The odyssey continues

"The novel is a milestone for China's science fiction literature. It presents Chinese peoples' understanding of the universe, indicating that the community of human beings has a shared future," he says.

"As the novel has a magnificent world view and complicated themes, it's hard to showcase the original work's setting of science and the imagination about future technology."

The team of scriptwriters carefully read the novel before they started adapting it. For a five-minute scene concerning complicated scientific theories, they spent about a year revising the script over discussion with the experts.

The producing team consulted experts in the fields such as quantum physics, nuclear power, aerospace and mechanical engineering, so as to combine these cutting-edge technologies, as well as scientists' understandings about future science, into the animation.

They also communicated with the experts regularly to hone the animation with sci-fi designs that are in accordance with scientific knowledge and laws.

Ruan believes the commonality of animation, TV series and movies is that the core is about storytelling. The biggest advantage for science fiction animation is that the advanced technology can realize the imaginary scenes. But it's very demanding for the animation team.