A bunch of popular illustrators try to revive the infamous Sanrio franchise. It may work, or not. That will depend on you.

They’ve already stockpiled an impressive set of goods for Comic Market 77. And if I had the balls to leave for Japan, I’d probably buy one.

I mean honestly, is that hot or what?

What an ugly cover.

A recent article from Yen Press reveals the cover for the new English version of Spice and Wolf, and boy does it suck. Do people really buy novels based on the cover? Unfortunately, yes. It’s a rather shallow way of approaching literature; no, rather than shallow, I’d have to say contradictory… Therefore I can understand their reasoning behind why they would pull something so daft. Many people are less inclined to buy novels with anime characters on the cover, including myself. However, I’m sure whoever gets tricked into buying spice and wolf will feel betrayed upon seeing the inner illustrations, so I think pulling that move was rather stupid and unnecessary on Yen Press’s part.

Not to mention, I’m pretty sure a lot of potential buyers didn’t buy the Haruhi novel because the cover for the paperback sucked. Besides, even though the cover was not anime-oriented, they still stuck it in the “manga” section of every bookstore I’ve gone to. It seems everything is just working against these people’s genuine efforts to bring Japanese light novels to a wider audience. Oh well, I don’t think too highly of any of these children’s books to begin with, so I’m not too affected.

To be entirely frank, I’m not completely enamored of Spice and Wolf, and its elementary economics, or its token furry heroine. I don’t care if the series gets ruined because it got a horrible eyesore as a cover, or the fact Yen Press’s logogram experts can’t come up with a title design that does not look like some early 90’s RPG. Let’s just say, I’m content with what I see. Hah!

A dark and dreary world full of noir emphasis. I see...

Oh lordy, why am I always ten steps behind the times? A Black Rock Shooter anime project has been announced, with all reason for me to be excited. I’ll admit, I’m not that infatuated in Vocaloid software or its music. But when Studio Ordet and ryo (supercell) is involved, how can I contain myself? Unfortunately Yutaka Yamamoto will not be directing this, so things are really up in the air as to how it’ll go. more…

Art not made officially by staff of a manga or animation would be the best way to describe fan art. That’s much different than saying art made by people or fans since staff or authors also make their own not so official art. What would you consider that since not all of their illustrations and works may be from series they worked on? They are more than a simple fan and some images they share may also be official ones.

The fact is many people believe it’s fine to take an image off of another blog that was taken from Anime News Network that got it from an official site or announcement to post on a discussion forum. It takes money and effort to get a digital camera and scanner to produce images from real life objects not previously added to the net. This brings me to a good supporting point of how the Internet is. If you make anything creative and share it publicly on the net, what do you expect everyone to do? Not saying it’s okay to be a jerk, but not everyone using fan art has a malicious intent and the uploader should know the possibility of others using their work without permission.

Human beings like recognition and linking to their image account or site shows you support them, however, don’t assume all artists are upset when they see their work used without permission. They may simply enjoy knowing someone liked their art enough to use. This being said, not all sites have field or detail areas when uploading a image and other sites may not be focused on comments and image details. Then what?

The best the artist can do is add a watermark or sign their name and put a notice where images are displayed that you wish to be linked to or asked before having an image used. The best blogger, graphic creator, or web disigner can do is link back, ask, or ask around for the source if unknown. One thing you can learn to do is add the artist or source name when saving an image so you can remember and so that some image hosts may keep that file name in the url or details page. Or just don’t upload at all…any of you.

Besides, people like to be able to find more. On a semi-related note, this community does have a link directory for anime and manga illustration and our gallery does have a copyright area.

I was organizing my closet today and I stumbled upon volume five of Shoujo Fight. I was practically estatic as I had finished reading volume four about two months ago. I wasn’t aware I owned more. My happy schoolgirl squeals made it hard for me to read more than a few pages at a time, but once my spasms died down I just lay on my bed staring at the pretty cover. more…

While most hip young people were masturbating to comics by Tamaoki Benkyou back in the early 21st century, I was eating through my family’s collection of Chef Boyardee from post-Y2K scare like crazy and accumulating needless amounts of energy that I needed to waste on something… anything. It was actually 4 years after that when I of course stumbled across TAGRO-sensei. more…