion in the same shot of the same episode with operation
j, but the process number n is different from that of j. For
example, for two operations j1 = (e, s, p) = (ε , σ , ρ1 ) and
j2 = (e, s, p) = (ε , σ , ρ2 ), the relationship of these two can
be written as j2 = j1 (p ← ρ2 ) and j1 = j2 (p ← ρ1 ). It is
noted that j1 (p ← ρ1 ) ≡ j1 and j2 (p ← ρ2 ) ≡ j2 .
In algorithm 1, for convenience, we denote W1 = WKA,
W2 = WED , W3 = WAD and O1 = OKA ε , O2 = Oε , O3 =
ED
AD
Oε .
443
Nakanishi, H. et al.

Fig. 4. Sub-deadline determination.

When j . p = 2 (Layout check)

D j shall be set one day earlier than the case with j.p = 3
(see below and Eq. (4)). The one-day difference between
j.p = 2 and j.p = 3 is due to necessary hours for the lay-
out check process.
Dj = ∑ t˜j − 1 . . . . . . . . . . . (3)
j ∈Li( j)
j  .p=1

When j . p = 3 (Layout revision)

D j shall be determined as the expected date for a key ani-
mator who takes charge of the corresponding shot to finish
all of the assigned operations with j.p = 1 (i.e. expected
date for him to start operations with j.p = 4).
Dj = ∑ t˜j . . . . . . . . . . . . (4)
j ∈Li( j)
“SetSubDeadline( j)” in algorithm 1 means that the j  .p=1
manager determines the sub-deadline of operation j based When j . p = 4 , 5 (Key animation making/check)
on the sub-deadline determination rule, which is ex- D j shall be determined by bringing forward the deadline
plained in the next section. by as many days as is necessary for the subsequent pro-
cesses.
3.3. Sub-Deadline Determination Rule
D j = Eε + D − (6 − j.p) . . . . . . . . (5)
This rule was also identified based on the interviews.
At first, D j , the absolute sub-deadline (in words, unpost- When j . p = 6 (Key animation revision)
ponable sub-deadline) for the operation j is determined The absolute deadline of episode ε , i.e., final process date,
according to the current work volume of the animators has already been given.
who are involved in this operation and to the final deadline D j = Eε + D . . . . . . . . . . . . (6)
of an entire episode ε (i.e. (Eε + D)). How to determine
D j is detailed below. The actual sub-deadline d j that a manager requests of
an animator is determined based on the abovementioned
When j . p = 1 (Layout making) absolute (unpostponable) deadline D j using a parame-
D j shall be determined as a middle day between the abso- ter α which represents the degree of advancement of the
lute sub-deadline for the fourth process (i.e. key anima- deadline schedule.
⎛ ⎞
tion making process) of the same shot and the work hours
necessary for the operation j’s corresponding animator to dj = ∑ t˜j + α ⎝D j − ∑ t˜j ⎠ . . . (7)
finish all the operations already assigned to him. j  ∈Li( j) j  ∈Li( j)
⎛ ⎞
1 Figure 4 explains what this equation expresses. α = 1
D j = ⎝Eε + D − 2 + ∑ t˜j ⎠ . . . . (2) indicates no advancement of the deadline schedule (i.e.
2 j  ∈L
i( j) the requested sub-deadline is identical to the absolute sub-
deadline), and α = 0 indicates full advancement. For ac-
Here, i( j) means the animator i who is assigned to the
tual use, α is determined by the method explained here-
operation j.
inafter.

