At the same time, Nelson Shin, another key figure in the story, was starting out and began by making a deal with Depatie-Freleng to bring six half-hours of a show they were producing with The Netherlands to Korea. The show was titled Dr. Snuggle. In 1979, Nelson also brought a Bugs Bunny special for Depatie-Freeling to Korea. Nelson Shin believes he brought the first full show (animation through camera) to Seoul. Others feel Steve Hahn or the late Jerry Smith was first. All in all, it doesn't really matter, as they were all pioneers and helped to get the industry started.

By 1985, the animation industry had become firmly established in Seoul. Jerry Smith had split with Steve Hahn, formed his own company, Take One, closed it and then left the country. Mr. Tayk Kim had left Dong Seo and started his own company called Pion Animation and Nelson Shin was opening a new studio, AKOM, which would eventually become the largest in Korea. Steve Hahn was about to lose his studio, then HanHo, by producing Starchaser, a 3-D theatrical film which would flop and result in his financial backers taking over his studio.

If there is a marked beginning to Korea's golden period, it had to be in the mid to late Eighties when animation studios began popping up all over Seoul; Daiwon, Sei Young, AKOM and Saerom, to name a few, were all formed during this period.

Nelson Shin, head of AKOM Studio, president of ASIFA Korea, and publisher of the industry magazine Animatoon, would like to see Koreans more involved in the creation of programs.

How Do They Do It?
To start with, everyone works very hard. Secondly, the studios in Seoul, and there are well over sixty studios listed there alone, have developed a system that relies upon a strong cottage industry for many phases of production. Anywhere from ink and paint to camera, there's someone out there who wants to sub-contract your work if you'll give it to them. Also, almost everyone freelances, or moonlights if you like, and many studios lay off work like a bookie lays off bets when he gets more action than he can handle. A studio may be producing three separate series at the same time and not even have a layout department in house; it will all be freelanced out.

While this might be undesirable for an overseas supervisor who wants to see his work come back to him in a smooth flow, this system helps the studios in that it provides decentralized micro-management within each phase of production supplied by each contractor, not dissimilar from the way Boeing manufactures its airplane. The larger studios producing the pricey shows maintain full in-studio departments but even they will avail themselves to freelance help when they need it. The bottom line is that over the past fifteen years, Seoul has developed a large and capable work force and a system in which their production efforts can be maximized when needed and downsized when slow.

Overseas Supervisors
For those not familiar with the term, this refers to the client's representative, sent by the client, and normally at his expense, to work within the contracting studio. This person most often is an artist (layout, animator, designer or even a director), but they could also be a production manager type. The first Westerners who went over to Asia were all very versatile artists who worked with the local staff as instructors as much as client watchdogs. What the Korean animators didn't know is that these people taught them. American animation employed and still employs, different techniques, style and timing than Japanese animation. These early supervisors helped the studios to speed up the learning curve, enabling them to understand quickly how to produce acceptable work for the Western market.