Sophia Magazine vol.4 / WINTER 2016

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As leader of Polygon Pictures, the cutting-edge CG anima-tion company that recently won an award at the prestigious International Emmy® Kids Awards, Shuzo Shiota knows the fundamental secret of his success: “Of course, we try to pio-neer the use of state-of-the-art technology to produce high-quality products; however, I think the most important thing is to move audiences.” Over the past 20 years, Shiota has been responsible for maintaining both the world’s interest in Polygon’s work and the strong motivation of the employees who produce that work. One of the oldest CG animation companies in the world, Polygon has consistently produced great work that appeals to international as well as Japanese audiences dur-ing the 34 years since the company was founded. As he ex-plains, “The world is always changing geopolitically, and the media is changing quickly, too. There used to be just TV and radio, but now we have streaming outlets, mobile, and other such media. We try to maintain a global presence in accor-dance with the rapidly changing environment.” Beyond producing good work, Shiota constantly thinks about what he has to do in order for the company to dif-ferentiate itself in the current market. “We figure that if we can create a product that drives us emotionally, our company will stand out.”He elaborates that by making animation products, creators are not just designing graphics, but also shaping emotions. Through stories, they delight audiences by making them happy and laugh, or even frightening them. “Ultimately, we can tickle people’s emotions though our creative products. If we fail to do that, then we are not achieving great results.”To create products that affect how people feel, Shiota thinks it is important to keep his employees’ energy levels “We can tickle people’s emotionsthrough our creative products.” high. The creators have to fabricate reality in such a way that audiences can believe it. To make it convincing, they need to have deep interest and insight into human lives. Accordingly, the lively energy at the company directly affects what people there produce: “The creative team has to be happy and pas-sionate. Of course, people’s moods brighten and darken, but I focus on keeping their emotional temperature high. I try to hear what these creative people say, help them loosen up if they get tense, and do whatever is necessary to maintain a good vibe.” Although he has been in the animation industry for over 20 years, Shiota has never considered himself to be a creator or artist, explaining that “I cannot even draw a circle right. I have no training in art or in computer graphics.” Shiota recalls how he entered the field purely by coinci-dence. Always driven by his vision to make an impact on so-ciety, his journey started when he came back to Japan from the United States, where he had spent nine years since 1974, through elementary and most of high school. “When I lived in the U.S., there was no such a thing as ‘Cool Japan,’ and I tried to be as American as possible. I was almost at the point of getting my driver’s license and beginning an independent life in the U.S. Then, at the age of 15, I had to go back to Japan. I became restless.”Upon returning to Japan, Shiota entered Rokko Gakuin, a pioneering Jesuit high school for boys in Japan. There, his life was turned around completely, and he regained his pride in being Japanese. At school, he had to wear a uniform, shave his head, and engage in humbling chores such as cleaning toilets daily. Life there was totally different from what he had expe-rienced in the U.S. As he recalls, “Now that I think about it, I actually favored the environment, because I could be carefree about how I was perceived by others. I could just be myself instead of pretending to be a grownup.” In his second year of high school, Shiota went with a group of other students to India to visit a Mother Theresa’s Home for the Dying, where destitute people close to death would go to spend their final days. Soon after this shocking, yet eye-opening, experience, he decided to study international relations, and enrolled in the Department of International Legal Studies at Sophia University. His vision, honed during his youth, was to work for the bet-terment of developing countries and help those nations im-prove their relationships with Japan. He visited other Asian countries, including the Philippines, Indonesia, and Korea numerous times. He was involved with the Catholic Student Association and joined in the Catholic Students movement. During his fourth year at Sophia University, Shiota and some col-leagues decided to make a docu-mentary film about the relationships between Japan and the countries it had occupied during World War II. He conducted interviews with war survivors and through the film in-troduced their voices that had not before been heard. The film was released in local churches. “I was happy and proud of myself, because AJIN - DEMI-HUMAN -The latest work of Polygon Pic-tures © GS,K/APC20Sophia People

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