444 Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013


3.4. Work Suspension Rule
Using the information obtained in the interviews, we
created the following model of work suspension.
• Daily work usually finishes within the animators’
standard daily work hours.
• If an animator’s to-do list contains an operation
which might not be finished by the specified sub-
deadline, i.e., if the sub-deadline cannot be met, the
animator shall work overtime, although the working
hour limit should not be exceeded.
3.5. Operation Sequence Order Determination
Rule
This rule is, in a sense, implicit, and it is therefore dif-
ficult to extract it from the interviews or working diaries.
As was done in the studies by Cheng et al. [11, 12], data
on actual work progress (i.e., shot progress chart, from
which one can find what shot was finished on what day)
and simulation results of comprehensively-selected oper-
ation sequence order determination rule candidates (sec-
tion 3.5.1) are compared, and the one that gives the small-
est difference between the actual data and the simulation
results is employed as the actual rule (section 3.5.2).
3.5.1. Listing of Possible Operation Sequence Order
Determination Rule
The problem of determining the sequence order of mul-
tiple operations is called the scheduling problem [15, 16].
One of the common methods for solving such problem
is to apply a dispatching rule that uses current time and
work information to determine the next operation. Since
dispatching rules are relatively simple and intuitive, this
study assumes that animators determine the order of op-
erations based on a certain dispatching rule. Under the
dispatching rule, the score or priority of each operation
is calculated, and the operation list is sorted with respect
to the score or priority. The first operation ranked in the
sorted list is the one that animators should perform next.
Several methods of calculating the score or priority of
each operation have been proposed. The methods em-
ployed in this study are the following. The methods
for calculating scores for dispatching rules are classi-
fied into 2 × 2 = 4 categories according to the conditions
(a) whether the working hours necessary for an operation
is taken account of and (b) whether the sub-deadline is
taken account of, and a typical rule in each category is
selected as a rule candidate (Table 2). The details of se-
lected rule candidates are described below.
• FCFS: First Come, First Served. Under this rule,
operations in Li (the to-do list for the animator i) are
conducted in the order of them being added to Li .
• SPT: Shortest Processing Time. Under this rule, op-
erations in Li are conducted in the ascending order of
estimated time necessary for each operation.
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013
Modeling the Process of Animation Production
Table 2. Dispatching rules as candidates for operation se-
quence order determination rule.
Necessary time taken account of
No Yes
taken account of
Sub-deadline
No FCFS SPT
Yes EDD SLACK
• EDD: Earliest Due Date. Operations in Li are con-
ducted in the order of sub-deadline for each opera-
tion.
• SLACK: Operations in Li are conducted in the as-
cending order of “slack time” S j , expressed in the
following formula.
 
S j = d j − t˜j + (current time) . . . (8)
3.5.2. Identification of Operation Sequence Order
Determination Rule Based on Simulations
Which rule candidate would be closest to actual data is
determined by simulations. The following are assumed to
reproduce the actual situation.
• The total number of episodes Ne = 12, order place-
ment time interval Nw = 4 (weeks), and the number
of shots in each episode Ns = 250.
• The number of animator groups Ng = 4. As a result,
the number of episodes that each group takes care of
is 12/4 = 3 (episodes). For each group, the num-
ber of episode directors WED = 1, and the number of
animation directors WAD = 2.
• Standard working hours per day hstd = 8 (hours),
and upper limit of working hours allowed hlim = 16
(hours).
• The shot progress chart is used as actual data. As
mentioned in section 2.1, the shot progress chart is
a table that records the progress of the work a di-
ary. It gives the date and the number of shots finished
on that day. The ratio (progress rate) of the finished
shots in each process to the total number of shots is
calculated from the shot progress chart and used for
experiments.
The following values could not be obtained from the in-
terviews or working diaries and are therefore treated as
variables to be derived.
• Final deadline is D days after the date
when work on each episode is started
(D = {20, 25, 30, . . ., 95, 100}).
445
Nakanishi, H. et al.

Table 3. Combination of variables that best matched actual data.

Case 1 Case 2
WKA 5 5
R EDD/SLACK SLACK/EDD
D 85 60
α 0.3 0.3

• Each group has WKA (WKA = {5, 6, 7, . . . , 20}) key

animators.

• The parameter α that represents advancement of the (a) Case 1 (Solid lines: Actual data for Layout, Dashed lines:
deadline schedule for managers (see section 3.3) is Simulation results)
given by α = {0.1, 0.2, . . . , 0.9, 1.0}.

