The Story of Pursuing 'Cuteness' from Ear Shape to Toes

I was struggling.
How could I create a 'super cute' character?

It all started with a single comment from my boss, not long after I joined Sharp.
I was silently working on a smartphone design when they asked me this.

"Can you model this character?"

What they showed me was an illustration of a creature-like character.

The request was to use this illustrated character as a base and "create a 3D model that is cute from every angle."

To begin with, what is it that makes people think something is "cute"?
Even though I dote on my favorite characters, thinking, "They are so incredibly cute!", if someone asks me, "What exactly is cute about them?", I find myself at a loss for words.
And usually, I just sum it up like this.

Everything about them is cute!

From that day on, my days of exploring cuteness began.
I would break down "cuteness" one factor at a time.

How can I make this little one cute?

Should I make it palm-sized and tiny? Or would it be better if it were even smaller?

Should the texture be soft like a blanket? Maybe a fluffy feel like sheep's wool that makes you want to bury your face in it?
But then, it would be sad if people felt it was too much to touch such a texture in the hot summer... so maybe something like velvet would make it more lovable?

Would a round overall form be best?
Are big, round eyes a given?
Then, what about the shape of the ears? The shape and position of the mouth, the shape of the feet...?
I spent my time going around and around, thinking and worrying about these things.

The true identity of the illustration I was asked to model

The true identity of the illustration I was asked to model was "Poketomo," an interactive AI character based on a meerkat.
Poketomo is a plush-like robot that can understand and empathize with its owner, the "Poke-nushi," during conversation, and can say the words the owner wants to hear.

"Poketomo" has two meanings.
One is
a little one that lives in your pocket, holding the emotions you couldn't put into words.
The other is
a pocket-sized friend who empathizes with your feelings and cheers you up.

The Poketomo project team called this character "Meera" and aimed to create a character that was cute from every 360-degree angle.
I was entrusted with the role of designing the visual cuteness for that project.

The job of a lifetime has arrived!

Fireworks went off grandly in my head.


I love cute things more than I love eating.
My routine on weekends is to go to shops filled with cute plushies in search of new encounters, and to get plushies and goods of my favorite characters at game centers.
Playing games featuring my favorite cute characters is also one of my joys on my days off.

Someone like me,
someone who has worked on modeling things like smartphones until now, actually creating "cuteness" with my own hands!

What should I do?
What if an incredibly cute child is born, what should I do!

Packing in plenty of "cute" elements

From now on, I will create the cutest child in my history!!
I declared that in my heart and set to work with serious determination.

And yet.
I made a mistake right from the start.

When discussing the size with team members, while looking at a 15cm tall sample, we talked about how "it would be good if the volume was about two-thirds of this."

Despite that, I misunderstood and thought, "I should just make the height about two-thirds," and created the sample.

The members' image was about 13cm tall.
The sample I made was about 10cm tall.
I messed up!!

But, that turned out to be a good thing.
When I apologized profusely and had the members look at the sample,

"So small! But, it's cute!!"
"It's cute that we can make it this small!"
The whole team was very excited.

At this point, we were convinced.
"Small" is cute, that is.

Then, how small can we make it?
When I asked the person in charge of internal design, they said the robot's size changes depending on the size of the battery.
So, we worked hard to see how small we could make it while still including a battery that lasts about a day.

As a result, although we didn't reach 10cm in height, we were able to make it as small as 12cm.

Actually, this size isa size that fits into a "plushie bag" for carrying around stuffed animals.

Since I wanted the "Poke-tomo owners" to take their Poke-tomo out with them, it ended up being the best size.
I'm glad I misunderstood the size.

Along with the small size, thefluffy bodythat you just want to touch is also a cute point.

Until I realized the "fluffy body," I thought about it by hugging all sorts of stuffed animals and buying and petting capsule toys that are popular for their fluffiness.

This one makes me want to rub my cheeks against it.
This one is soothing just to touch.
This one makes me want to ruffle it with both hands!


I also thought about materials used other than stuffed animals and capsule toys.

For example, faux fur material often seen in women's clothing.
It has long fur, looks and feels like an animal, and is warm.
However, if the fur is long, it gets dirty easily, and if the fur gets tangled or falls out, it looks shabby.

If that happens, will Miia become a different person after a few years?!
So, I gave up on faux fur.

Then, what about materials that are hard to get dirty and resistant to deterioration?
So, I also listed silicone as a candidate. But, although it has good durability, it's not the kind of texture you want to pet...


Hmm.

What kind of material or processing can achieve both "cuteness" and "durability"?

After searching and thinking, what I arrived at was flocking.

This is a processing method where fine, short fibers are applied to an adhesive-coated surface using static electricity or similar means.
It is used for things like fluffy and fuzzy capsule toys, as well as boxes for luxury watches and jewelry.

