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The Story of Team AniKaneda

When I was 14, my parents moved to the small town, located in north-west Germany, called Steinfurt. Back in the day without global interconnection (internet), living out your hobby was a little bit different then it is now. We had real game and anime magazines printed on paper, friends meeting at school yard and 54k modems. Well yeah ok, we had internet, but a very slow one. Soon after I went to school there, I found some friends, who also were digging in to video games and japanese movies and animations like me. We were the people who knew everything about Japan(!) .............


home sweet home - a small town on far west side of Germany

.... that was until we found out about conventions, and we realized that there are more crazier people out there :D AnimagiC in Koblenz was the first big convention we went to visit in summer of 2000. It had such an amazing impact on me, that I desided to create my own website and name it anikaneda "ani" is short for anime or AnimagiC and "Kaneda" is my nickname that I am still using today. Back in the day everyone on the internet had some kind of alias or nickname. It was cool and fresh! Like a prince from aahm .... never mind.



my first homepage that I made in the late summer of 2000

At our first convention we were only 3 guys. We didn't had our own cars yet, so we ended up taking a train to Koblenz. I have a video dedicated to that particular trip on my YouTube channel (german with eng. subs), so if you interested check it out. You can learn about the beginning of anime & cosplay convention and about our experiences that we made there.





From that year we continued to visit AnimagiC every single year. 2001 I went to Koblenz with 2 other dudes that I already knew from school. One of them was a huge Neo Genesis Evangelion fan back in the day. He bought so much stuff, that we had trouble to sleep in the car. Yes we kind of stayed 2 nights in the car after beeing hushed out from the video rooms in the middle of the night. There is some nostalgic memories from 2001 but not from sleeping in my Ford Ka with 2 other guys.



my second AnimagiC homepage in 2001

AnimagiC 2001 we spend the whole weekend in Koblenz. The weather was pretty good in comparison to last year and you could practically sleep outside if you wanted. Cosplay became a huge thing that year. Including some WTF moments that would stay in your brain forever. Chibi Chibi XXX was born and would have a multiple come backs in following years.

AnimagiC 2001 memories

From 2002 our crew started to grow. That year we went as a quartet to AnimagiC and stayed for the first time at hotel. I remember that this year the convention was very intence and full of program. Also a lot of japanese guests participated at AnimagiC this year. Yôko Kano, a music composer who is very known for the gorgeous soundtracks in several animes. Range Murata, a very talanted illustrator whos work can be find not only in animes but also some video games like Wachenröder for the Sega Saturn. Nobuteru Yuki - Record of Lodos war, Escaflowne. Shinichiro Watanabe - Macross Plus, Cowboy Bebob etc. and a long time guest to became in the future Tadashi Ozawa-san! We did not wanted to miss anything at that weekend, so we pushed ourselves to the limit.


Team ANK 2002

Also I had some extra video projects in mind, that I wanted to shoot in Koblenz this year. For example we shoot a parody to Metal Gear Solid 2 on the bridge after midnight. Also a spontaneous video shooting on sunday morning as a homage to japanese HipHop artist Zeebra and one of his best titles 解放戦線 (Liberation Front) came to life.






all our video projects from AnimagiC 2002 were united on 4 Video CDs (out of print)


my third and final stand alone website dedicated exclusively to AnimagiC

Somewhere between AnimagiC 2002 and 2003 my friend from school got a call from a misteriouse girl, that got his phone number from a local comic shop. It turned out to be someone who is living in the same town and wanted to learn some new people interested in anime and manga as well. My friend gave her my phone number and the rest ist history. This is how we got not only one, but three new crew member that year. Summer 2003 was the hottest since weather records started!



We even made our own AnimagiC 2003 crew t-shirts to wear them at the convention that year.
It was a blast to be with such an amazing crew. That year was one of those that I still remember to this day






2003 I got my own DVD burner and learned how to use DVD authoring programs to create
Video DVDs with a nice custom menu. Our first convention DVD was from AnimagiC 2k3,
that was available thru our website and brought us a lot of positive feedback.



AnimagiC 2003 DVD (out of print)

The amazing weekend was comming to an end. One last time we took a group photo at the parking spot in the front of our hotel, that has an amazing view over the Rhein river and a convention buildings on the other side.

Team aniKaneda @ AnimagiC 2003 with a view from our hotel at convention site on the other side of the river

We knew, we defenetely will return!



And it went even better in 2004! AnimagiC offered so much more that year in terms of shows, programs and cosplay and even went viral by appearing on GIGA TV (was famous German TV show/internet media at that time)



Even we lost each other on the Autobahn on the way to Koblenz, caused by a truck and making somebody step on the gas very hard, we (this time 9 crew member plus friends from neighbor town) arrived in Koblenz on friday afternoon



It felt like a big family reunion this time. We knew already many people there and were happy to see them again



including cosplay Girls & Boys and their costumes <3



One of the memorable moments at AnimagiC 2004 - Dance Dance Revolution Contest - organized by Wolfsoft





TEAM ANIKANEDA WILL RETURN!