Writing introductions is a bit tedious so....just take a look at my first post if you want to know more....

....and if you get curious about the name of this World or my posts, check out the second one.

Not Perfect is Good

So, I have to amend my last post....Heroman isn't a Studio Bones original. It's written by Stan Lee. And while that's totally freaking awesome, it kinda takes away from the, "Oh they did a good job being accurately American!" factor. Oh well, I still liked it. Second episode of Star Driver was kinda ridiculous, but I'm gonna keep watching it for now. Also, they had another series that I can't believe I forgot about, Darker Than Black...

...which I didn't get to watch when it was first out for some reason, and then couldn't find when it came time for the second series and the OVA. A teacher (yeah....) gave me DVDs of the whole set a couple months ago so I'm finally getting around to it. Only 2 episodes in so I can't say much about it, but it has the typical depressing Bones feel so I think I'm gonna like it...

I didn't get to draw as much this week as I wanted to, but I felt so good about my Alfred from the other week that I drew Arthur without any reference too.

He looks too young & I still can't do much more than his face, but I've decided on a way to work on this stuff so hopefully there will be progress this fall.

I met some otaku in a bar last night who have cosplay/dance/anime song events at a club near where I live every other month. That was kind of crazy. But also, really great. I'll probably go to the next one at the end of this month.

There was something I was thinking about this week (weekend?) that seemed like it was important for writing about, but now....it's gone...I hate when that happens...Halloween's coming soon and I have no plans. That's nothing new of course, but I wonder if I even want to have any? It seems like every year I think I don't care about it & then it gets to be about a day or so away & I wish I had cared sooner. I wanted to do a Halloween themed page for my school's art club magazine too, but the kids said they haven't been putting it out recently. I can't find the inspiration for exactly what to draw anyway so I guess it's a good thing...

Aha! I knew if I waited around long enough I'd remember what I wanted to say! I talked about Bakuman a while ago...

...it's got an anime now! Watching it reminds me of why I had a hard time liking the manga at first. Waaay too many gender role stereotypes. But now, it's almost entirely focused on manga writing so it's a lot better. I love the way that every time they talk about a certain writing or drawing device they actually start using it in the manga itself. It's definitely a cult manga b/c of that though. I'm impressed that it's so popular, but then again, there are a ton of Japanese kids who dream about drawing manga for a living (and adults, and non-Japanese...) so I guess it's not so surprising. I've found that whenever Mashiro-kun is having drawing issues his answers always help me with my own work. I'm guessing I can't be the only person this works for either. When he realized his drawings were too dark I noticed the over-inking in some of my own. Currently he's working on speed. I've been worried about my own speed for a while now so I was really happy to see it in the manga. First b/c it was reassuring that it's not just an amateur who never went to art school (although, neither did he...) who has this problem & second b/c the conclusion he came to (don't put all the details in the pencil sketch) was the same one I did! It was really cool that he got the idea from his assistant (esp. b/c Shun is sooo adorable!) and I was even more reassured by the fact that Saiko realized he couldn't do it quite so bare-bones as Shiratori-kun, and set about finding his own sketching limits.

Kids, and sometimes teachers, ask me a lot of questions about drawing. Not just, "why do you like to draw?" or, "how long have you been drawing?", but serious ones like, "when you draw where do you start from?" or, "how can I get better at drawing?" At first it was hard for me to answer them since I felt like I didn't have any real expertise in the area, so I just talked around the issues or said I didn't really know. Eventually I started explaining the way I do things, but I still always tell them, "That's what works for me. You should try and find the way that works for you." b/c I like to think that there's no "right" way to do it. I'm sure someone out there would say differently, but I've always been big on doing things my own way. And letting other people do things their own way. It works best if you figure it out yourself after all. Just keep drawing and drawing, even if it looks bad at first, if you don't try....well, you know...

Rather than not doing it so that you'll have regrets, it's better to just do it.

Don't Look Back

Somehow, maybe it's just the ingrained routine of childhood, but I always get the feeling that the year begins in September. It's not the beginning of the year. It's not even the beginning of the school year in Japan. But it's just one of those things I can't shake. Things end in August and begin in September. You go back to school and feel like somebody new because something happened over the summer. Or because something different is happening at school. You go back and think you're smarter. You've grown up. Or something like that...

A lot of stuff I've been into for a while now is ending soon. "Shangri-la", "Canaan", "07-Ghost" "Tsubasa" (been waiting on that one for a LONG time...) It's disappointing but what can you do? "Kobato" starts next week so that's pretty awesome. Also, I've kind of become obsessed with "Pandora Hearts" and "Bakuman" and both of those look like they'll continue for a while.

At first I thought I'd really love Bakuman b/c it's about writing manga. A manga about manga. Like my 'play within a play' from so many years ago. (That was a big success....) Like my two favorite TV shows, about making TV shows. But as I read it there were so many things that made me balk about the characters personalities, the way things are done, the choices people made. It was anger inducing at times. But in the end, reading it just makes me want to draw even more. I can't really explain it, but it's made me realize things that might be useful.

I heard about Pandora Hearts, or rather, I saw it, advertised in Animate so many times that I finally downloaded it b/c I was bored. When I realized it had Alice in Wonderland themes I thought it'd be cool, at least design-wise, but it's the characters that I really love. I really can't decide on a favorite, or which one I'm most like from the main three. After catching up to the anime I had to get the manga too so I could get ahead in the story. I thought. And that's what sunk me. The clean simplicity of the characters (the way they're drawn that is) and the way the author's feelings for them come through is something I haven't seen in a while. I've been reading too much mainstream stuff I think...

When things change it's like a breath of fresh air. To speak in ridiculous cliche. You can breathe more easily, think more clearly, find the right path to follow more decisively. Suddenly, things make sense.

"Never look away - not from nightmares or the truth."