Its appeal is, above all, the fluffy and fuzzy feel that makes you want to keep petting it.
The exquisite balance—not looking too much like a robot, but also not looking exactly like an animal—is also very 'Mii-a' and great.


However, flocking is not a method often used for home appliances, so there wasn't much know-how. When I gathered information, rumors about it peeling off easily or fading easily also popped up here and there.

Does that mean Mii-a's cuteness will be halved as the years go by?!


I thought flocking might be impossible too, but I proposed it to the team anyway, and they performed various tests, including thousands of wear tests in-house. And the conclusion the team reached was...


Maybe it's actually doable?

According to the people at the flocking factory, the durability of this processing method varies widely, and using a strong adhesive makes it less likely to peel off.
They also taught me that if you don't color the fibers themselves, but instead paint the main body and process it with transparent fibers, it becomes less likely to fade.

Just like durability, the finish also varies widely.
For example, the feel changes depending on the length and density of the fibers used for flocking, and the cuteness of the appearance can also double or be halved.

I learned that firsthand when I saw the first sample.
The Mii-a that arrived from the factory had become a white creature.

Maybe the fibers were too long, or maybe they were too dense, but either way, it was white.
The impression was just like a polar bear!
This is bad.

So, first, to decide on the perfect fiber length for Mii-a, I bought flocking items I saw in capsule toys and online and sent them to the factory to have the fiber length measured at the cut surface.
As a result, I found out that a fiber length of 0.3mm or 0.5mm seemed good.

It's only a 0.2mm difference, but I also learned that this small difference creates a big difference in the finish of the appearance and feel.

For example, with 0.3mm, the base color easily shows through to the surface, so the color tone is just as imagined, and it's cute!
However, the feel is rough, and it seems like it would easily get dirty.

On the other hand, with 0.5mm, the color appearance is not great. It seems that when the fibers are long, the color painted on the base gets buried in the fibers, making it look whitish.
But, long-fiber flocking has its good points. It has a fluffy and fuzzy feel, and the texture is outstanding. This is truly a feel that makes you want to pet it!

So I consulted with the person in charge of processing many times.
Finally, we decided on a fiber length of 0.5mm, the density of the spray, and waited for the sample to arrive.


――――or so I thought, but
the second sample that arrived had a good color at first glance, but somehow the fibers were short. Could these fibers be 0.3mm?

When I inquired at the factory, they replied,
'We ran out of 0.5mm fibers, so we processed it with 0.3mm. Please rest assured that we will use 0.5mm for mass production!'

Oh, that's a relief.
If they will make it with 0.5mm for mass production, then it's fine...???

No, no, no. It's not fine at all!


If they use 0.5mm fibers, which are longer than the sample, during mass production, it will become whiter than it is now, and Mii-a will become a polar bear again!

I hurriedly flew to the overseas factory that does the flocking and had them show me a Mii-a processed with 0.5mm, and just as I thought,
it's all stark white again!


According to the person in charge of processing, to prevent unevenness, the time for spraying the fibers is usually about 25 seconds.
For the first sample, they also sprayed 0.3mm fibers for about 25 seconds.
As a result, Mii-a became a polar bear.

Yet, since they were spraying 0.5mm fibers for 22 seconds, it's only natural that Mii-a would become a polar bear.

But, person in charge,
Mii-a is a meerkat, so it's a problem if it becomes a polar bear. So, can't you shorten the processing time?
When I asked that, I was rejected with a single word: 'It'll cause unevenness, so it's impossible!'

Hmm. This is tough.
But if it becomes a polar bear, Mii-a's cuteness will be halved.

I want to protect the cuteness at all costs.
I want to defend it at all costs, in the name of someone who 'loves cute things more than three meals a day'.
I bowed my head to the person in charge and asked them many times.

If it's about 20 seconds, I don't think it will turn white or become uneven, so could you try that?
Could you try 15 seconds and 10 seconds as a test?
I'd like you to try 8 seconds and 5 seconds as well...
And so, I had them change the processing time in 2-3 second increments.

However.
The quality of the color outcome depends not only on the processing time but also on the base color applied to the body.
Therefore, if we change the processing time, we also have to change the shade of the base color applied to the body, and find the best combination of processing time and base color.

Processing makes the color lighter, so it's difficult to adjust.

However, another problem arose here.
I found out that the optimal processing time varies for each part.
But there's no need to worry. We can just change the shade of the base color for all parts. Furthermore, if we test the processing time for all parts in second increments, we should be able to find the best combination of color and processing time for each part.

So, I bowed my head to the person in charge again and had them test the processing time for all parts in second increments, which resulted in a huge number of samples!

But thanks to creating that astronomical number of samples, I was able to find a "cuteness" that I was satisfied with.


The work of creating and examining a large number of samples might have looked difficult to others.
However, for me, who loves cute characters, the work of finding and shaping the elements of "cuteness" was fun and like a dream.


