The Energon Pub

Takara Tomy has posted an interview on their home site with Transformers Designer Hisashi Yuki. Mr. Yuki is credited for designing some of the films Transformers included the films namesake The Fallen, along with "The Doctor" Scalpel and Sideways.

Mr. Yuki is not new to the franchise, though. He's also credited with creating previous Transformers such as RID Optimus Prime and Lio Convoy.

The interview is in Japanese, but thanks to a most awesome translation by TFW2005.com board member SydneyY , those of us who aren't familiar with the language can be in the know.

Check out the translated interview here and then let us know what you think by clicking Discuss this topic above.

Nice interview. It's great to get the perspective from one of the designers, especially someone with such a history with Transformers. He's the man behind Fire Convoy and BT Skids. Very cool!

That was really niece,i would look for more of this.

good stuff.

wow really cool.... i like the pic with him sitting with the toys he designed all around him.... that must be a really cool feeling

Soooo.... he had to design toys without knowing what role they play in the film or what they would actually look like on film. Nice one. No wonder a lot of the toys so far have been inaccurate! Some people need to be sacked.

The only exception is that Hasui (Shogo Hasui) always wants to design Starscream and we let him.

He's got a lot to answer for.

Mykltron wrote:Soooo.... he had to design toys without knowing what role they play in the film or what they would actually look like on film. Nice one. No wonder a lot of the toys so far have been inaccurate! Some people need to be sacked.

I think that's a tad unfair, for three reasons...

1) The fewer people who know the plot of the film, the better for Dreamworks so as to avoid early spoilers. We know the filmmakers resent the release of spoliers, hence Bay's misinformation campaigns (Megatron will only appear in flashback, etc.) As such, it makes sense not to let too many people know what's going to happen.

2) It takes a long time to design a transformer, from concept to prototype to production. As such, a lot of the ROTF figures were in the design stage a year or two before the film's release, in order so that the toys would be ready when the film came out. Let's not forget that ROTF was a troubled production thanks to the writer's strike, and there were many last-minute changes that we know of (such as the presence of Jolt, for example). As such, it's no surprise that some of the toys resemble earlier stages of character development, such as Leader Megatron. That's not something people should be sacked for, it's just a necessary evil when the CGI designs are in a constant state of flux and the toy designers are working to deadlines.

3) Anyway, why should it matter what the role of the character is in the film? The designers should always give their best when designing the toys. It's no use saying "oh well, Sideways is only in the film for three seconds, let's not bother so much when designing him." I for one am glad that the Hasbro and Takara designers lavish the same care and attention they do on Bumblebee as they do on no-mark characters such as Jolt. It shouldn't matter how many scenes a character is in, the designers should work to their very best regardless of screen-time or character importance.

Stay happy x.

starfish wrote:

Mykltron wrote:Soooo.... he had to design toys without knowing what role they play in the film or what they would actually look like on film. Nice one. No wonder a lot of the toys so far have been inaccurate! Some people need to be sacked.

.... 2) It takes a long time to design a transformer, from concept to prototype to production. As such, a lot of the ROTF figures were in the design stage a year or two before the film's release, in order so that the toys would be ready when the film came out....

starfish is right. that concept to production phase usually takes about a year. so while pre production of the movie is beginning, shortly after the toys will be in the designing stages as well. this early on, the toy designers have only the concept art passed down to them by the movie studios to work with. so im sure the designers were already designing the toys before production of the movie was completely finished

Mr Yuki Hisashi, the uber engineering designer of Neo Unicron, Big Convoy and Fire Convoy among others.......has categorically stated the immense contribution RID had on the resurgence of TF interest in the early 2000? Wow, imagine to much chargin what that statement would mean to anonymous "know-it alls" who think otherwise.......

starfish wrote:

Mykltron wrote:Soooo.... he had to design toys without knowing what role they play in the film or what they would actually look like on film. Nice one. No wonder a lot of the toys so far have been inaccurate! Some people need to be sacked.

I think that's a tad unfair, for three reasons...

1) The fewer people who know the plot of the film, the better for Dreamworks so as to avoid early spoilers. We know the filmmakers resent the release of spoliers, hence Bay's misinformation campaigns (Megatron will only appear in flashback, etc.) As such, it makes sense not to let too many people know what's going to happen.

2) It takes a long time to design a transformer, from concept to prototype to production. As such, a lot of the ROTF figures were in the design stage a year or two before the film's release, in order so that the toys would be ready when the film came out. Let's not forget that ROTF was a troubled production thanks to the writer's strike, and there were many last-minute changes that we know of (such as the presence of Jolt, for example). As such, it's no surprise that some of the toys resemble earlier stages of character development, such as Leader Megatron. That's not something people should be sacked for, it's just a necessary evil when the CGI designs are in a constant state of flux and the toy designers are working to deadlines.

