The Otomo map image could have been made on an early version of Deluxe Paint a bitmap digital drawing program that precedes Photoshop and was developed for the Commodore Amiga. But it was first released in 1985, but perhaps earlier versions existed in Japan at the time of Otomo drawing Akira? Or maybe the earlier MacPaint which only had black and white images with a color overlay? Hmmmmm...🤔 en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deluxe_Paint
Iron Fist was drawn by Baron Yoshimoto (バロン吉元 -he did Troublemakers manga and an artbook with his work was recently published in the US) and Doctor Strange is by Masaru Sakaki (榊まさる).
That kind of video make me realise once again I'm quite lucky, Dômu has been reprinted multiple time in France and is quite easy to find. I think it's even been printed with the left to right AND right to left reading direction.
Love this episode. I've tried to track down all the Otomo I can at eBay and other sources, and even when I can't read a word of it, it's some of the best cartooning I've ever seen. Plus, I love the Elliot Gould and Paul Newman characters in the war book.
1982-83 is right around when Apple came out with their first computer. It’s applications were obviously limited back then, but there was a lot of potential in that bad boy that made the advertising field slowly adopt it as a replacement of conventional art production at the time. There were a lot of industrial computer graphic companies back then trying to break out with the new platform, competing for the same niche, but nobody got it right like Apple and Adobe, because they made it affordable. Photoshop came out only a few years later, but it was geared towards retouching at first. Photoshop replaced the masters of the airbrush. The smart ones adapted by learning Photoshop. It wasn’t thought of as a painterly application right away. Meanwhile, that pixelated effect was quite common back then. It’s pretty raw. That might’ve been state of the art even, but I’m thinking Sensei had some mixed media going on there with a hard copy of the pixelation either integrated physically, or even using a projection of the effect as a map to build on.
Ryan Holmberg recently shared that Iron Fist image. It was done by Baron Yoshimoto. Retrofit put out the collection Troublemakers by Yoshimoto last year and he has an art book that was just released last month in the US.
i wonder why the full color marvel epic run of akira didn't include all of the painted pages? there are definitely parts of the story that appear as painted pages.
My copy of Brutus x O.K. is slightly different, the stickers come with an insert booklet. All of the books you showed here are great! Thanks for sharing this!
It's possible that the cartoonist for My Hero Acadaemia saw that "encyclopaedia of sound effects" spread, since he uses similar English onomatopoeia in his strip.
I have three ideas on the pixelated image. These are just guesses but I think they might have some merit. The first is he did paint it, kind of like a Chuck Close painting ( www.artyfactory.com/art_appreciation/portraits/chuck_close/james.jpg ). We did "pixelation" paintings in art school to teach us about value, you paint big so the squares aren't tiny then from far away the image is visible. However, this would be very time consuming so it seems unlikely with the schedule mangakas keep. The second, in the late 70s the Mitushita Corporation released a color monitor and a printer that could print color as well. This was 8 years or so before Apple's Imagewriter II which, I believe, was the first color printer available in America. So it could be early color printing tech we didn't have here. The third, and what I think is most likely, is you mentioned projection and photographing images in an earlier part of the video. This same technique but projecting from a computer or game system could achieve this effect. The tech would line up with the time period and it would most likely be the quickest with a collaboration from someone in the computer or gaming industry at the time.
The storyboards being viewed for "A Fairwell to Weapons" are from the the anime short anthology collaboration "Short Peace", however if you want to get an eclectic view of Otomo's works, then you might want to seek out Kaba and Kaba 2, which cover his artwork through the decades. Thanks for the heads up on the Dove Loves Dub album, I hadn't heard of that before. Short Peace m.imdb.com/title/tt3392330/ Kaba halcyonrealms.com/books/otomo-katsuhiro-artwork-kaba/ Kaba 2 halcyonrealms.com/animation/kaba-2-otomo-katsuhiro-artwork-book-review-pt-1/
I have envies! I do have an original chapter of AKIRA from the 80s. My dad was over in Japan doing work for the government. He randomly grabbed a copy of Young for us and it contained a chapter of AKIRA in it. Also, a story about a guy with a robot penis...
When I saw that Farewell to Weapons book in one of the haul videos, I was wondering if there was more to the comic than what was reprinted in Epic Illustrated/the UK Edition of Memories. On one hand, I'm glad that it's just an intense deep dive into the comic. On the other hand, I really want that much Otomo ancillary material
I have a second edition print from Dark Horse from 2001 which I must have picked up new at a convention around 2010. I think it was around 30 euros which I thought was super overpriced because the dollar price on the cover is 17.95. But it was an Otomo book which I'd never heard of, so I bought it anyways, glad I did 😁
The Otomo map image could have been made on an early version of Deluxe Paint a bitmap digital drawing program that precedes Photoshop and was developed for the Commodore Amiga. But it was first released in 1985, but perhaps earlier versions existed in Japan at the time of Otomo drawing Akira?
Or maybe the earlier MacPaint which only had black and white images with a color overlay?
Hmmmmm...🤔
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deluxe_Paint
I had paint programmes on my C64 back then and there were game magazines that had screenshots of games, don't how they were made though.
Wow Amiga, my cousin had one. But we just played Tie-Fighter on it.
Iron Fist was drawn by Baron Yoshimoto (バロン吉元 -he did Troublemakers manga and an artbook with his work was recently published in the US) and Doctor Strange is by Masaru Sakaki (榊まさる).
That kind of video make me realise once again I'm quite lucky, Dômu has been reprinted multiple time in France and is quite easy to find.
I think it's even been printed with the left to right AND right to left reading direction.