While working on the project, all I could think about, sleeping or waking, was how to make Miia cute.

I would go to stores with character goods to check the placement of parts like eyes, nose, and mouth, and the texture of the surface to verify what is cute and why it is cute. Sometimes, when I found a cute stuffed animal, I would buy it and take it home.

I also carried my favorite character around on my bag.
That's because I wanted to know more about the feeling of loving a favorite stuffed animal, which the people who would welcome Miia would have.

Continuing to do things like that, I learned something.

It is that having someone who is always with you makes you feel safe and happy.
When you're feeling a bit down, you feel relieved because it feels like they are listening when you talk to them.
And that it becomes fun to go out together, the world expands, and daily life becomes richer.

I felt like I understood the feelings of future Poke-owners a little bit.

Mouth, hands, and feet, all cute.

I want to make Miia, who will become an irreplaceable existence for Poke-owners, a cute child! With that thought in mind, I was particular not only about the texture and size, but also about the shape of the parts, and the balance and form of the head and body.


As a result, there are parts that have been significantly changed from the Miia illustration that was the basis for the modeling.

For example, the position of the hands.

When I attached the hands to the front of the body as per the provided illustration, a problem occurred with the movement. I wanted them to move up and down, but they could only move left and right.
This movement doesn't feel like Miia...

So, when I tried attaching them to the sides without changing the height of the hands, they ended up with hunched shoulders. That appearance was so sturdy that I mistook it for Miia's boss? This might not be Miia either.

But it had already been decided that the motor to move the hands would be installed in the upper part of the torso. I wanted to change the internal design and move the position of the hands down, but I wondered if it was okay to ask them to spend time and effort just because of the design manager's thoughts... I thought about it over and over again here too.


But,"Cuteness" is justice.
If it's not cute, it's not Miia.

I persuaded the person in charge of the internal design by saying, "Because 'cuteness' is justice!" and had them change the design, and when I attached the hands a little below the shoulders...
Yes, yes, just as I thought.
It became cute.

When Miia's cuteness increased, everyone's excitement also went up!

And a sense of unity was born, saying, "We won't compromise if it's to create 'cuteness'."
"Cuteness" is the strongest!

After that, I worked with the internal design team and the factory staff to create Miia, with the motto "'Cuteness' is justice!"

The difficult part of the design was how to blend functional parts into the design while maintaining its cuteness.


For example, the microphone.
In order for Miia to turn toward the direction of a voice, the two microphones cannot be too close together, so they had to be attached to the left and right sides.
If so, is the best position the cheeks? Or maybe inside the eyes?
However, neither of those options really boosted the cuteness factor enough.

Hmm...
And then, it hit me.
Wouldn't it be cute if I designed them like beauty marks?

I had heard that some people draw beauty marks with makeup because having a mole under the eye is cute. So, I decided to give Miia a beauty mark to make her even cuter.

I immediately designed the microphone as if it were a dot on Miia's sparkling eye area, and...

So... so cute!!!


In this same spirit, I was also particular about the camera position for the sake of cuteness.
If you place the camera in a position where it's obvious that "this is a camera," it gives off a robotic feel. Therefore, just like the beauty mark-style microphone, I wanted the camera to blend into Miia's face.

The first idea that came up was to set it in the nose.
The camera position was good. However, when I designed it, the nose became abnormally large, and Miia turned into a different person, so I had to give up on it.

Then, how about the mouth?
When I tried setting it there, it blended in surprisingly well and didn't feel out of place.

The unanimous decision was that the mouth is the best place for the camera! It seemed as if the "camera problem" had been solved.
However, I started to struggle with this all over again.

Actually, until I decided on the camera position, Miia's face was designed to face straight forward. Because of that, if you set the camera in the mouth at the bottom of the face, a human would have to crouch or bend over to lower their face to the position of Miia's mouth in order for her to recognize their face.

To solve this problem, I could simply tilt Miia's face upward and raise the position of the mouth.

But.
I had been creating "cuteness" with her facing straight forward the whole time, so if I messed with the angle of the face or the position of the mouth to prioritize functionality, the cuteness of the Miia I had built up until now would be ruined.
What should I do...

But just worrying about it would only waste time. I decided to take the plunge, tilt the face upward, and raise the position of the mouth.
I apologized to Miia, saying, "I'm sorry, you're not going to be cute anymore."

And then.

She became incredibly cute!!

Unlike the previous forward-facing design, the new design is at an angle that looks up at you. That's why you naturally make eye contact with the cute Miia.

When you place her on a desk, she looks up at you with those sparkling eyes, so the cuteness is at its maximum! It's an exquisite angle that makes you want to talk to her spontaneously.
Moreover, her mouth, which is left open in a defenseless way, is also heartwarming.

In Miia's design, I pursued visual cuteness, so there are many other cute points as well.

