I mean, look at this. The background almost looks like a painting. The characters in the foreground are drawn with only two shades of colour for their skin and clothes.
How come nobody thinks it's weird an entire country has decided that this is how absolutely everything should be drawn?
Flat shaded characters on a painted background?!? Crazy!
@apLundell I shouldn't have focussed on the shading. What I mean more is the relative uniformity of style. Japanese animators don't rotoscope like Snow White or the Little Mermaid. And their style is all derivative of Astroy Boy, whereas Scoody Doo looks nothing like Sleeping Beauty.
I'm not a serious manga fan but as a casual, I diasgree: yes, there are some stylistic similarities, but c'mon, it's not exactly like they are all exactly same. Because I'm not a pro hobbyist myself, I tried googling a list of examples and found this anime.SE question: https://anime.stackexchange.com/questions/3477/is-there-a-difference-in-drawing-style-between-different-anime-for-different-dem ...it explains some basic differences between genres.
@aqsalose @apLundell I've seen these comparisons, and despite the arguments offered, it all looks Japanese to me. Yes, there are variations, but there are variations from a common mold.
The only times when Japanese artists don't look Japanese is when they actually tried to look different, like the Thundercats or The Last Unicorn, because they were specifically made for western audiences only.
@apLundell @aqsalose I've seen western artists drawing in Japanese style. RWBY and Boondocks come to mind. I can't think of examples of Japanese artists drawing in western styles except the 80s examples I've mentioned. Do you know others?
I doubt a Japanese person would say Boondocks looks Japanese.
It looks a *little* Japanese, so to someone who thinks western art is "normal", those anime-ish qualities stand out.
There are lots of anime's that Japanese people describe as "western influenced". But again, to those of us who grew up thinking western stuff was "normal", all we can see is that it's still not 100% western, so we label it "Japanese"
@apLundell @aqsalose Really? I think this has a lot of features of Japanese style:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnLJkeFsbE8
The author acknowledges those influences. The themes and characters of course have nothing to do with Japan, though.
As for Japanese drawing in western style, I can think of Tatsuya Ishida, although he's Japanese-American:
It absolutely has a Japanese influence.
And as people used to western animation, that Japanese influence stands out to us like a sore thumb. But it's still very western, and I'm pretty sure that someone used to Japanese animation will only see its 'westerness'.
Basically, if it's halfway between worlds, you'll perceive it as being in whichever world you're least familiar with. Because that's the part that's not "normal" to you.
I don't think I'm noticing Japanese style because it's foreign. I'm noticing it because it's so uniform.
@aqsalose @apLundell Hah, Clémentine is the original title of The Blue Bubble, which I translated back from Spanish. In the 90's Saint Seiya, uncensored, was a massive phenomenon in Latin America and I think parts of Europe.
Anyway, yeah, I think this trip down memory lane is good evidence that the style has never been foreign to me. All kids liked these shows, not only Japanophiles.
@apLundell @aqsalose I think it's a bit odd to suggest that Japanese style is foreign to me. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Latin America had a bigger presence of Japanese cartoons in the 1980s than other parts of the world. Wizard of Oz, The Blue Bubble, Candy Candy, Mazinger Z, Tom Sawyer, Heidi, Belle & Sebastian, Captain Tsubasa stand out as iconic animation for Mexican children of the 80s such as myself. We probably didn't even know they were Japanese-made.