The Common Knowledge of Pani Poni Dash! Ending

Please tell the basic concept of the ending.

Oonuma

There were a lot of ideas, but since I was left to handle it, I thought to give a lively feel to it by using chibi characters. Also, since the work has a lot of characters, I wanted to have them all to appear. The person I asked to design the chibis has a rich imagination, so I explained the characters’ personality and then asked them to use their own imagination. I think we got some great expressions and poses. As for making how chibis look and move, I used a software called After Effects. There are a lot of times where I feel like I’m the one doing the whole production, as there a lot of parts that are done digitally. In order to differentiate myself from other directors, I think not learning up from my projects would be quite bad.

When one person comes on screen, the other person disappears, right?

Oonuma

Yes, in other words, we matched them with the song lyrics. I believe there should always be something worth looking at on screen, even if it's just one frame. I wanted there to be spots where eyes could rapidly roll to. We paid special attention to it when directing the first episode, making sure that you could see different parts of the screen. This makes it look maybe more scattered around compared to a normal anime, but I think it’ll be fun no matter how many times you watch it. I had the feeling of wanting to see something new, as in “Hey, here’s free space so please draw something on it” (laughs). I think it was great how everyone had fun with the project, and it turned out very lively. I’ll be careful not to get too distracted from now on, but I consider wanting to add variety of things in order give it more volume.

You were also in charge of the production of Episode 1, and you’re also the series director, right?

Oonuma

Yeah. Overall, I support the director and help complete the work.

What are the director’s orders like?

Oonuma

The thing director was concerned about was getting a wide range of people watching, like with content that would please young and older anime fans, so it seemed he didn’t want to leave anything not added. I’m originally an illustrator, but when doing key animation, there are many cases where I think whether it would be funnier to do in this other way. In this way, I take up as many of the animators' opinions as possible and have everyone making the direction together. And not only by the animators, but also from the colour specifiers, people who do the finishing touches, the film handlers and the producers, I want to pick up and include a lot of those things they consider interesting. So even if there’s some mishap, we’ll just keep on going and improving. If we show others something that we ourselves don't find funny, I don't think they'll find it funny either. And so, I want to adopt more and more new methods.

Are there any points you want to pay attention to?

Oonuma

When showing one picture, it isn’t that interesting if it’s the only one slapped in there, so I put a lot of thought on devising how it presents and displays itself.

Please tell us what spots you want us to look at.

Oonuma

I guess it's the chibis and Becky cute hauhau’ing. While searching for the various implemented jokes, I hope people will watch it over and over again, like chewing a dried squid.

When producing Pani Poni Dash!, do you have certain themes in mind?

Oonuma

Those themes are ”lively” and “fun”. The trailer had a unique feel to it, so I wish people to have fun and get surprised

By the way, who is your favourite character?

Oishi

Nanjou. There aren’t many ojou-samas who are depicted as cute characters. To me, Nanjou is a moe character. I want to bring out more Nanjou’s cuteness.

Thank you very much.