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Monthly Archives: May 2014
Hey!
I just posted a short piece over on my friend Philip Zeng’s blog Spark of Inspiration. Go check it out.
The MoMA Changed My Life
When I was in the 12th I went to the Museum of Modern Art for the first time, and it changed my life.
Up until I was 15 I lived in Jamaica, on the country side. There was a lot of fresh air, fresh fruits, and beautiful trees, but no museums. The only art I had ever seen was on TV or in books so my concept of art was a bunch of portrait and landscape oil paintings. I knew nothing of the new generation of art and artists and the MoMA changed that for me.
When I stepped into the MoMA for the first time in the spring of 2012 my idea of what art was got completely revamped. For the first time ever I was seeing Picassos right in front of me, close enough to touch. I saw abstract pieces, sculptures, and print. I was learning what really good art was, and I was loving it. After that trip I abandoned my ideas of becoming a doctor and decided to become a graphic designer and surround myself with as much art as possible, whether it be a painting, a really good movie or TV show, a great band, digital designs or graffiti on the side of a building.
Now I am studying Graphic Design at the New York City College of Technology and I go to museums all the time, I especially like the small museums in Chelsea NYC because they show a lot of unknown artists, and they’re mostly free entry. Also I am writing this blog analyzing the art style between cartoons and anime and I love it all. Thank God for the MoMA.
The Big Four: Characters (Part 2)
Dragon Ball, Bleach, Naruto, One Piece
These are the main characters from the big four, and you can see they look like people. Also you might notice a few things that they all have in common, that is because the illustrators are following the general guidelines for drawing anime characters. Although these guidelines are not written anywhere, most of the anime artists follow them diligently that is why most anime characters look so much alike. Humans should look like humans (except for the eyes). Anime characters are almost always way more realistic than cartoon characters. No one’s head is too big, or have short arms, or legs twice the size of their bodies. In the world of anime things look like they are supposed to look because the art style of anime is close to real life.
These four anime are unofficial standard for the art style of all anime. Even between Naruto and Bleach you can see that they are very similar, and if you should look at all anime you will see that the art takes after one or several of these four anime. Characters heads are almost always oval, eyes are a little bit large and hair is spikey. In western cartoons characters have a very wide variety of looks, people heads are the size of their whole bodies, and they have square and triangular heads. Cartoons have much more relaxed art guidelines, they not even have any guidelines because they do not have to be close to reality.
Phineas and Ferb, Powerpuff Girls, Dexter’s Laboratory
In part three of this series I will be taking a look at the worlds in which both cartoons and anime exist to spot the differences, until then check out characters from some anime and cartoons and see what differences you notice.
Fooly Cooly (FLCL): Review
Fooly Cooly is a show about a boy, his alien house maid and the robots that jump out of his head, and it is every bit as awesome as it sounds.
It all starts when Haruko Haruhara shows up out of nowhere and hits Naota Nandaba in the head with her bass giving him an unusual bump, but little did Naota know there was going to be a robot coming out of the bump later. What ensues after that first robot is six episodes of pure awesomeness. In my opinion this anime has everything you could want; its comical, the writing and voice acting is great, it has exceptional action sequences, and a really interesting story. The animation is also very well done. I love how they switched up the animation style. Sometimes it’s perfectly drawn, other times it’s a little rough, they did a manga (comic) sequence twice that was really fun to watch, and at one point they even did South Park which I found really amusing. One thing I don’t like though is the fact that there are some characters that are unnecessary. They have no impact on the plot at all, they are just there to fill space. Otherwise I can find no fault with this show.
Usually when a show I like is as short as six episode I would want more but with FLCL six episode is just right. It’s short and sweet, and if you have three hours to spare on a Saturday morning you should definitely give it a watch.
The Face Of Anime
As you look at this picture of a “cartoon” character flying through the sky holding an orange sphere, those of you who are not familiar with the world of anime might be thinking, who is this and why does he matter? Well his name is Goku and he matters because he is the face of anime.
I got this image as a wallpaper from dragonballz.com which is the official Dragon Ball Z website. It shows Goku in his famous “super saiyan” mode, that’s why he is blonde instead of his normal black hair.
But why is Goku the face of anime? It’s not because he is the best anime character ever created, or even because he is my favorite anime character. He is face of anime because he is the star of the Dragon Ball Z franchise, and Dragon Ball Z was the first anime ever to be popular the whole world round. For many, many people Dragon Ball Z is the first anime they ever watched, and for a lot of those people it is the only anime they ever watched. When I look at this picture I am brought back to childhood when I didn’t know what an anime was. I was just in love this amazing “cartoon” that I would watch every time it came on TV. Its popularity opened the western world to all those other anime that we love, and to this day is till one the most popular and recognizable anime ever, and for that Goku gets to be the face of anime.