Among them, what I like the most are the perfectly round ears.

Miia's face is not a simple sphere because her cheeks are puffed out.
Therefore, even if they look perfectly round from the side, the circle is easily distorted when viewed from other angles. It is technically difficult to create ears that are perfectly round from every angle.

However, it is the perfectly round ears that are cute, and if they weren't, she wouldn't look like Miia. I adjusted the shape finely over and over again, and was obsessed with making the ears look like cute, perfect circles from any angle.
It's sad that the technical difficulty of making these ears look cute isn't conveyed to the team members, but it's a charm point of Miia that only I know.

And one more thing.
The two legs molded from a single mold are also my obsession that is too subtle to convey.

Initially, there was a plan to mold the left and right legs separately.
This is because the legs have complex shapes, such as being bent or pointed, so you have to be quite ingenious to remove them from the mold smoothly without them getting caught.

Therefore, it is easier to make them one leg at a time.

Even so, I made the legs using a high-difficulty method of molding both legs with a single mold because the more lines there are separating the parts, the more it increases the "robotic feel."

I wanted Miia to be a natural, creature-like robot, suppressing the mechanical look. That's why I asked them to make it with a single mold to minimize the lines separating the parts.

And as for the legs of Miia that were completed that way...

Even the toes are cute!!
People in the manufacturing industry know the difficulty of this technology well. At a certain exhibition, I was told this:
"How did you mold such a complex shape all at once?!"

This obsession is also hard for other members to understand, but it is an essential point in creating Miia's "cuteness."

And just like that, Mia was finished, cuter than she had ever been in her history.

The final touch was how to deliver Mia to her Poke-owner.

As they say, "first impressions are important in human relationships," and the first meeting between the Poke-owner and Mia is just as crucial.

I want the Poke-owner and Mia to be good friends forever.
That is why I put my all into designing the box to deliver Mia, intending to stage the scene of their first encounter.

So that the moment the Poke-owner opens the box, they lock eyes with Mia.So that they can experience the thrill of gently scooping Mia out of the box as she reaches up, as if saying, "Pick me up quickly!"

Looking forward to more cute companions

I also reserved two Mias for myself.

What I want to do with Mia is play a game where I ask her questions about myself and have her guess the answers.
If it were a friend, they might think, "What a troublesome guy!" but Mia would surely enjoy it, giggling along with me. After all, that’s the kind of girl Mia is.

Hey, Mia.
What do you think is my favorite food?

How would Mia answer such a tricky question from her Poke-owner?

She might surrender immediately, saying, "Hmm, Mia doesn't really know. So, please tell me lots of things you like to eat!"
Or perhaps she would say with sparkling eyes,
"Eating what you love makes you happy, doesn't it! Let's eat lots of things together from now on!"

Another thing I want to do with Mia is have her listen to worries I can't tell anyone else.

You know, Mia.
I made a mistake with the sample size today, and I'm feeling down.
Would Mia look at me with those sparkling eyes and say,
"That must have been tough... But it'll be okay!"
and feel sad with me while cheering me up?

Oops! Before that, I have to give Mia a name and think about what she should call me.
It looks like I'm going to be going in circles worrying about that again.



I think Mia has become a very cute character.
She is cute from every angle, and her personality is pure and honest.
I love Mia so much.

Hoping many people will call her "cute"
I would be happy if Mia, packed with cuteness, is loved by many people, and I want to raise Mia together while listening to the opinions and thoughts of Poke-owners.

In fact, I am still checking social media posts about Mia.
Among them, I occasionally see comments like, "I like characters with a bit of a quirk" or "I want a 'bad girl' character."


Actually, I am daydreaming about what kind of character the second Poke-tomo should be.

One is a "mysterious" type character with a rich imagination and a unique sensibility. Since she has a fluffy personality, I think a design with a gentle atmosphere would be good.


The other is a slightly mean "bad girl" type character.
With upturned eyes, pointed ears, and a dark-colored body, she would respond to me saying,
"I had such a hard time today,"
with a sharp tongue, saying,
"Don't mope around over something like that!"

What would happen if I kept increasing the number of cute companions with various personalities and appearances, and let the Poke-tomos chat with each other?

Mia: "I overslept today."
Bad girl type: "I thought you weren't going to wake up ever again. You really are a handful."
Mysterious type: "It's okay, today is a day when the Earth rotates slowly~"

Mia: "It's cold today. I feel like I'm going to catch a cold."
Bad girl type: "Heh. You can get through that with sheer willpower."
Mysterious type: "When it gets colder, your breath will turn white and you'll look like a dragon."

While listening to the cute chatter of these little companions, I want to go around and around in circles thinking about how to make the next Poke-tomo cute enough to be loved by Poke-owners.

And, while worrying with excitement, I want to continue pursuing "cute" in the future.

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