AnotherDesignBlog.

Posts for Tag: japan

'Moyasimon' Manga: Super Cute Bacteria

Moyasimon is very popular in Japan with the comics selling out on release. The creator, Masayuki Ishikawa, was inspired to create it from a trip to an agricultural college where he visited the sake brewing room. The professor told him that when the sake was ready it 'spoke to him' - that gave Masayuki the idea.

"Moyasimon: Tales of Agriculture, known in Japan as Moyashimon (もやしもん?), is a manga series created by Masayuki Ishikawa. It has been serialized in Kodansha's seinen magazine Evening since August 2004. It won the 2008 Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize for Grand Prize and the 2008 Kodansha Manga Award for general manga.The series follows Tadayasu Sawaki, a first-year college student at an agricultural university, who has a unique ability to see and communicate with bacteria and other micro-organisms." From Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moyasimon:_Tales_of_Agriculture

They go up to 11, all on youtube...

More...Moyasimon Vol. 1: Tales of Agriculture - http://www.readaboutcomics.com/2009/12/11/moyasimon-vol-1/ and some Bento Moyasimon: http://www.annathered.com/2009/01/24/bento29-moyashimon/ - Figurines http://en.gigazine.net/index.php?%2Fnews%2Fcomments%2F20100726_wf2010_s_moyas... - Is being made into a real-life film http://asianmediawiki.com/Moyashimon

Japanese Cosmetic Ads 1920's-1940's #japan #advertising

MIT Visualising Cultures: Selling Shiseido, Cosmetic Advertising in early 20th century Japan http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/21f/21f.027/shiseido_02/index.html

"The 20th-century history of the Shiseido cosmetics company provides a vivid image of the efflorescence of modernity in Japan—reflecting the changing ideals of feminine beauty, the emergence of a vibrant consumer culture, cutting-edge trends in advertising and packaging, and the persistence of cosmopolitan ideals even in the midst of the rise of militarism in the 1930s. This project draws on Shiseido’s vast archives, focusing on the marketing of concepts of modern beauty from the 1920s through 1943, when wartime exigencies eventually curtailed the promotion of an international aesthetic of worldly chic."

There's lots more great content on the MIT Visualizing Cultures site which was launched in 2002 to explore the potential of the Web for developing innovative image-driven scholarship and learning. http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/21f/21f.027/home/index.html

Parappa (& Friends): Sketches, Artwork, Vids | Rodney Alan Greenblat

Some great initial sketches for Parappa and Major Minor's Majestic March...

Rodney Alan Greenblat's site http://www.whimsyload.com/ - "...In the 1990's Rodney's experimentation with the then novel personal computer led him to the production of interactive CD-ROMs and then to the video game industry. He became the artistic force behind the best selling game for Sony Playstation called "Parappa The Rapper." This led to a whole line of popular consumer products distributed in Japan, and a weekly animated television series also in Japan. Rodney has now become known as one of the worlds top character designers, with his original character franchise "Thunder Bunny" still popular in Japan..."

An Interview with Rodney about Parappa by Austin Bunn for I.D. Magazine - http://www.whimsyload.com/media.items/parappa/paraInterview.html

Read more