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Nowadays it seems like a common thing to use actual places as backdrops in anime. After all, why go through the trouble of trying to imagine and draw an entire city when all you have to do is go outside, snap a few photos and animate them. This technique has been used for some high-profile anime such as Clannad, Haruhi, Kanon, Lucky Star, K-ON, and A Certain Scientific Railgun. There are some pros and cons to making anime in this way.

First of all, the obvious advantage to using real places for anime backgrounds is that the animators don’t have to bother coming up with something that looks nice and has a realistic feel to it. All the small nit-picky things have already been decided for them. That pretty much guarantees the anime will have at least a certain level of detail and a somewhat realistic feel to it. It’s certainly a lot better than coming up with backgrounds like this one:

Using real places for anime also has the added side-effect of bringing more tourists to the area. A popular example of this is the Washinomiya shrine, whose popularity has skyrocketed after crazed Lucky Star fans discovered that it was used as the basis for the Hiiragi shrine in the anime. The actual shrine has even taken this opportunity to rake in more money by selling Lucky Star merchandise. Of course, featuring real places in anime can also have a negative effect of increasing anime tourists where they’re not welcome.

Although copying actual locations in anime does give it a certain level of quality, it also restricts the creativity of the animators. Having a detailed and realistic looking background is nice, but considering that you can draw anything in anime, it seems a waste not to create a background that helps set the mood or emphasize the severity of a certain situation. An example of a good fictional backdrop is this park from the anime ef – A Tale of Memories:

The sidewalk seems to extend on forever, probably emphasizing the fact that the relationship between the two characters doesn’t appear to be going anywhere. It’s animation like this that can help turn an average anime into a good one.

In the end though, what really matters is whether or not the audience cares enough about the animation that it affects their impression of the anime, and if the animators are up to the task of coming up with their own backdrops.