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'Spirited Away': Early Sketches For Hayao Miyazaki's Animated Fantasy (PHOTOS)

The Huffington Post     First Posted: 02/ 2/2012 5:49 pm   Updated: 02/ 3/2012 10:33 am

The images reposted here originally appeared in a post for JoBlo.com.

Over at the movie-cataloguing site JoBlo, a guy named Steve Seigh keeps writing unbelievably in-depth histories of animated movies for a column he calls "Ink & Pixel." It's the kind of internet rabbit hole that takes a lot of work to put together and often goes un-fallen through, and in an attempt to even out that balance we'll be pointing an arrow every so often to Seigh's best efforts.

The last Seigh post we featured used early sketches to tell the story of how Pixar made "Up," an elaborate process that involved a "design vocabulary chart." Now, Seigh's broken down "Spirited Away," the Japanese fantasy film about a girl set on rescuing her parents from a parallel universe that's turned them into pigs (har har). The way Seigh tells the story, "Spirited" was the gorgeous little film that could. Director Hayao Miyazaki and his team had to quadruple their output 6 months before the premiere date in order to finish, which they managed without fudging what any fan will tell you is an unusually beautiful aesthetic.

Below, we've reposted some of the stills and early "Spirited" sketches Seigh shared. Head on over to JoBlo for the full story and more images.

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03:06 PM on 02/07/2012
I love Hayao Miyazaki's work! Spirited Away was pretty good, but my favorite is Howl's Moving Castle. The music in the films, with the exception of Nausicaa (except for the Ohms "La La" song), were a beautiful accompaniment.
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sacmom3
Watch out! They're wearing Hoodies!
10:09 AM on 02/07/2012
There are no other anime films out today that compares to Miyazaki's. A true genius of the anime genre.
07:23 PM on 02/05/2012
I love all of Miyazaki's films. There hasn't been a bad one yet.
01:51 PM on 02/06/2012
Couldn't agree with you more. I was fortunate to see "Totoro," and I've been a huge fan ever since.
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Mike Macguinness
Artist of industrial dementia
09:36 PM on 02/04/2012
I was not a fan until I saw 'Spirited Away'
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VictoryBlue
Motorcycle rider, Legalization supporter, Texan
03:27 PM on 02/03/2012
Howl's Moving Castle and all his other works are simply awesome. My kids and I love his work.
11:27 AM on 02/03/2012
My kids and I love this movie; so much so we've bought 3 copies over the years to replace ones that were used in the minivan and later fouind under the seat in sand.......at $26+ a pop!!!!!!!
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triplettam
Mind Bender
05:33 AM on 02/03/2012
One of the greatest animated films of all time. Miyazaki . . . a true genius.
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Lady Saera
Love,love,love is the soul of genius, 'Mozart'
07:56 PM on 02/02/2012
Oh I just adore his animations, Miyazaki is amazing..his Studio Ghibli has done so many wonderful things..I have seen Spirited Away four years ago and since watched it again, and Castle in the Sky, loved it, Ponyo, and Kiki's Delivery Service,and so many more, I just love them! All are so delightful, and fanciful. You dont have to be a child to enjoy them.