• Four candidates for the operation sequence order de-

termination rule for animators are shown in Table 2
(R = {FCFS, SPT, EDD, SLACK}).
In order to find the best combination of the variables
D, WKA, α , and R, the difference in the progress rate on
a given day between the simulation and the actual data
for a selected combination of the variables is calculated.
(The progress rate is set to 0 on the day the work begins.)
The sum F of the calculated differences (i.e., sum of the
difference in the progress rate over days and processes) is
derived from the following formula.
Np Nd  
1  d d
F=
Np ∑∑ Π
 p − Π̃ p . . . . . . . (9)
p=1 d=0

Here, (b) Case 2 (Solidlines: Actual data, Dashed lines: Simulation

results)
N p : Number of processes to be analyzed (= 6)
Fig. 5. Simulation results compared with actual data.
Nd : Maximum number of days to finish designated work
(should be set to a sufficiently large number)

Π pd : Progress rate of the process p on d-th day (actual
data)
Π̃ pd : Progress rate of the process p on d-th day (value ob-
tained by simulations)
F is calculated for all combinations of parameters D,
WKA, α , and R to find the combination with the smallest
F.
3.5.3. Simulation Results
We performed simulations for two animation programs
with shot progress charts available. The combination of
the variables that best matched the actual data is shown in
Table 3, and the progress rates of the two cases are shown
in Fig. 5. In one of the two cases (called case 1), actual
data were available only for three processes of the layout
stage. We therefore set N p = 3 in Eq. (9) for this case.
The results are discussed below.
• EDD and SLACK were found to be appropriate
as rules for the animators to determine the order
of assigned operations. In each column of Ta-
ble 3, the combination of the variables that gives a
smaller F appears on the left. Therefore, in case of
“EDD/SLACK,” EDD comes first and SLACK next.
However, there is not much difference between the
value F in EDD and in SLACK. This indicates that
animators determine the operation sequence order
with emphasis on the sub-deadline. In other words,
the working conditions of animators can be con-
trolled considerably by adjusting the sub-deadline.
• α is set to a relatively small value, 0.3. This means
that the sub-deadlines managers tell to animators are
ahead of the “actual” limit dates to a significant de-
gree. As a result, animators have to work overtime
from the beginning.
• It was found from the subjective impressions of re-

446 Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013


lated animators that the values of WKA and D ob-
tained in Table 3 were quite realistic.
Because of the above facts and because the actual data
and the simulation results in Fig. 5 are mostly in line, the
results shown in Table 3 should be highly valid. It can
therefore be considered that the validity of the model pro-
posed in sections 3.2 to 3.5 has been confirmed.
The premise of the knowledge obtained in this study is
that the work hours for the target work vary considerably,
although the work hours could be a somewhat rough esti-
mate. If the working hours could be accurately estimated,
a centralized scheduling method widely used at factories
would be more appropriate. On the contrary, if no in-
formation about working hours were available, a simpler
method such as FCFS, with decentralized manner would
be adequate. It was also shown that even when the in-
terviews or other surveys could not collect sufficient data,
the data could be supplemented to allow for efficient anal-
ysis by integrating the abovementioned simulation analy-
sis and the results of the interviews, working diary survey,
and shot progress chart survey.
4. Proposal of More Appropriate Style of Work
Execution
The current situation was analyzed in the discussions
