Visual Experiments Lain
Visual Experiments Lain is a book of illustrations and information about the Serial Experiments Lain anime. It does not have a single author, but a production staff headed by Acura Honda (本田あきら) from AX magazine. It was originally published in 1999, and reissued in 2013. The contents of the 2013 edition appear to be unaltered from the original, with the exception of the staff credits page.
It includes many screencaps, production art (i.e. layouts and storyboards), and information about the anime's production process. It also contains several original illustrations and staff interviews. Most of the production art and original illustrations are by Takahiro Kishida. The production art is printed in frustratingly small dimensions, but the original illustrations take up full pages or two-page spreads. Though there is a translator in the credits, the vast majority of the text is Japanese.
Yoshitoshi Abe is notably uninvolved in the production of this book. The Weather Break illustrations are reprinted in it in very small dimensions, but other than that nothing in the book was drawn by him, and he was not interviewed for it.
Contents
Taken verbatim from the front flap of the book jacket, except for the description field.
| Page No. | Contents | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 01 | What is " lain " ....? | Various staff members' comments on what Lain means to them. |
| 04 | story & data | Credits and synopses for each episode. |
| image of each layer & the making of the layers | ||
| 08 | layer:01 WEIRD | wire, life, layout, NAVI series, weird, profile |
| 12 | layer:02 GIRLS | Accela, cyberia, handyNAVI, bear-wear, horror, GIRLS |
| 16 | layer:03 PSYCHE | Psyche, home, friends, newNAVI, men in black, KIDS |
| 20 | layer:04 RELIGION | hardware, PHANTOMa, boy meets girl, friends, family, design |
| 24 | layer:05 DISTORTION | SHIBUYA, direction, memory, profile |
| 30 | layer:06 KIDS | KIDS, inner side of WIRED, kids, friend, sound effect, design |
| 34 | layer:07 SOCIETY | Knights, Nezumi's POV, NetNews, Shou's flight simulator, NAVIoldtype, Typographics, from玲音toレイン, friends, design |
| 40 | layer:08 RUMORS | eye, school, HandyNAVI interface, Tarou's 3D game, layout, lain duplication, Alice with T., adult sight on wired, 玲音、レイン、lain |
| 44 | layer:09 PROTOCOL | history of network, expanding NAVI, broken girl, family, kiss, レイン of the Wired, design of creature |
| 48 | layer:10 LOVE | deus, virtual window, guruguru lain, "wind," love, world without her, design |
| 54 | layer:11 INFORNOGRAPHY | lain?, inforno, Typographic, chisa, Alice's NAVI, image, design |
| 58 | layer:12 LANDSCAPE | alice and lain, friends, layout & conte, home, men in black, "let's all love lain," TARO, Gun type NAVI, expanding machine |
| 64 | layer:13 EGO | |
| 68 | device# (kaori shimizu) | opening, Eiri's fall, All RESET, life without lain, dining table, after story, "れいん", pedestrian bridge, "lain" |
| interviews | ||
| 02 | What is "lain"? (chiaki j. konaka / ueda yasuyuki) | |
| 24 | digital effects & "NAVI" system (junji nakahara & tomokazu tokoro) | |
| 72 | opening & ending themes (boa / CHABO) | |
| 74 | sound direction,effects, & design
(youta tsurouka, kouji kasamatsu, & akira takemoto) |
|
| 76 | film direction & design (ryutaro nakamura & takahiro kishida) | |
| special image graphics (original illustration/CG) | ||
| cover
01 02,03 62-63 |
takahiro kishida | |
| 38-39 | ueda yasuyuki | |
| 52-53 | hidenori matsuhara | |
| 78-79 | ryutaro nakamura (text: chiaki j. konaka) | |
Staff
Producer: Acura Honda
Editors/Writers: Acura Honda, Shunsuke Kishi, Motohisa Tanaka, Kaori Yamamoto
Translator: Akiko Matsumoto
Proof Readers: Cathy Fishman, Scott Shifrel
Photographer: Hisashi Maruyama
Hair and Makeup: Tomoko Ebisawa
Photo & CG works (cover pages of layer): Makoto Abe
Art director/designer: Atsushi Doi
designers: Mayumi Matsukura, Yuji Satoh