Dude. Cartoonist Kayfabe should be on pbs
The map is pretty advanced pixel art. For akira they had 5 animation studios join forces so advanced workstations were at hand.
Love this episode. I've tried to track down all the Otomo I can at eBay and other sources, and even when I can't read a word of it, it's some of the best cartooning I've ever seen. Plus, I love the Elliot Gould and Paul Newman characters in the war book.
1982-83 is right around when Apple came out with their first computer. It’s applications were obviously limited back then, but there was a lot of potential in that bad boy that made the advertising field slowly adopt it as a replacement of conventional art production at the time. There were a lot of industrial computer graphic companies back then trying to break out with the new platform, competing for the same niche, but nobody got it right like Apple and Adobe, because they made it affordable. Photoshop came out only a few years later, but it was geared towards retouching at first. Photoshop replaced the masters of the airbrush. The smart ones adapted by learning Photoshop. It wasn’t thought of as a painterly application right away. Meanwhile, that pixelated effect was quite common back then. It’s pretty raw. That might’ve been state of the art even, but I’m thinking Sensei had some mixed media going on there with a hard copy of the pixelation either integrated physically, or even using a projection of the effect as a map to build on.
Ryan Holmberg recently shared that Iron Fist image. It was done by Baron Yoshimoto. Retrofit put out the collection Troublemakers by Yoshimoto last year and he has an art book that was just released last month in the US.
i wonder why the full color marvel epic run of akira didn't include all of the painted pages? there are definitely parts of the story that appear as painted pages.
Maybe it was harder to reproduce at the time ?
My copy of Brutus x O.K. is slightly different, the stickers come with an insert booklet. All of the books you showed here are great! Thanks for sharing this!
It's possible that the cartoonist for My Hero Acadaemia saw that "encyclopaedia of sound effects" spread, since he uses similar English onomatopoeia in his strip.
Guys, the “desert raider” manga (@15:15) looks to be Shabaka no Maô (“The Devil of the Desert”) by Fukushima Tetsuji for Akita Shoten.
www.lambiek.net/artists/f/fukushima_tetsuji.htm
order.mandarake.co.jp/order/detailPage/item?itemCode=1056610840&ref=list&keyword=Tetsuji%20Fukushima&lang=en
Hell yeah!! Been waiting for this episode for a minute.
I just got mood is another war, how do you get the new release in the magazine. How the hell do I get my hands on that?
I have three ideas on the pixelated image. These are just guesses but I think they might have some merit.
The first is he did paint it, kind of like a Chuck Close painting ( www.artyfactory.com/art_appreciation/portraits/chuck_close/james.jpg ). We did "pixelation" paintings in art school to teach us about value, you paint big so the squares aren't tiny then from far away the image is visible. However, this would be very time consuming so it seems unlikely with the schedule mangakas keep.
The second, in the late 70s the Mitushita Corporation released a color monitor and a printer that could print color as well. This was 8 years or so before Apple's Imagewriter II which, I believe, was the first color printer available in America. So it could be early color printing tech we didn't have here.
The third, and what I think is most likely, is you mentioned projection and photographing images in an earlier part of the video. This same technique but projecting from a computer or game system could achieve this effect. The tech would line up with the time period and it would most likely be the quickest with a collaboration from someone in the computer or gaming industry at the time.
The storyboards being viewed for "A Fairwell to Weapons" are from the the anime short anthology collaboration "Short Peace", however if you want to get an eclectic view of Otomo's works, then you might want to seek out Kaba and Kaba 2, which cover his artwork through the decades. Thanks for the heads up on the Dove Loves Dub album, I hadn't heard of that before.
Short Peace
m.imdb.com/title/tt3392330/
Kaba
halcyonrealms.com/books/otomo-katsuhiro-artwork-kaba/
Kaba 2
halcyonrealms.com/animation/kaba-2-otomo-katsuhiro-artwork-book-review-pt-1/
The back of the second Akira volume is pixelated and otomo said in Akira club that he did it with a vcr
I have envies! I do have an original chapter of AKIRA from the 80s. My dad was over in Japan doing work for the government. He randomly grabbed a copy of Young for us and it contained a chapter of AKIRA in it. Also, a story about a guy with a robot penis...
Akira is still 20 pound a book new in the uk. Which is kind of nuts...
Great stuff guys. Love your Otomo deep dives!
Guys remember you can use Google translate with the camera, handy for fast translation 😉👍🏻
Amazing episode
Is that Kalimán el hombre incredible? It’s better drawing then I associate with that comic but I think I see a k on his turban.
that image of the soldiers with selfie sticks in the trenches... whoa...
Akira is required reading for any comic artist
Oh man, I'm gonna have to buy these and a much higher price haha .
Wow, great finds
When I saw that Farewell to Weapons book in one of the haul videos, I was wondering if there was more to the comic than what was reprinted in Epic Illustrated/the UK Edition of Memories.
On one hand, I'm glad that it's just an intense deep dive into the comic. On the other hand, I really want that much Otomo ancillary material
What should I search to find scanlations of Otomo's new work?
I found Park reader.roseliascans.com/series/kouen_park/
Read Chainsaw man
I did see Dark Horse put out Domu back in 95, or at least that's what it looks like from Ebay.
I have a second edition print from Dark Horse from 2001 which I must have picked up new at a convention around 2010. I think it was around 30 euros which I thought was super overpriced because the dollar price on the cover is 17.95. But it was an Otomo book which I'd never heard of, so I bought it anyways, glad I did 😁
Yeah, Dark Horse was the American distributor of Domu but it had a small print run and today is very hard to find in the wild.