in the preceding sections. In this section, to deepen the
discussion, we propose a method of specifying the sub-
deadline (i.e., specifying α ) and an appropriate rule for
determining the operation sequence order for animators.
Overtime work from an animator’s viewpoint and produc-
tivity and deadline violation from a manager’s viewpoint
will be discussed below.
Since the daily working hours of an animator can be
calculated by using the model proposed in section 3, over-
time work and slack time during the animation produc-
tion period can be estimated. A simulation was per-
formed by setting (WKA, R) = (5, SLACK) and (α , D) =
{(1, 30), (1, 90), (1/3, 30), (1/3, 90)} to calculate work
hours per day of key animators. The work hours were av-
eraged for each group and plotted in Fig. 6. It was found
that workload varied more from day to day in the schedule
with α = 1/3 than in the schedule with α = 1. This dif-
ference in variation is more significant for D = 30 than for
D = 90. These tendencies were also observed for anima-
tors involved in other operations. It was therefore found
that the sub-deadlines should be set to the actual “limit”
dates without moving forward in order to prevent varia-
tions in the workloads of animators.
Next, productivity and deadline violation are discussed
from the viewpoint of management. Simulations with var-
ious sets of D, WKA, α , and R showed that, among the op-
eration sequence order determination rules in R, SLACK
was the one that minimized the number of shots com-
pleted after the deadline. As a result, SLACK was found
to be preferable as an operation sequence determination
rule for animators. It was also found appropriate to set α
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013
Modeling the Process of Animation Production
Fig. 6. Cumulative probability density distribution of work
hours per day of a worker responsible for layout and key
animation.
to about 0.3 as in the previous section.
α = 1 is preferable for shortening overtime work hours
and α = 0.3 for minimizing deadline violation. In other
words, these two values are in a trade-off relationship, and
it is difficult to set α to meet the two conditions. Both
conditions can be improved if the value WKA (number of
key animators) is increased. In an actual situation, WKA
is first set to the minimum number necessary, and then
the two evaluation functions (overtime work and deadline
violation) are compared to set an appropriate value of α .
To close this section, we discuss the relation of the
present study to automation technology. An important
point of the present study is that, even for jobs with many
manual operations, such as service-sector jobs, a quanti-
tative model could be developed by using a scheduling
model, one of the core knowledge of automation tech-
nology. Another important point is that, with this model,
one can find which part in the work process could be im-
proved, as shown in the present study, and which manual
operation should be automated in the future.
5. Conclusions and Future Prospects
In this study, we have built a work process model for
animation production. It has been found through a com-
prehensive analysis that EDD and SLACK are appropriate
as the rules for determining the order of multiple opera-
tions for animators. It has also been found that the sub-
deadlines that managers tell to animators are set to dates
30% earlier than the actual final deadlines. A method of
reducing workloads and increasing on-time work comple-
tion has been proposed based on the model developed. It
has therefore been shown that, with this work model, var-
ious proposals could be made using quantitative data.
The knowledge obtained in the present study could be
applied to work processes in which variation in work-
ing hours is relatively large, even though work hours can
447
Nakanishi, H. et al.

