I finally decided to create a blog to share my thoughts on anime/animation and Japanese visual culture in general. I don’t plan to do any regular blogging on anime series or something as there are enough blogs which focus on that kind of stuff, but I’ll review the occasional outstanding episode and other things catching my attention. I’ll probably take a closer look at Kyoto Animation’s work every now and then and try to provide some insight in it and its creators. If I come along some exceptional animation or unknown shorts or any other things of interest for me, I’ll mention them in a compiled post if there’s not much to say.
So I hope that you’ll enjoy my blog entries and come back regularly.
Ani no Miyako 
Hi Max,
It’s good to see that you’ve started a Blog because you have always discussed the elements of anime that really make it such a beloved phenomenon, aside from just popularity, moe, and ratings.
If taking on Kyoto Animation’s work, I’d advise you to try to seek out the “behind-the-scenes” looks that were included on the original Kanon DVDs. They were excellent at showing not only the step-by-step process of creation, but also gave several commentaries on other things, such as the director’s love of Shiori’s hair and how he insisted that his animators took special care in making it move. (And you can plainly see the results in her scenes in Kanon.)
Congratulations on creating your Blog, and I’m looking forward to reading more 🙂
Thanks for your comments. I think we talked about the “behind-the-scenes” extras before, would love to check them out but unfortunately not all of the original DVDs are available and I already bought the complete collection, which lacks any kind of extra. I’ll concentrate mainly on upcoming Kyoani projects anyway, though we’ll probably see their next anime in the beginning of 2010. Rumors say that the shoujo manga adaption “Kaichou wa Maid-sama” is produced by Kyoani, I wouldn’t be surprised due to the high share of female staff…