005
Giant robots
Can the pilot stay anime while the robot stays cinematic?
Fan artThe robots and characters that inspired these images belong to their creators and rights holders. This is a personal, non-commercial tribute, with no affiliation or endorsement.
Part 01
From 75 / 25 to 85 / 15
Fan art of seven giant robots from 1970s anime, each with its pilot, in a vertical format for a reel. The technical question was where to set the balance between anime and semi-realism so the metal looks cinematic and the face doesn’t look like a photograph.
Krea 2 · 85 / 15 recipe · upscaled to 1536×27306 attempts
The pilot drifts toward photography
With the first recipe, a 75 / 25 balance, the pilot’s face kept sliding toward editorial photography while the robot looked great. Top row: 75 / 25. Bottom row: the same three robots at 85 / 15.
- 75 · Mazinger ZDiscarded
Mazinger Z, pilot at 75 / 25: the face leans toward editorial photography.
Pilot 75 % anime / 25 % semi-real - 75 · Getter RoboDiscarded
Getter Robo, pilot at 75 / 25: the face leans toward editorial photography.
Pilot 75 % anime / 25 % semi-real - 75 · Great MazingerDiscarded
Great Mazinger, pilot at 75 / 25: the face leans toward editorial photography.
Pilot 75 % anime / 25 % semi-real - 85 · Mazinger ZBetter
Mazinger Z, pilot at 85 / 15: anime eyes, painted skin and clean line art, and the robot keeps its cinematic metal.
Pilot 85 % anime / 15 % soft semi-real - 85 · Getter RoboBetter
Getter Robo, pilot at 85 / 15: anime eyes, painted skin and clean line art, and the robot keeps its cinematic metal.
Pilot 85 % anime / 15 % soft semi-real - 85 · Great MazingerBetter
Great Mazinger, pilot at 85 / 15: anime eyes, painted skin and clean line art, and the robot keeps its cinematic metal.
Pilot 85 % anime / 15 % soft semi-real
8 attempts
The eight plates of the reel
The eight plates I froze for the animated reel, in the order they play. They are seven series, not eight: Mazinger Z appears twice, opening and closing.
- 1 · Mazinger ZMy pick
Opens the reel: the rear view.
Plate 01 · 1536×2730 - 2 · Getter RoboMy pick
Getter Robo.
Plate 04 · 1536×2730 - 3 · Great MazingerMy pick
Great Mazinger.
Plate 05 · 1536×2730 - 4 · Getter Robo GMy pick
Getter Robo G.
Plate 07 · 1536×2730 - 5 · Steel JeegMy pick
Steel Jeeg.
Plate 06 · 1536×2730 - 6 · GrendizerMy pick
Grendizer, the Goldrake of the Italian dub.
Plate 02 · 1536×2730 - 7 · GaikingMy pick
Gaiking. Its file was a quarter of the pixels of the rest, so I rebuilt it from the original PNG.
Plate 03 · 1536×2730 - 8 · Mazinger ZMy pick
Closes the reel: the front view. Mazinger Z opens and closes, so it works as a frame.
Plate 08 · 1536×2730
What I learned
The pilot drifted toward photography. Going from 75 / 25 to 85 / 15, taking photographic words out of the positive prompt (hyperreal skin, micro-texture, photographic hair) and adding anime eyes, simplified nose and lips, painted skin without pores, clean line art and hair in graphic masses, fixed it.
Attempts: 75 · Mazinger Z, 85 · Mazinger Z, 75 · Getter Robo, 85 · Getter Robo
The pilot can be anime while the robot stays cinematic. I kept the dimensional finish in the metal, the atmosphere and the depth of field, and only changed the face.
Attempts: 85 · Mazinger Z, 85 · Great Mazinger
A recipe only reaches the robots it was run on. The 85 / 15 batch covers robots 01 to 07; from 08 to 20 there are only the older generations, with the pilot drifting to photography. Today the reel covers a third of the catalog.
Check what you actually froze. Comparing the eight plates with the project’s 300 PNG by image signature showed they all came from the 85 / 15 batch, that one plate had a quarter of the pixels of the others, and that Mazinger Z appeared twice.
Attempts: 7 · Gaiking, 1 · Mazinger Z, 8 · Mazinger Z
For the animation I settled on short prompts, about 35 words, that describe where things move instead of listing prohibitions.