"Book of Nouns" - 名詞の本 - An Internet-first Anime Story
TL,DR
This proposal is seeking 96,000 USDC to conceptualise an original anime universe based on ⌐◨-◨. Within scope of this proposal, we will develop original anime / video stories (60-65 / 10-15 seconds runtime each) fit for short format distribution over social media on the course of five months totalling a run-time of 12-14 mins.
Inspiration
Nouns have explored different art directions over time that gravitated towards a more westernised aesthetic and kids/family genre + focused on more wholesome vibes. Nouns Movie, Wizard Hat Short film, Nouns Short Film festival are good examples of that. We wanted to propose a radically different art direction which focuses more on "Seinen" than "Shonen".
With Book of Nouns, we want to create a world which is more adult themed, more brain food & thought provoking, and has a diehard community of fans who love it.
The World (世界) defined
You can also access this preliminary world bible here in pdf format.
Wait, Is this just another story with noggles on it?
Tl;dr: It’s NOT another existing story with retrofitted noggles on it.
- We started working on the concept after looking through dozens of media based proposals and understanding the gravitation towards literal representation of “Noun Characters” as the “acceptable” form of storytelling. Going for character representations make sense in early years when awareness of higher-level of branding is still low but we wanted to keep elevating ⌐◨-◨ as the primary moniker for Nouns and storytelling.
- In this world, you have nouns representing various emotions associated with the character forms people take on.
- For example take the werewolf, He is an intelligent quirky character who happens to be stuck in the world of people after taking this form.
How did that happen?
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Cheese is his secret formula. He can turn into a werewolf when he eats cheese and turn back into human form again. In wolf form he is always gluttonous and greedy. Cheese vanishes once one of the ingredients is locked away via the book.
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Now his pursuit is the same as our MC, where he needs to find the lost word(s) to escape this fate.
Who is making this happen?
Creative Director My name is Erene. I have worked as a Lead Artist and creative director in the anime industry for over 10 years now. I had the opportunity to contribute in Attack on Titan S1, Vinland Saga, Demon Slayer, Star Wars Visions etc to name a few. I've since found my passion in independent work and when i heard about Nouns, I fell in love with the idea and the goals!
Animation Director Meet my co-director Ivan Mina. Ivan has been a veteran in the Animation Industry being Key Animators in the OG One Piece Series, Digimon etc. Ivan is a long-time Toei Animation Alumnus and currently mentors and freelances all over the world on incredible Anime titles.
Here is the full list of team of people involved on "Book of Nouns". We're based out of Korea, Philippines and Vietnam.
Together we are known as Otsu Labs. We've worked with MAPPA, Toei Animation, WIT Studios and MadHouse and now want to create an original anime universe built atop of cc0 art and ethos.
Check out our Showreel
Why this specific format?
In adult anime genre, World building needs to be deliberate and today's internet is the new testbed of rapid iteration. In the traditional ways, you have seen authors build following on a franchise through Manga / Comics (e.g. Jujitsu Kaisen)Webtoons or Manhwa (e.g. Solo Levelling) before they graduated into a full anime adaption.
We have done this before.
Another example is Luna Gardner who does chain based interactive story where fans co-investigate with her to solve a mystery.
In Summary... We want to experiment with short video format to weave a story with dozens of pieces which we can iterate and can compete in shrinking attention environment. It becomes an alternative to developing the lore via traditional mediums like manga where distribution continues to be a chokepoint for many.
Once a core fanbase is established, you can proceed with more confidence to tackle time consuming formats like full-anime series which is resource intensive. (Attack of Titan S1 took 2+ years to make!)
Funding and Milestones
We're requesting 96,000 USDC to help us jumpstart this world. 100% of the funding goes into early conceptualisation, spinning up the social properties, and production.
We will be building out dedicated "Book-of-Nouns" social presence alongside a web property to house this growing world view as more is revealed to the fans.
Funding
The funding is requested in 2 parts:
- 96,000 USDC via a stream for a period of 5 months from Dec 20, 2024 till May 20, 2024.
Milestones
- Hit 100k+ audience built up across all "bookofnouns" channels. 30mil+ in impressions.
- Explore with multiple media formats (high velocity short videos, illustrations, 4コマ漫画 / 4 Koma Manga) etc.
- Deliver 60-65 pieces of visual micro-stories amounting totol 12-14 mins of animated runtime that tell a story, establish the core MCs (main characters) and the world they live in.
- Build a website where bookofnouns world bible resides, alongside all of the visuals integrated.
- Proposal updates sent onchain along the way with published growth signals.
What is Atrium's role in this project?
Atrium introduced us to nouns through the nouns movie project. We will rely on their guidance to plan and appropriately reflect the core nouns ethos in the world we build.
After spending more than a decade co-creating the best anime you've watched and love, We want to make something for Nouns and ourselves.
What comes after?
If we are successful in establishing the core true fan group via this project, we will have the groundwork ready for a lasting anime brand people love and follow passionately.
Opportunities are endless
- Manga adaptations
- Short films
- Anime episodic content
...While retaining ownership because of the said fan group.
All roads lead back to nouns.
