Chapter 276 - 273: Qitian Animation’s First Step

Chapter 276: Chapter 273: Qitian Animation’s First Step

On October 8th, the seven-day National Day holiday finally came to an end. The working stiffs and student grunts all returned to their normal routines of work and study.

"Nanny Su, I’m skipping my theory class this morning. If the professor takes attendance, could you cover for me?" Jiang Xia said to Su Qing after breakfast.

As the boss, he had to show up and say a few words today, no matter what. Even though he was a hands-off boss, there were some things Li Weiya couldn’t completely handle in his stead.

For example, when it came to understanding *Cat and Mouse*, it was necessary for him, the father of *Cat and Mouse*, to give all the employees a lesson.

"Okay."

Su Qing nodded slightly. She had already guessed he was probably going to the company to handle some business.

"Do you still need me at the company?"

Jiang Xia shook his head. "Not right now. Didn’t Director Li explain your tasks to you yesterday?"

"Yeah, for now, she has me and Luo Peng in charge of secondary key animation."

Secondary key animation involved refining and detailing the first key frames. This division of labor, an assembly-line-style operation, could greatly speed up the animation production process.

"Keep up the good work."

Generally, first key animation is handled by experienced key animators, while secondary key animation can be done by newcomers, allowing them to quickly gain experience.

Since Su Qing and Luo Peng were university students who had just entered the School of Fine Arts, assigning them to secondary key animation was the most logical move. It wouldn’t be too late to move them to first key animation once they became familiar with the team’s overall production process.

In this regard, Li Weiya had a great deal of management experience.

"I will."

Jiang Xia smiled faintly.

After that, he told Lin Yanwan he was leaving and rode his bike toward the company.

At eight in the morning, Li Weiya had already arrived at the office. Today was the company’s first official day of business. She was going to be very busy, and she also had a meeting to lead.

Seeing Jiang Xia, she was slightly surprised. "Didn’t you say you weren’t coming in today?"

"My morning class is just theory. It’s not important, so I came to check things out," Jiang Xia said with a smile.

Li Weiya nodded. With Jiang Xia here, she had her pillar of support.

Another half hour passed, and colleagues began to trickle into the office. There were young people and middle-aged people, but the majority were middle-aged. Jiang Xia hadn’t met many of them before, but since Li Weiya had hired them, it meant their professional skills were definitely up to par.

A short while later, Li Weiya came over to Jiang Xia with a smile, two people in tow.

"Ah Xia, let me introduce you. This is Zhou Zhen, our cinematography supervisor, and this is Meng Xiulian, our music supervisor. Both have worked in their respective fields for seven or eight years and are very experienced."

Jiang Xia looked up at the two people before him. Zhou Zhen wore glasses, had medium-length hair, and was slightly heavyset. Meng Xiulian was dressed in a pantsuit and heels, looking very professional.

"Zhou Zhen, Xiulian, this is the President Jiang I told you about. He’s the founder of Qitian Animation and the true father of *Cat and Mouse*," Li Weiya introduced with a smile.

Hearing this, both of them froze for a second. The young man in front of them was actually their boss? And the hit animation *Cat and Mouse*, which had swept the nation, was his creation!

Despite their surprise, they were seasoned professionals with years in the workforce, so they both recovered quickly.

"Hello, President Jiang," Zhou Zhen and Meng Xiulian said.

"Hello."

Jiang Xia smiled. "From now on, I’ll be counting on you two for the cinematography and sound work. If you need anything at all, please don’t hesitate to speak with Director Li."

"Not at all, President Jiang. It’s our job."

Jiang Xia looked at Meng Xiulian. "Our company’s recording studio is still under renovation. We estimate it won’t be finished until the end of the month."

"President Jiang, Director Li has already told me," Meng Xiulian said.

"That’s good."

After that, with Li Weiya’s introductions, Jiang Xia met several more experienced key animators, colorists, and animators. With their help, he believed that after a period of adjustment, Qitian Animation could begin true assembly-line production.

"Ah Xia, this is the project schedule I created based on the storyboards you provided. Take a look and see if it’s suitable," Li Weiya said, handing him a chart.

Jiang Xia took it and examined it carefully. He had to admit, as the project director, Li Weiya had done a very meticulous job.

From storyboard submission to key animation, then to drawing the in-between frames, followed by coloring, cinematography, sound editing, and final video editing—each day was scheduled with different progress benchmarks. The entire process, from start to finish, would take about 20 days per episode on average.

With the company’s current staffing, they could work on four episodes simultaneously. A 12-episode season would take exactly two months.

Of course, this was just the ideal scenario.

After all, everyone’s skill level was different, making the progress on the drawing side unpredictable. It would be easy for the early schedule to fall into disarray, leading to a frantic crunch in post-production. That was how you ended up with scenes of people pulling all-nighters to meet deadlines.

Fortunately, Jiang Xia had already provided the storyboards, the most critical part of pre-production. Everyone else just needed to follow the plan, so there shouldn’t be any major problems.

"It’s excellent. But isn’t this schedule a little too tight?" Jiang Xia asked.

There were only 15 days from key animation to finished animation, and only five days for the subsequent coloring, cinematography, sound editing, and final editing. If they were still shooting on threes like before, this would be no problem at all. But after switching to shooting on twos, the workload had nearly doubled.

"Don’t worry, the timeline is perfectly adequate," Li Weiya said with a faint smile. "Each animation team has four people. Even with two days off per week as required by law, the workload distributed to each person isn’t that heavy."

Four animators: one for first key animation, one for secondary key animation, and two in-betweeners who specialized in drawing the intermediate frames. If they coordinated well, it would be more than enough to handle the simple line art of *Cat and Mouse*.

Jiang Xia paused, stunned. He had completely forgotten about days off. Back when it was just a small workshop of a few people, the concept of a day off didn’t exist. To get the final product out as quickly as possible, they were pulling all-nighters almost every day.

Now that they were producing under the name of an animation company, every process had to be properly regulated.

"That’s good, then. For now, let’s stick to this schedule," Jiang Xia finalized.

"Then I’ll go make some more copies and hand one out to everyone in a bit."

"Okay."

Before he knew it, it was already nine o’clock.

Jiang Xia glanced over the employee roster. Except for the few who were still in school, everyone had arrived on time. Out of 35 employees, 31 were present.

The large hall was divided into several major areas. The once spacious and quiet office was suddenly bustling with activity.

Jiang Xia couldn’t help but sigh with emotion. ’Qitian Animation has finally taken its first step. With this group of people, future development will be much easier.’

Just then, Li Weiya stood up and called everyone into the conference room for a meeting. This was the first all-staff meeting, and it was a momentous occasion.