be roughly estimated. From the standpoint of method-

ology, the proposed modeling method, which utilizes in-
terviews, working diary surveys, and shot progress chart Name:
surveys and which is based on a scheduling model, is Hisato Nakanishi
a highly general method. This is because interviews or
other surveys can supply necessary information appropri- Affiliation:
The University of Tokyo
ately, even when not all information is available. Brief Career:
Possibilities for future study include improvements in 2012 Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo
the precision of the work process model and widening of
the range of the processes incorporated in the model.

Acknowledgements Name:
Naohiro Shichijo
This study was partially supported by the “Project of personnel re-
cruiting and training in the content industry (Project of basic skill
Affiliation:
improvement of animators)” (Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Foresight Center, National Institute for Science
Industry, 2010) and by the Waseda Institute for Advanced Stud- and Technology Policy (NISTEP)
ies.

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448 Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013


Name:
Masao Sugi
Affiliation:
Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical
Engineering and Intelligent Systems, Graduate
School of Informatics and Engineering, The Uni-
versity of Electro-Communications
Address:
1-5-1 Chofugaoka, Chofu-shi, Tokyo 182-8585, Japan
Brief Biographical History:
2003-2007 Project Research Associate, Graduate School of Information
Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo
2007-2009 Project Assistant Professor, Information and Robot Technology
Research Initiative, The University of Tokyo
2009-2010 Project Researcher, RACE (Research into Artifacts, Center for
Engineering), The University of Tokyo
2010-2011 Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical Systems
Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Tokyo University of
Agriculture and Technology
2011- Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering and
Intelligent Systems, Graduate School of Informatics and Engineering, The
University of Electro-Communications
Main Works:
• Y. Tamura, M. Sugi, T. Arai, and J. Ota, “Attentive Deskwork Support
System,” J. of Advanced Computational Intelligence and Intelligent
Informatics, Vol.14 No.7, pp. 758-769, 2010.
• M. Sugi, Y. Shiomi, T. Okubo, K. Inoue, and J. Ota, “A Solution for 2D
Rectangular Cutting Stock Problems with 3-Stage Guillotine-Cutting
Constraint,” Int. J. of Automation Technology, Vol.4, No.5, pp. 461-468,
2010.
• M. Sugi, H. Nakanishi, M. Nishino, Y. Tamura, T. Arai, and J. Ota,
“Development of Deskwork Support System using Pointing Gesture
Interface,” J. Robotics and Mechatronics, Vol.22, No.4, pp. 430-438, 2010.
• M. Sugi, M. Cheng, M. Yamamoto, H. Ito, K. Inoue, and J. Ota, “Online
Rescheduling in Semiconductor Manufacturing,” Int. J. of Automation
Technology, Vol.4, No.2, pp. 184-197, 2010.
Membership in Academic Societies:
• The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
• The Robotics Society of Japan (RSJ)
• The Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE)
• The Japan Society for Precision Engineering (JSPE)
Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013
Modeling the Process of Animation Production
Name:
Taiki Ogata
Affiliation:
Research Associate, Research into Artifacts,
Center for Engineering (RACE), the University
of Tokyo
Address:
5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8568, Japan
Brief Biographical History:
2009- The University of Tokyo
2009- Project Researcher, Tokyo Institute of Technology
Main Works:
• “Temporal Co-creation between Self and Others with Multi-sensory
Inputs,” The Advanced Engineering Informatics, Vol.20, pp. 321-333,
2006.
Membership in Academic Societies:
• The Japan Society for Precision Engineers (JSPE)
• The Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE)
• Society for Serviceology (SfS)
Name:
Tatsunori Hara
Affiliation:
Associate Professor in Research into Artifacts,
Center for Engineering (RACE), The University
of Tokyo
Address:
5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8568, Japan
Brief Biographical History:
2009- The University of Tokyo
Main Works:
• T. Hara and T. Arai, “Encourage non-designer’s design: sustainable
value creation in manufacturing products and services,” CIRP Annals –
Manufacturing Technology, Vol.61, Issue 1, (ISSN 1660-2773),
pp. 171-174, 2012.
• T. Hara and T. Arai, “Simulation of product lead time in design
customization service for better customer satisfaction,” CIRP Annals –
Manufacturing Technology, Vol.60, Issue 1, (ISSN 1660-2773), 2011.
• T. Hara, T. Arai, and Y. Shimomura, “A CAD system for service
innovation: integrated representation of function, service activity, and
product behavior,” J. of Engineering Design, Special issue on PSS, Vol.20,
No.4, pp. 367-388, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09544820903151715, 2009.
Membership in Academic Societies:
• The Japan Society of Precision Engineering (JSPE)
• The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineering (JSME)
• The Society for Serviceology (SfS)
• The Information Processing Society of Japan (IPSJ)
449
Nakanishi, H. et al.

Name:
Jun Ota

Affiliation:
Professor in Research into Artifacts, Center for
Engineering (RACE), The University of Tokyo

Address:
5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8568, Japan
Brief Biographical History:
1989-1991 Nippon Steel Corporation, Kanagawa, Japan
1991- The University of Tokyo
1996-1997 Visiting Scholar at Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA
Main Works:
• Z. Liu, H. Kamogawa, and J. Ota, “Motion Planning for Two Robots of
an Object Handling System Considering Fast Transition Between Stable
States,” Advanced Robotics, Vol.26, Issues 11-12, pp. 1291-1316, 2012.
• Y. Kung, Y. Kobayashi, T. Higashi, and J. Ota, “Motion Planning of Two
Stacker Cranes in a Large-Scale Automated Storage/Retrieval System,” J.
of Mechanical Systems for Transportation and Logistics, Vol.5, No.1,
pp. 71-85, 2012.
• T. Mizuno, M. Sakura, M. Ashikaga, H. Aonuma, R. Chiba, and J. Ota,
“Model of a sensory-behavioral relation mechanism for aggressive
behavior in crickets,” Robotics and Autonomous Systems, Vol.60, Issue 5,
pp. 700-706, 2012.
Membership in Academic Societies:
• The Japan Society for Precision Engineers (JSPE)
• The Robotics Society of Japan(RSJ)
• The Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE)
• The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME)
• The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

450 Int. J. of Automation Technology Vol.7 No.4, 2013

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