Amin Abbas

DUBAI: Mohammed (known as M Ali), a talented Pakistani animator who works on various Japanese animation projects such as ‘Jujutsu Kaisen’, ‘Nier: Automata Ver1.1a’, ‘Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End’, ‘Mushoku Tensei’, ‘Rurouni Kenshin’ and more.

“”I wanted to pursue art as a career since childhood, but I was clueless about what I wanted to do exactly,” Mohammed said. “During Covid, I began drawing anime and manga fan art. My primary inspiration was Sui Ishida. Every single panel of Tokyo Ghoul is a masterpiece, and the fact that he was creating such exceptional work on a tight, weekly schedule was impressive.”

“I got introduced to the world of animation through an online friend on X who goes by the name Ty (uremeshi). Ty added me to his group chat with Sakuga fans. Some animators I first came to know about were Sunghoo Park and Kouki Fujimoto. I was really impressed by their work ethic. Initially, I aspired to become a mangaka (comic artist), but there were numerous challenges, such as relocating to Japan and gaining fluency in the Japanese language. In contrast, these barriers were not in the way when it came to animation, which ultimately led me to pursue it as a career. ”

The animator started working in the industry in 2021. “Many of my practice animations were action cuts, which received positive recognition. However, when I started working professionally under tight deadlines, I wasn’t really enjoying action,” he said. “Often, my work would be completely redrawn by animation directors. After a few projects, I decided to stop taking action scenes and shifted my focus to character acting and daily life cuts. This turned out to be a good decision. Currently, my main focus is to develop strong draftsmanship and eventually become an animation director.”

“My very first project was my own original short animation movie. I never gave it a title, as the purpose was simply to test the waters. After publishing it, I sent it to Shingo Yamashita. Looking back, I still don’t know what I was thinking, but to my surprise, Yamashita actually responded. He liked the color design and advised not to use speed lines in daily life cuts. He also recommended incorporating rotoscoping for character acting. Receiving advice from someone I idolized was a massive confidence booster, and I will always remain indebted to his kindness,” he added.

About the challenges that he faced during his career, Mohammed said, “I think the biggest challenge was meeting the deadlines. Hand-drawn animation is a time-consuming craft and schedules for TV anime are always tight and demanding. Delivering quality work on time has always been difficult, as neither quality nor deadlines can be compromised.”

“The most enjoyable project I worked on was season 2 of Mushoku Tensei. The schedule I was given was very good, and I had the opportunity to draw many characters from the main cast. I also had the chance to animate a very funny scene with Rudeus at the beginning of Cour 2. As a big fan of the series, it felt really good to contribute to its production,” he added.

Mohammed shared that he has many exciting projects coming up. “Many of them are unannounced, but there’s a lot of fun stuff, touching themes like camping, circus, travel, and more. I’ve also been planning on making a short original animation film. I think I will take a break in 2025 to start working on it.”

About his recommendations for those who want to work on animation projects, Mohammed said, “For those aspiring to pursue a career in animation, my advice would be to focus on developing good drawing speed. During practice, many people tend to spend too much time on each drawing, which can cause difficulty in meeting deadlines during professional work. The most common reasons why people quit animation are not being able to meet deadlines due to poor time management or not earning enough money, both of which can be correlated to drawing speed.”

About the establishment of his career in the animation industry, he said, “I started animation in early 2021. Many of my practice animations were action cuts, which received positive recognition. However, when I started working professionally under tight deadlines, I wasn’t really enjoying action. Often, my work would be completely redrawn by animation directors. After a few projects, I decided to stop taking action scenes and shifted my focus to character acting and daily life cuts. This turned out to be a good decision. Currently, my main focus is to develop strong draftsmanship and eventually become an animation director.”