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In a recent interview with Oricon, Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War arc chief director Tomohisa Taguchi and director Hikaru Murata shared behind-the-scenes techniques that have shaped cour 3 of the anime.
When asked about the memorable moments during the production of the third cour, Taguchi shared the team’s decision to take photographs of themselves to use as reference material for complex animation scenes.
This approach, according to him, helped the animators accurately depict challenging angles and perspectives that would have been difficult to visualize solely through imagination.
“For the Thousand-Year Blood War arc, we actually took our own photos to use as reference material for the animation. It’s hard to imagine and draw certain difficult angles just by visualizing them. For instance, the layout of Rukia hiding in the closet while Yuzu and others are outside in the BLEACH 20th anniversary PV was decided after consulting with the production staff, the director, and the animators, and then we took photos to capture the angle.“
Taguchi recalled that the shift towards using reference photos began when their chief animation director, Michio Hasegawa, suggested, “If we can’t draw it, then let’s just take a photo!”.
Murata added that they even used video references for pivotal scenes, like the blood pact between Yhwach and Uryu, ensuring that every angle was meticulously captured.
“For the scene in the second cour where Yhwach and Uryu share a blood pact, we even took videos, not just photos, for reference.“
The third cour of Bleach TYBW has started airing on Oct 5, 2024.
Six Lounge’s Without Any Words will be the opening song of the third cour, whereas Monochrome by Suisoh will be the ending song.
Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War cour 1 aired in Japan on Oct 10, 2022, and ended on Dec 26, 2022, with a one-hour long special episode, combining episodes 12 and 13 of the anime.
Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War cour 2 started airing on July 8, 2023.
It was previously revealed that anime will be split into four cours, with breaks in between.
Source: Oricon
