Anime backgrounds are produced separately from the animated foreground figures and traditionally were painted in opaque gouache or acrylic on illustration board. The relationship between the painted background and the animated cels is one of the production decisions that most directly defines an anime's visual identity. This page describes the traditional method, its principal schools, and the digital transition.
Traditional method
In the traditional pipeline, the background artist (背景, haikei) works from the layout drawing — which specifies framing, perspective, and any animated foreground action — and paints a full-colour scene on illustration board. The painted background is then photographed (or scanned, in the late-cel era) and composited beneath the transparent character cels. A single TV episode requires 200–400 background paintings; a feature film several thousand.
Schools and traditions
Several recognised background-painting traditions exist:
- Studio Ghibli, under Kazuo Oga — saturated, painterly backgrounds with visible brushwork; rural and natural settings particularly emphasised. The Oga style on My Neighbor Totoro, Princess Mononoke, and Spirited Away is the international reference point for ambitious anime backgrounds.
- The Mamoru Oshii / Production I.G school — dense, photo-realistic urban environments; Ghost in the Shell's Hong-Kong-inspired cityscapes are the canonical example.
- Makoto Shinkai's CoMix Wave style — extreme detail, with explicit attention to lighting effects (lens flares, golden-hour sun, light through glass) and small environmental details (clouds, vending machines, train signage).
- The Kyoto Animation school — restrained, often soft-edged painting that prioritises tonal consistency over individual painterly statement, allowing character animation to remain the visual focus.
Digital painting
By the late 2000s most TV anime had moved to digital background painting, using Adobe Photoshop with custom brushes or specialised software such as OpenCanvas. The transition reduced per-painting time but did not eliminate the role: a skilled digital background painter still produces work that takes hours to days per scene. Studio Ghibli was a late holdout for traditional gouache, with The Wind Rises (2013) widely cited as one of the last major features to use principally traditional methods. The Boy and the Heron (2023) combines digital and traditional techniques.