Plans to make a 60-foot moving version of the well-loved Gundam robot in Japan has been announced by a team of Japanese animators and engineers.
The Gundam robot is a famed character of the "Mobile Suit Gundam" anime series that attracted millions of followers in Asia, Europe and the Americas since it first aired on TV on 1979. At present, the Gundam robot has a stationary version erected at Tokyo Park, and plans to create a 60-foot mobile version of this is warmly welcomed by long-time fans of the series.
Calling all fans' help
To be able to turn the plan into reality, the developing team of this project, animation studio Sunrise has called on fans in Japan and worldwide for suggestions on how to make the 60-foot robot prototype move. "We are looking for the most advanced techniques and inspired thinking, without regard to field of expertise or nationality," says the company on a statement posted on their Japanese website.
Because of this, Sunrise has opened its doors for ideas and proposals submissions that can be utilized to create the moving Gundam. Sunrise will take submissions before July ends. Japanese and foreign fans alike may send their entries once a formal announcement of the date of submission is announced, while the development team will start to read and consider some of the proposals around February 2015. They will also let the public know of the chosen most-promising proposals.
Sunrise may also seek fans' help for revisions of the chosen ideas sometime during the fall of 2015 until February 2016.
Planning and construction of the animated robot may take place in mid-2018, and if nothing goes wrong in the animation studio's timeline, the moving Gundam robot may be ready to be unveiled in the summer of 2019, in time of the TV series' 40th anniversary and a year before Japan (Tokyo) hosts the Olympic Games.