3) Anyway, why should it matter what the role of the character is in the film? The designers should always give their best when designing the toys. It's no use saying "oh well, Sideways is only in the film for three seconds, let's not bother so much when designing him." I for one am glad that the Hasbro and Takara designers lavish the same care and attention they do on Bumblebee as they do on no-mark characters such as Jolt. It shouldn't matter how many scenes a character is in, the designers should work to their very best regardless of screen-time or character importance.

Stay happy x.

Are you serious? You think it's okay that the toy designers are kept in the dark when designing the toys that we are going to buy? It's for this reason that the most expensive Megatron in the ROTF range only bears a passing resemblance to the CGI. And the designer said that the Doctor's toy and films microscope modes aren't the same. Okay, so the designers don't need to know the plot, but Hisashi Yuki said:

As for the characterization ideas, we hardly had any information as to how he would be featured in the story, which made it very difficult for me to come up with a character-based gimmicks.

Granted that is not as important as knowing what the guy will look like but if the CGI and toy designers worked together we'd have a more accurate toy line.

starfish wrote:
3) Anyway, why should it matter what the role of the character is in the film? The designers should always give their best when designing the toys. It's no use saying "oh well, Sideways is only in the film for three seconds, let's not bother so much when designing him." I for one am glad that the Hasbro and Takara designers lavish the same care and attention they do on Bumblebee as they do on no-mark characters such as Jolt. It shouldn't matter how many scenes a character is in, the designers should work to their very best regardless of screen-time or character importance.

Stay happy x.

I was not under the impression *at all* that he was referring to whether or not a character had a large number of scenes. As he was speaking from a toy designer's perspective, it seemed more like he was referring to what sorts of actions they performed in the course of the film, so they could come up with interesting toy gimmicks that mimicked those actions.

Does that partially hinge on the robot's screen time? Sure. The more you're on screen, the more time there is for you to pull a neat trick that could show up in the toy, but was talking about what the robots actually do, not how long or how many times they were on screen.

Mykltron wrote:Are you serious? You think it's okay that the toy designers are kept in the dark when designing the toys that we are going to buy? It's for this reason that the most expensive Megatron in the ROTF range only bears a passing resemblance to the CGI. And the designer said that the Doctor's toy and films microscope modes aren't the same.

I honestly don't think it's a case of people being deliberately left in the dark. All I'm saying is that the design of Megatron changed numorous times before the eventual details were finalised, and in order to get the toys in the shops - and on time - the only possible solution would be to use older information.

Look at it this way - changes were being made to the film even in the weeks leading up to the eventual release. Assume, for argument's sake, that Megatron's design was only finalised, say, in January of this year. In order then to get a fully screen-accurate Megatron, we would then have to wait a year (maybe 18 months) to see that toy pass the design & prototype stage. Had the makers used the final screen model, we woudln't have had a Megatron toy at all until maybe next summer.

Do you really think that would be a good idea for Hasbro from a marketing point of view, for thir showcase Deception toy not to be available until a year after the film's release?

Anyway, that's my understanding.

Stay happy always x.

fenrir72 wrote:Mr Yuki Hisashi, the uber engineering designer of Neo Unicron, Big Convoy and Fire Convoy among others.......has categorically stated the immense contribution RID had on the resurgence of TF interest in the early 2000? Wow, imagine to much chargin what that statement would mean to anonymous "know-it alls" who think otherwise.......

What? Where did that come from?

RiD has pretty much universally been loved for its new molds.

People were frantically importing Car Robots because of the delay in getting RiD toys in the States.

Personally, it was the RiD show that reminded me that Transformers was back in the public eye.

Unless I'm missing something, I don't know of any real RiD detractors that have a real hate-on for the show or toys.

I thought the most interesting thing was the fact that each size class has a maximum number of parts allowed.

Yeah, I wonder what how they decided what the maximum number of parts per class should be. Cost, I suppose...

Counterpunch wrote:

fenrir72 wrote:Mr Yuki Hisashi, the uber engineering designer of Neo Unicron, Big Convoy and Fire Convoy among others.......has categorically stated the immense contribution RID had on the resurgence of TF interest in the early 2000? Wow, imagine to much chargin what that statement would mean to anonymous "know-it alls" who think otherwise.......

What? Where did that come from?

RiD has pretty much universally been loved for its new molds.

People were frantically importing Car Robots because of the delay in getting RiD toys in the States.

Personally, it was the RiD show that reminded me that Transformers was back in the public eye.

Unless I'm missing something, I don't know of any real RiD detractors that have a real hate-on for the show or toys.

Indeed.

Beast Wars was good an' all, but it was great to see the franchise going back to its roots, with toy robots that transformed into recognisable toy cars and other vehicles. Hell, even the latter days of G1 were filled up pretty much with futuristic vehicles like Blurr, the Technobots and the Pretenders, and when G2 did ordinary vehicles, they were in horrendously unrealistic day-glo colours... so for many people RiD represented the first 'proper' Transformers since 1986!